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Swiss Muslim girls must learn to swim with boys, court rules

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Swiss Muslim girls must learn to swim with boys, court rules

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Switzerland has won a case at the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) obliging Muslim parents to send their children to mixed swimming lessons.

It said authorities were justified in giving precedence to enforcing "the full school curriculum" and the children's "successful integration" into society.

The ECHR acknowledged that religious freedom was being interfered with.

But judges said it did not amount to a violation.

The case was brought by two Swiss nationals, of Turkish origin, who refused to send their teenage daughters to the compulsory mixed lessons in the city of Basel.

Education officials, however, said that exemptions were available only for girls who had reached the age of puberty - which the girls had not reached at the time.

In 2010, after a long-running dispute, the parents were ordered to pay a combined fine of 1,400 Swiss Francs ($1,380, £1,136) "for acting in breach of their parental duty".

They argued that such treatment was a violation of article nine of the European Convention on Human Rights, which covers the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion.

In a statement, the ECHR said the refusal to exempt the girls had interfered with the right to freedom of religion.

But it also said the law involved was designed to "protect foreign pupils from any form of social exclusion" and Switzerland was free to design its education system according to its own needs and traditions.

Schools, it said, played an important role in social integration, and exemptions from some lessons are "justified only in very exceptional circumstances".

"Accordingly, the children's interest in a full education, thus facilitating their successful social integration according to local customs and mores, prevailed over the parents' wish to have their children exempted from mixed swimming lessons," the court said.

The court also noted that "very flexible arrangements" had been offered as a compromise, including allowing the girls to wear burkinis during lessons rather than traditional swimwear, and allowing them to change clothes with no boys in the room.

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One in three women harassed while running, survey finds

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One in three women harassed while running, survey finds

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-38568166

Wolf whistles, honking horns and concerns over safety are just some of the things women say they worry about when they go out for a run, according to a survey by England Athletics.

Holly Hamilton spoke to runners who said they had been harassed while running on their own.

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GUANTANAMO BUILT WITH SOLE PURPOSE OF BREAKING PEOPLE 

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GUANTANAMO BUILT WITH SOLE PURPOSE OF BREAKING PEOPLE 

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DOAM - Documenting Oppression Against Muslims

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Shaker Aamer: Guantanamo built with sole purpose of breaking people

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Guantanamo is run by psychologists with the sole purpose of destroying the human beings it holds, Shaker Aamer told RT in an exclusive interview.

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 The Guardian, 15 November 2016  The empowerment trap: Ivanka Trump and the art of co-opting feminism  https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/15/ivanka-trump-feminism-us-election

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 The Guardian, 15 November 2016  The empowerment trap: Ivanka Trump and the art of co-opting feminism  https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/15/ivanka-trump-feminism-us-election

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http://ind.pn/2fGeZwm

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Yesterday evening (Friday 4 November) I went to the most remarkable event I've been to for a long time - to see part of the film 'Cruel and Unusual' and to hear the two surviving members of the Angola 3, Albert Woodfox and Robert King, speak at MMU as part of their European tour. They are two of the most remarkable, wise, compassionate and intelligent human beings I have ever met. I urge everyone who didn't go to the event, to visit the BlogSpot above. Annapurna

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Beatings for asking for help: corporal punishment in India's schools

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Beatings for asking for help: corporal punishment in India's schools

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https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2015/may/22/tough-boys-and-docile-girls-corporal-punishment-in-indias-schools

Despite widespread concern about the effects of corporal punishment on children, it persists in schools across the world. Its eradication in many countries is proving difficult, and India is no exception.

Violence against girls is now high on India’s political agenda, after the horrific fatal gang rape of a female student in Delhi in 2012 led to demonstrationsdemanding an end to sexual violence against girls and women. However, more everyday forms of violence may go unnoticed or unquestioned, and limited academic attention has focused on gender differences in the way punishment is meted out to boys and girls at home, school, and society at large. For children in many parts of India, norms relating to femininity mean that girls are required to be docile and submissive, and not to be “naughty”. Ideas about masculinity may mean that boys are supposed to be able to accept physical punishment and to withstand pain.

India ratified the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1992, and has many policies that ban corporal punishment in schools. But these seem out of kilter with everyday realities. The Right of Children to Free and Compulsory Education Act of 2009 guarantees school for all children between the ages of 6 and 14. Although elementary schooling has expanded, this rapid expansion has not been matched by comparable increases in the teaching workforce. There is a shortage of teachers across schools, and class sizes are very large, putting pressure on teachers to control high numbers of children.

Poorer children were more likely than less poor children to be punished

The government of India commissioned research that included more than 3,000 children aged from 5 to 18, asking about physical abuse by teachers. In all age groups, 65% reported being beaten at school. Our own findings back up these figures. Younger children (aged 7–8) were significantly more likely to have witnessed and experienced corporal punishment than the 14- to 15-year-old cohort, with over two-thirds of the younger children having been physically punished at school in the past week, compared with one-third of the older young people. Poorer children were more likely than less poor children to be punished.

However, among children aged 14–15, we found that girls and boys alike experience routine corporal punishment, with boys experiencing particularly high levels. There was a less sharp distinction in use of corporal punishment between boys and girls in the younger cohort. This may be because corporal punishment is part of the socialisation of younger children, but when they are older it is no longer seen as an appropriate way to discipline young women, while “toughening up” young men may be normative.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Younger children (aged 7–8) were significantly more likely to have witnessed and experienced corporal punishment than teenagers. Photograph: Young Lives

It may be seen as part of boys’ socialisation and transition into adulthood. One 15-year-old boy complained about the unfairness of the beatings being meted out on boys, whom he perceived as being punished much more than girls. The violence children and young people experience in schools may not be visibly gendered but it may reinforce gender differentiation because of the ways in which it is employed by male and female teachers. Some children, for example, spoke of being particularly afraid of the male PE teachers. However, the reality is that young boys and girls alike are physically abused in schools, and it is being children that make them vulnerable, rather than their gender.

Reasons to be punished

Girls and boys spoke of a range of other reasons for punishment, including being absent from school due to work, illness or attending family celebrations, missing classes, not doing their homework, not reading well, making mistakes, receiving poor marks in exams, not wearing uniform, not having the right equipment, or not paying the teacher for extra lessons. One girl, aged 10, said:

“If we don’t study, they beat us. If we ask other children for help, they beat [us]. I went to drink water without asking sir, so he beat me that time. They said all children should come back to class by the time they count 10 after the interval. But I went home [to use the toilet]. After coming back to school, he beat me.”

Punished for poverty

Poverty at home also clearly influenced school discipline practices. Living in poverty meant that children were sometimes not in a position to follow the rules and expectations of school. Children described being punished for not having uniform or the right equipment, or money to pay fees.

One mother mentioned that the only thing her seven-year old daughter says about school is that teachers beat her:

“She studies well, she goes regularly and returns, but when there is no dress [uniform] and when we delay the fee payment then she will not go, she refuses to go ... she says she will not go and she hides behind that wall and says that ‘sir will beat me, they will beat me’.”

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Children are physically punished for missing school to help on their family farm. Photograph: Young Lives

As Young Lives data have shown, economic constraints and family circumstances mean that boys and girls in rural areas engage in seasonal agricultural work on family land, and miss school for days, weeks, or months at a time. Although the boys and girls did different gender-specific work, the impact was the same: when they did return to school, they faced punishment. Although older boys rarely spoke directly about their fears of punishment, their mothers spoke of their sons’ emotions. Ranadeep’s mother explained:

“Without him, we cannot run the family, we don’t get labourers and there is no other way for us. When he returns to school they shout at him and he is terrified ... His father goes there and informs them ... they scold us, they say ‘how will he get on if he is absent for such a long time?’... We try to pacify them by telling them about our problems at home.”

Crowdsourcing anti-corruption: 'Like Yelp, but for bad governments'

Read more

What can be done?

In global policy debates, much emphasis has been placed on the role of education as the solution not only to reducing cycles of poverty in developing countries, but also to addressing gender violence.

However, the evidence presented here suggests that we must question this, at least in the Indian context. All children, regardless of gender, experience high levels of physical violence in schools. But it is teenage boys who experience the most.

But blaming specific groups (teachers, and/or parents) will not enable progress to be made, and risks alienating teachers already under pressure because of overcrowded classrooms, poor infrastructure, and poverty situations.

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Approaches need to develop not only from the top down, but from communities, families and teachers to find ways of working together to change practices.

Violence as an integral part of schooling may have consequences for boys’ and girls’ development that go beyond the here and now of childhood to social and economic factors in adulthood. In India, this needs to be understood in the context of the high expectations that parents and children have of schools. Some children dislike school for many reasons, but if they discontinue school because of their experience of corporal punishment, and if they learn that corporal punishment is the solution to behaviour that is out of line, then formal schooling may inadvertently be reinforcing both cycles of poverty and the use of violence.

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The Guardian, 12 October 2016
What if nature, like corporations, had the rights of a person? Chip Colwell

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/oct/12/nature-corporations-people-zuni-environment-mount-taylor

In recent years, the US supreme court has solidified the concept of corporate personhood. Following rulings in such cases as Hobby Lobby and Citizens United, US law has established that companies are, like people, entitled to certain rights and protections.

But that’s not the only instance of extending legal rights to nonhuman entities. New Zealand took a radically different approach in 2014 with the Te Urewera Act which granted an 821-square-mile forest the legal status of a person. The forest is sacred to the Tūhoe people, an indigenous group of the Maori. For them Te Urewera is an ancient and ancestral homeland that breathes life into their culture. The forest is also a living ancestor. The Te Urewera Act concludes that “Te Urewera has an identity in and of itself” and thus must be its own entity with “all the rights, powers, duties, and liabilities of a legal person”. Te Urewera holds title to itself.

Although this legal approach is unique to New Zealand, the underlying reason for it is not. Over the last 15 years I have documented similar cultural expressions by Native Americans about their traditional, sacred places. As an anthropologist, this research has often pushed me to search for an answer to the profound question: What does it mean for nature to be a person?

A majestic mountain sits not far north-west of Albuquerque, New Mexico. Like a low triangle, with long gentle slopes, Mount Taylor is clothed in rich forests that appear a velvety charcoal-blue from the distance. Its bald summit, more than 11,000 feet high, is often blanketed in snow – a reminder of the blessing of water, when seen from the blazing desert below.

The Zuni tribe lives about 40 miles west of Mount Taylor. In 2012, I worked with a team to interview 24 tribal members about the values they hold for Dewankwin K’yaba:chu Yalanne (“In the East Snow-capped Mountain”), as Mount Taylor is called in the Zuni language. We were told that their most ancient ancestors began an epic migration in the Grand Canyon.

Over millennia they migrated across the south-west, with important medicine societies and clans living around Mount Taylor. After settling in their current pueblo homes, Zunis returned to this sacred mountain to hunt animals like deer and bear, harvest wild plants like acorns and cattails, and gather minerals used in sacrosanct rituals that keep the universe in order. Across the generations Dewankwin Kyaba:chu Yalanne has come to shape Zuni history, life and identity no less than the Vatican has for Catholics.

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But unlike holy places in the western world, Zunis believe Mount Taylor is a living being. Zuni elders told me that the mountain was created within the Earth’s womb. As a mountain formed by volcanic activity, it has always grown and aged. The mountain can give life as people do. The mountain’s snow melts in spring and nourishes plants and wildlife for miles. Water is the mountain’s blood; buried minerals are the mountain’s meat. Because it lives, deep below is its beating heart. Zunis consider Mount Taylor to be their kin.

There is a stereotype that Native American peoples have a singular connection to nature. And yet in my experience, they do see the world in a fundamentally different way from most people I know. Whether it is mountains, rivers, rocks, animals, plants, stars or weather, they see the natural world as living and breathing, deeply relational, even at times all-knowing and transcendent.

In my work with Arizona’s Hopi tribe, I have traveled with cultural leaders to study sacred places. They often stop to listen to the wind, or search the sky for an eagle, or smile when it begins to rain, which they believe is a blessing the ancestors bestow upon them.

During one project with the Hopi tribe, we came across a rattlesnake coiled near an ancient fallen pueblo. “Long ago, one of them ancestors lived here and turned into a rattlesnake,” the elder Raleigh H Puhuyaoma Sr shared with me, pointing to the nearby archaeological site. “It’s now protecting the place.” The elders left an offering of cornmeal to the snake. An elder later told me that it soon rained on his cornfield, a result from this spiritual exchange.

Understanding these cultural worldviews matters greatly in discussions over protecting places in nature. The American west has a long history of battles over the control of land. We’ve seen this recently from the Bundy family’s takeover of the federal wildlife refuge in Oregon to the current fight over turning Bears Ears – 1.9 million acres of wilderness – into a national monument in Utah.

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Yet often these battles are less about the struggle between private and public interests, and more about basic questions of nature’s purpose. Do wild places have intrinsic worth? Or is the land a mere tool for human uses?

Much of my research has involved documenting sacred places because they are being threatened by development projects on public land. The Zuni’s sacred Mount Taylor, much of it managed by the US National Forest Service, has been extensively mined for uranium, and is the cause of violent disputes over whether it should be developed or protected.

Even though the US does not legally recognize natural places as people, some legal protections exist for sacred places. Under the National Historic Preservation Act, for example, the US government must take into consideration the potential impacts of certain development projects on “traditional cultural properties”.

This and other federal heritage laws, however, provide tribes with a small voice in the process, little power, and rarely lead to preservation. More to the point, these laws reduce what tribes see as living places to “properties”, obscuring their inherent spiritual value.

In New Zealand, the Te Urewera Act offers a higher level of protection, empowering a board to be the land’s guardian. The Te Urewera Act, though, does not remove its connection to humans. With a permit, people can hunt, fish, farm and more. The public still has access to the forest. One section of the law even allows Te Urewera to be mined.

Te Urewera teaches us that acknowledging cultural views of places as living does not mean ending the relationship between humans and nature, but reordering it – recognizing nature’s intrinsic worth and respecting indigenous philosophies.

In the US and elsewhere, I believe we can do better to align our legal system with the cultural expressions of the people it serves. For instance, Congress could amend the NHPA or the American Indian Religious Freedom Act to acknowledge the deep cultural connection between tribes and natural places, and afford better protections for sacred landscapes like New Mexico’s Mount Taylor.

Until then, it says much about us when companies are considered people before nature is

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The Calais conversation that left Lily Allen in tears

By Catrin Nye and Joshua Baker BBC Victoria Derbyshire programme

Singer Lily Allen has never visited a refugee camp before. So when she meets unaccompanied child migrants living in a makeshift camp in Calais, it all becomes too much.

"I think as human beings we have a responsibility to help those who are suffering," Lily Allen explains to the BBC's Victoria Derbyshire programme.

She's at a recording studio in London, where she is working on her new album. It is less than 100 miles from the so-called Jungle in Calais - home to up to 10,000 migrants from countries such as Afghanistan, Syria and Eritrea - but the two places feel worlds apart.

The life of a celebrity is perhaps more removed than most from the squalid conditions those in the camp face. This is something Allen is keen to address - if only for a short while - as she prepares to head to the Jungle.

"I hope my visit will shine a light on the situation, humanise the people that are there," she explains. "At the moment what I read is all these articles that are very dehumanising, about people... and about children."

She says she frequently "sits next to millionaires at dinner", and that she would like to be able to ask them to "put their hands in their pocket" using her own first-hand experience of the camp.

Image caption  Hundreds of unaccompanied children live in the Jungle

Currently, official estimates suggest between 600 and 900 unaccompanied children are staying in the camp, which is of particular concern to Allen. Charities put the figure at around 1,000.

"I'm a mother and I've got two little girls. If something happened in this country and they were displaced and had to run for it, I hope other parts of the world were a little bit more helpful," Allen says, openly critical of the UK's response to the migrant crisis.

"The only thing I can think of that prevents us from acting is self-preservation. People are scared of our government having to provide funds to look after these other people and how that will affect us."

Home Secretary Amber Rudd has said action will be taken within "a matter of days - a week at the most", to bring eligible lone children to the UK.

She said more than 80 unaccompanied children had been accepted to the UK so far this year under EU rules known as the Dublin regulations.

Find out more

The Victoria Derbyshire programme is broadcast on weekdays between 09:00 and 11:00 on BBC Two and the BBC News channel.

Watch Catrin Nye's full film with Lily Allen here.

Having left the studio behind, Allen travels to Calais with the charity Help Refugees joins volunteers looking after the expanding population of the camp.

She begins by unloading a case of donations that her children asked her to bring - shoes, jackets, jumpers and even a Snow White costume, to be passed on to the Jungle's youngest residents.

In just a few weeks, however, the camp will be closed. French President Francois Hollande has vowed to dismantle it "definitively, entirely and rapidly" by the end of the year, with migrants to be moved to reception centres across France.

Image caption  Lily Allen's children asked her to take clothes to donate - including a Snow White dress

There are fears that this could put migrants at risk of trafficking or leave them lost in the system.

The campaign group Citizens UK has previously drawn up a list of 387 lone children in Calais it believes have a legal right to come to the UK.

But not all might make the journey. Ms Rudd has said it "would be a really good result" if the UK took in 300 children - half the lower estimate for the number of unaccompanied children in the camp as a whole.

'I apologise for the UK'

One 13-year-old boy from Afghanistan, who asked for his name not to be used, has been staying in the camp for two months while his case is being processed. He says his father lives in Birmingham, giving him the right to legally make his way across the Channel.

But, desperate to make the final leg of his journey, he tells Allen that he still tries every night to cross the border by stowing away on lorries.

"The legal process is too slow. The way I am trying works better," he says through a translator.

"We wait for the truck to stop, then we get on the top. Last night we got on to the lorries and we hid ourselves. The police caught us. They started to kick us, and they slapped me."

Image caption  One teenager from Afghanistan tells Allen that he fled the Taliban

The teenager made it to Calais after fleeing his home in Afghanistan, telling Allen: "The Taliban were going to kill me. The Taliban were on one side and IS on the other.

"My father sold his land and he sent me here."

Allen looks visibly shaken by his story.

Media captionLily Allen: "I apologise on behalf of my country, I'm sorry for what we've put you through"

Britain became involved in the US-led invasion of Afghanistan in November 2001, deploying ground troops - but the success of the campaign is disputed, with the Taliban still posing a major threat to the country's government.

Allen tells him: "At three points in your life [the UK] has put you in danger. We bombed your country, put you in the hands of the Taliban, and now put you in danger of risking your life to get into our country."

Then, breaking into tears, she adds: "I apologise on behalf of my country, for what we've put you through."

He quietly responds: "It's all right."

The UK mission in Afghanistan has been extended into 2017, with military personnel training and advising Afghan security forces.

'Geographical lottery'

On a walk through the thousands of tents that make up the Calais camp, Allen has time to reflect.

"It's desperate. I'm shocked that this is happening, in such close proximity to where we live.

"Life is easier for me if I put this stuff out my mind," she explains in her characteristically honest manner. "That's not really a correct response to humanitarian crises.

Image copyright AFPImage caption  The Jungle is to be dismantled before the end of 2016

"No-one's chosen to be here. It's not fair. It's a geographical lottery, wherever you're born in the world.

"I know I wouldn't want to end up here. I certainly wouldn't want my children to end up here."

Asked later whether she would consider taking an unaccompanied child into her own home, she replies: "100 per cent. 100 per cent. Who wouldn't?"

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US election: Trump presidency 'dangerous', says UN rights chief

Donald Trump's "deeply unsettling and disturbing" views make him a danger internationally, the UN's human rights chief has said.

UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Raad al-Hussein cited Mr Trump's comments on the use of torture and his attitude to "vulnerable communities".

The Republican presidential candidate's campaign has been marked by a number of controversial comments.

Recent crude remarks about women have caused the biggest political fallout.

Overnight President Barack Obama, at a rally for Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, condemned those comments, saying: "The guy says stuff that nobody would find tolerable if they were applying for a job at 7-Eleven."

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Yemen famine feared as starving children fight for lives in hospital

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Yemen famine feared as starving children fight for lives in hospital

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Dozens of emaciated children are fighting for their lives in Yemen's hospital wards, as fears grow that civil war and a sea blockade that has lasted for months are creating famine conditions in the Arabian peninsula's poorest country.

The UN's humanitarian aid chief, Stephen O'Brien, described a visit to meet "very small children affected by malnutrition" in the Red Sea city of Hodeida. "It is of course absolutely devastating when you see such terrible malnutrition," he said on Tuesday, warning of "very severe needs".

More than half of Yemen's 28 million people are already short of food, the UN has said, and children are particularly badly hit, with hundreds of thousands at risk of starvation.

There are 370,000 children enduring severe malnutrition that weakens their immune system, according to Unicef, and 1.5 million are going hungry. Food shortages are a long-term problem, but they have got worse in recent months. Half of children under five are stunted because of chronic malnutrition.

A sea blockade on rebel-held areas enforced by the Saudi-coalition supporting the president, Abd Rabbuh Mansur Hadi, stops shipments reaching most ports.

Its effects can be seen in centres such as the Thawra hospital, where parents cram waiting rooms seeking help for hungry and dying children. In April, between 10 and 20 children were brought for treatment, but the centre is now struggling with 120 a month, Reuters reported.

Among them are Salem Issa, a six-year-old so emaciated he looks years younger and is now too ill to eat. "I used to feed him biscuits, but he's sick. He won't eat," said his mother.

The crisis may get worse after Hadi ordered changes at the central bank. Aimed at squeezing the funds of Iranian-backed Houthi rebels, the move could leave ordinary Yemenis short of cash and make food shortages worse by depriving traders of the financial cover the bank has offered.

Ibrahim Mahmoud, of Yemen's Social Development Fund, told Reuters only an improvement in the country's financial system and an emergency aid effort could prevent the spread of hunger.

"If there is no direct and immediate intervention on behalf of the international community and state organisations, we could be threatened by famine and a humanitarian catastrophe," he said.

Oxfam's humanitarian policy adviser, Richard Stanforth, said: "Everything is stacked against the people on the brink of starvation in Yemen. The politicisation of the central bank and attempts by the parties in the conflict to use it as a tool to hurt one another ... threaten to push the poorest over the edge."

Hadi moved the central bank headquarters from Sana'a, the capital currently controlled by Houthi rebels, to the southern port of Aden which his government holds. He also appointed a new governor, who said the bank had no money.

"It risks leaving the salaries of more than a million Yemenis unpaid. There may be a long-term effect on the Houthis, but the immediate effect will be on normal people trying to put food on the table," the Yemeni economic analyst Amal Nasser said.

The sea blockade and daily airstrikes, which have hit civilian targets including hospitals, are part of a campaign to push rebels out of the capital.

There have been widespread calls for an independent inquiry into the conflict, including from senior British MPs. More than a third of Saudi-led bombing raids are thought to have hit civilian sites, and human rights groups say violations are also being perpetrated by Houthi rebels.
Topics

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Yemen famine feared as starving children fight for lives in hospital

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Dozens of emaciated children are fighting for their lives in Yemen's hospital wards, as fears grow that civil war and a sea blockade that has lasted for months are creating famine conditions in the Arabian peninsula's poorest country.

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The value of women voting in Saudi Arabia

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The value of women voting in Saudi Arabia

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Votes continue to be counted in Saudi Arabia's municipal elections, in which women were allowed for the first time to cast ballots. According to official figures, 130,000 women registered to vote in Saturday's poll, compared with 1.35 million men.

Back in 2011, the late King Abdullah bin Abdulaziz al-Saud announced that Saudi women would be allowed to participate in the municipal elections for the first time. Observers said the move, which came with a set of political decisions, was a temporary response to the regional's political unrest, rather than real reform.

Indeed, women's participation was not allowed in the 2011 elections, amid claims of logistical difficulties. The grassroots "Baladi" campaign by women's rights activists to empower women for political participation had been active since 2010.

The campaign, however, was ordered shut shortly before the start of the 2015 elections.
READ MORE: Historic Saudi poll 'a step towards gender equality'
Nevertheless, this latest round of municipal elections in Saudi Arabia is promising, and not only because of women's participation.

New municipal regulations have granted members of local councils wider authorities in reviewing and deciding on issues concerning public health, land allocations, permits and planning. Moreover, citizens as young as 18 can now participate in voting, widening public engagement.

As for many other rights denied to women: The right is first acknowledged, then advocated, until it is finally practiced and optimised.

However, procedural complications in the electoral process have hindered effective participation by women.

It was expected that the elections planning committee, with female members on board, would consider certain affirmative measures to ensure women's accommodation in the process.

On the contrary, the process was loaded with roadblocks that severely limited their participation. Women were asked for their national identity cards, when a good proportion of Saudi women utilise only family cards of their guardians as a means of identification.

Proof of residence was another problem, in a country where the majority of women customarily live with their families. They were required to obtain a validation of residence from an authorised district clerk, requiring a copy of a family card and residence documents.

Unfortunately, district clerks were not always on duty or adequately informed to facilitate the process, so many women were excluded from participating in the elections.

And for women who were actually blessed with a national identification card but not with a guardian who agreed or was available to lend them a copy of his papers to prove residence, exclusion was guaranteed.

Time restrictions were also a key concern, with just one day allocated for the public to cast their votes. In a country where women do not drive and have to plan their commutes meticulously in advance, this strategy was seriously short-sighted.
READ MORE: Low turnout in Saudi Arabia's first poll open to women
In addition, the final list of qualified candidates was released on the first day of the two-week campaigning period, leaving no room for disqualified candidates to process their appeals and resume campaigning if accepted.

The main hurdle faced by some of the female candidates, though, was their unjustified rejection based on an anonymous review by a "specialised entity", also known as the Saudi Ministry of Interior. Just 979 female candidates, compared with 5,938 male candidates, managed to reach the final list, and the ability of female candidates to promote their platforms was limited.

In a surprising announcement after the list of female candidates was released, the national election committee demanded certain requirements from female candidates before they could promote their programmes, including gender-segregated campaign sites, no displaying of personal pictures, and assigning men as representatives for female candidates to interact with male voters during the promotional period.

Such measures aimed to appease an influential religious group that views women's public roles and engagement as unnecessary.

The mufti of Saudi Arabia, the highest religious figure in the country, issued a televised edict against women's participation, which was reciprocated by several religious hardliners. Traditional social resistance followed, including an incident in which two masked men tore apart a banner containing the name of a female candidate from their tribe.

Despite these restrictions, many female candidates posted their electoral platforms online with personal photographs.

All of which begs the question: Do such limitations reflect a lack of real political will, or just the limitations of social and bureaucratic traditions? Critics of the municipal elections have cited the lack of transparency and the limited authorities of the councils as signs of a lack of real political interest in power-sharing.

The unchallenged authority of the Ministry of Interior to manipulate the course of the electoral process is indicative of a controlled political sphere. Indeed, some women disqualified from candidacy are well-known writers and activists.

In the 2011 elections, an activist blogger was similarly disqualified as a candidate, with no reasons given.

Amid this backdrop, women who participated in the electoral process were accused of serving to promote false political progress. However, boycotting the elections due to an absence of more meaningful reform would ensure that dominant groups remain in that role. The value of women's participation in any form outweighs that of boycotting.

As for many other rights denied to women: The right is first acknowledged, then advocated, until it is finally practiced and optimised. In the end, building awareness through engagement, rather than through segregation and isolation, is a far more effective policy.
Hala Aldosari is an activist and a researcher on women's health.

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Analysis: The value of women voting in Saudi Arabia

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Votes continue to be counted in Saudi Arabia's municipal elections, in which women were allowed for the first time to cast ballots. According to official figures, 130,000 women registered to vote in Saturday's poll, compared with 1.35 million men.

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Annapurna and Kay