Today a historic conviction came down in the Democratic Republic of Congo. It was the first time an official or commander has been convicted of masterminding rape in the country.
A call comes in at 4:58 p.m. The night shift hasn’t yet started, so the day team that has been working since 7 in the morning goes out. We leave at 5:30. There’s no explicit rush. The 11-year-old isn’t bleeding.
Meghan Markle will be the first nonwhite woman ever to marry into the British monarchy. But is this fact a point of progress, or does the frenzy surrounding Markle’s race just further reinforce harmful stereotypes surrounding beauty and colorism?
In India, it’s now illegal for a man to have sex with his wife if she is under the age of 18. But anti-rape activists in India are looking at the next fight ahead of them: making the rape of adult women in marriage illegal.
There is disproportionate rate of HIV infection among young women in sub-Saharan Africa. Here's what you need to know ahead of World AIDS Day.
It is 9 a.m. on November 9, and hundreds—maybe 1,000—people have gathered to watch something many believed would never happen: the trial of a group of men who allegedly gang-raped approximately 50 little girls, aged 18 months to 11 years, in a village called Kavumu. Justice has been four years in the making.
Sexualized violence is widespread throughout the world. This is true even in times of peace and stability, but it escalates during humanitarian crises. In conflicts, women’s bodies can become battlegrounds, with rape used to humiliate and dominate. Protection systems also collapse during natural disasters, leaving women and girls vulnerable. And child marriage, a form of gender-based violence, is often seen as a coping mechanism among crisis-affected families.
While the most recent extreme campaign to exterminate the Rohingya has shocked the world, it is an effort built upon a long history of oppression.
How I realized that “virginity” is a crucial element of a broader sexist culture that aims to oppress women through their bodies.
U.S. Ambassador to the UN Nikki Haley is going to Africa. South Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Ethiopia, specifically. She says in an October 22 CNN op-ed that President Trump is sending her “to get a first-hand picture of what can be done.”
Unlike many other post-conflict African nations, Rwanda is working to support women widowed by the country’s 1994 genocide. With the establishment of care homes and other initiatives, the country’s elderly widows can finally find peace.
When in August Brazilian writer and feminist activist Clara Averbuck refused the advances of an Uber driver, he physically threw her out of his car, leaving her bruised and with a black eye. He then sexually assaulted her as she lay on the ground.
Rohingya Muslims are facing an ethnic cleansing in Myanmar.
The Irish government announced in September they would hold a referendum on the 8th Amendment in mid-2018—a long-awaited move by many in the country. The announcement followed years of campaigning by pro-choice organizations in Ireland.
Ekhlas was 14 years old when Islamic State militants attacked the northern Iraqi city of Sinjar in August 2014. Her family tried to flee to nearby Mount Sinjar, but they never made it.
In 2014, the so-called Islamic State abducted thousands of women and children when they invaded large parts of Iraq and tortured, enslaved, and killed many people affiliated with the Yazidi religious group. In response, in November 2015, the Jiyan Foundation for Human Rights, an Iraq-based organization that helps victims of human rights violations, opened a trauma clinic for women in the Kurdish city of Chamchamal.
On computer screens thousands of miles away from one another, some of the world’s leading feminist figures joined in solidarity with women in the Democratic Republic of the Congo at the country’s first-ever women’s summit on September 14.
Saudi women are unable to exercise freedom in clothing, travel, work, or family. This reality led the World Economic Forum to rank Saudi Arabia 141 out of 144 countries in its 2016 report on the global gender gap.
Rahaf feared going home. Her clothes had been torn, making visible the painful red welts that would turn into eggplant-colored bruises. On her arms and legs, her family and fiance would be able to see the round burn marks where they put out cigarettes on her skin.
As the Caribbean and Florida have been pummeled by Hurricane Irma these past few days, people around the world have been desperate for news of their loved ones, while those stuck on battered islands and coasts with no electricity, no information on rescue activities, and little hope that their lives and property will make it through this A-bomb-level storm are left trying to find cell phones that work to learn what they can.
Women around the world continue to struggle not only with draconian laws that deny them ownership of their own bodies, but also the threat of hard-won rights being rolled back. Here, we take a look at some of the places around the world that are playing the long game for abortion reform.
At the end of last month, the BBC was forced to reveal its employees’ salaries, and the results upset many—specifically, the considerable wage gap between its male and female employees. Two-thirds of the presenters who earned over £150,000 were men.
In a primary school classroom, Deepa Das holds back tears as she explains to her 6-year-old daughter why she doesn’t have enough clothes for her. Eight days ago, as heavy monsoon rains lashed the state, Das’ home, which lies in a village behind the school where she is taking shelter, was completely flooded in the space of an hour.
The week after she handed in her AK47 rifle, Patricia found out she was pregnant. Patricia had been a rebel fighter in the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, for 14 years. Last month, she was one of 7,000 rebels to hand in their weapons in a low-key ceremony that marked the end of the armed struggle.
In the violence that rocked Kenya following the disputed elections of 2007, the media reported hundreds of cases of sexualized violence. Jane’s was one of them. Today, Jane grapples with HIV, trauma, and empty promises of reparation. Her husband was killed in the violence, but his body has never been found.