Civil Society

Sixty women including young women in government, politics, civil society, women network and movements from different West African countries, yesterday converged at Hotel Barmoi in Freetown to participate in the 5thWest African Women Policy Forum to chat the way forward for women’s empowerment and effective participation in politics and decision- making.

Human Rights Watch urged Iran on Saturday to lift restrictions on women attending university and enrolling in certain academic fields.

Thirty-six universities across Iran have banned women from 77 different majors, including accounting, counseling, and engineering, for the school year that begins on Saturday, Iran's Mehr news agency reported in August.

Women political activists say they feel proud of Kuwaiti women entering judicial circles following a decision to appoint them in position of Public Prosecutors and judges.
They consider this a victory for women who until lately had been marginalized in a male dominated society, something which contradicted the reality when the Kuwaiti women had reached leadership levels after holding the office of ministers and being elected Members of Parliament in addition to other positions.

The focus on a few specific men in the history of Mongolia can be attributed to the long focus on a monarchy-led country—with few leaders exercising great control over the majority. Socialism changed this focus to a degree, investing in educating both women and men; however women’s representation was still limited. Democracy even further transformed the social landscape of Mongolia, yet women’s ability to create change has been largely formed within organizations, rather than political representation.

Several NGOs staged a demonstration on Kossuth tér on Sunday to draw attention to violence against women and to speak up for women’s rights more generally.

Several speakers expressed outrage at Fidesz MP István Varga’s comment during parliamentary debate last Monday night, to the effect that there would be no domestic violence if women had four or five children instead of only one or two.

A study has called on all stakeholders to work consciously to increase the number of women who will win the District Level Elections (DLEs) in 2014 and other such future elections. "The Performances of Women Candidates in the 2010 District Level Elections: In the Northern, Upper East and Upper West Regions of Ghana," asked District Assemblies, traditional authorities, civil society organisations (CSOs) and others "to keep all hands on deck, to get more women win the 2014 DLEs" and all other such elections.