Two women journalists killed in Mexico City (Reuters)

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Mexican authorities are investigating the murder of two women journalists whose bodies were found in a park in the south of Mexico City on Thursday.

Dozens of journalists have been killed in drug-related violence in Mexico in the past five years. However, the attorney general's office in the capital said the motive for the killing of the two friends was unclear.

"This is still being investigated," a spokesman said, adding that initial findings suggested the victims had been strangled. Both women were 48, the spokesman added.

One of the women, Ana Yarce, was the founder of investigative magazine Contralinea, it said in a statement. The other, Rocio Gonzalez, had worked previously for broadcaster Televisa, the magazine added.

Daily newspaper Reforma said Gonzalez had apparently just withdrawn a large sum of money and the two women may have been victims of a violent robbery.

(Reporting by Dave Graham; Editing by Todd Eastham)

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Gadhafi training women for Libya war

Women in Libya are training to defend Moammar Gadhafi's regimeWomen training with weapons is not an uncommon sight in LibyaMasoud: "I liked training and defending my country"

Tripoli, Libya (CNN) -- Embattled Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi is calling for fresh volunteers in a months-long war with rebels attempting to bring about an end to his 42-year rule -- and women of all ages are answering, CNN has learned.

Women from in and around Gadhafi's stronghold of Tripoli have been traveling south to a training facility in Bani Walid to practice with weapons, a common sight in a country where young girls receive military training in schools.

As NATO's airstrikes crossed the 100-day mark and rebels continue to fight to oust Gadhafi, he is tapping everything and everyone in his arsenal to hold on to power.

At the training facility in Bani Walid, women are training to "defend Moammar and the country," said Sgt. Faraj Ramadan, a woman who is training other women to properly handle weapons.

"They train to use it, assemble it and take it apart, and to shoot," she told CNN recently. "They were trained and got excellent scores."

At a recent graduation at the facility, 40-year-old Fatima Masoud said she liked the training. She said she left her textile job every day at 4 p.m. to train.

"I liked training and defending my country, and now I'm am training women from all ages to use weapons," she said.

It is unclear how many have answered Gadhafi's call or how many had graduated from the program at Bani Walid.

But women are fighting alongside government forces.

A woman, who did not want to identified, fresh from the frontlines, attended the graduation. She was still wearing a cannula in her wrist.

"Do not underestimate any woman in Libya, whether old or young," the woman said. "The woman is still able to perform more than you think."

Gadhafi's government claims it has handed out more than a million weapons to civilians since the uprising began. CNN cannot independently verify the claim.

CNN

Saudi activist: 5 women detained for driving (AP)

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates – A Saudi activist says at least five women have been taken into custody accused of defying the men-only driving rule in the ultraconservative Arab kingdom.

The detentions mark the first major backlash by Saudi authorities since a campaign was launched nearly two weeks ago to challenge the driving restrictions.

Dozens of women have since driven through the capital Riyadh and other cities.

Saudi-based rights activist Eman al-Nafjan says police detained a woman Tuesday while driving in Jiddah on the Red Sea coast. Al-Nafjan says four other women accused of driving were later detained in the city.

Al-Nafjan spoke to The Associated Press on Wednesday. She says there has been no new information on the status of the detainees.

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Supreme Court Tells Working Women, You're on Your Own (OneWorld.net)

Jun 21 (New America Media) - Sitting in the majestic paneled courtroom in the U.S. Supreme Court three months ago, it did not take long to get that dreaded sense that Betty Dukes and 1.5 million other current and former women employees at Wal-Mart were not likely to prevail in their epic 10-year battle against the nation's largest private employer.

On Monday, that premonition came true. The Supreme Court threw out several lower-court rulings and declared that the women’s claims of massive, persistent sex discrimination were not sufficiently similar to merit class-action status. Ladies, you are on your own!

In order to get the case certified as a class action, Dukes and her fellow plaintiffs had introduced vast amounts of evidence supporting their claims of discrimination. Women made up two-thirds of the Wal-Mart work force, yet held only one-third of management jobs. Wal-Mart had a far smaller proportion of women managers when compared to the other major retailers. Indeed, in 1999 (the most recent date for which data were available) Wal-Mart had a lower percentage of female managers than its top competitors had in 1975.

Other evidence from Wal-Mart’s own personnel records showed that women were paid less on average than their male counterparts in all job classifications, despite having higher performance ratings and more seniority than their male co-workers.

This evidence, along with more than 100 declarations from women employees around the United States, convinced a San Francisco federal court to certify the class in 2004, allowing the women to sue en masse and giving them a fighting chance against the corporate giant. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the class certification three separate times, albeit by a narrow majority. Wal-Mart was thrilled when the pro–big business Supreme Court agreed to hear its appeal.

To no one’s surprise, the court sided with Goliath. Where Wal-Mart’s women workers and their lawyers see group inequality in the form of common practices and policies that place women in a disadvantageous position, the Supreme Court’s conservative, all-male majority could only see 1.5 million individual women with specific, unrelated gripes about how much Wal-Mart pays them, and individualized complaints about promotional opportunities they may have been denied.

In my notes of the hour-long oral argument this past March, the conservative majority’s skepticism comes across loud and clear. Justice Kennedy: “Let’s suppose that experts’ testimony, sociologists and so forth, establish that in industry generally and in the retail industry (in particular), women still are discriminated against by a mathematical factor of X. You have a company that has a very specific policy against discrimination, and you look at their — the way their employees are ... treated, and you find a disparity by the same mathematical factor X. Does that give you a cause of action?” Translation into common English: If everyone else does it, how in the world can a woman claim there’s discrimination at Wal-Mart?

This same question was asked, in one form or another, by each of the conservatives (except Clarence Thomas, who asked no questions during oral argument, as is his custom). In the end, they decided to give Wal-Mart a€” a company well known for its union-busting policies and for profitting off the backs of its low-wage workforce a€” the benefit of their doubt. In a corporation with 3,400 stores located in 50 states, with an express policy forbidding discrimination, and where managers had substantial discretion as to how much employees were paid or who was promoted, the court's majority held that the plaintiffs could not establish that their claims of discrimination had enough in common to warrant suing en masse.

The dissenting justices — Ginsburg, Sotomayor, Kagan and Breyer — strongly disagreed. They found the evidence convincing that “gender bias suffused Wal-Mart’s corporate culture” and noted that the company’s policy of giving supervisors great discretion to make personnel decisions “has long been known to have the potential to produce disparate effects.” The justices (three of whom are female) argued that the suit should go back to the lower court for further determination as to whether the class action could proceed. The majority dismissed the class altogether.

On March 28, 2011, the night before the Supreme Court argument, the American Association for University Women and the Alliance for Justice hosted a reception for Betty Dukes and the other Wal-Mart plaintiffs. These working-class women were thrilled to be in Washington and proudly introduced their family members, who stood by them on the eve of the most public day in their otherwise ordinary lives. The women had spent a decade fighting Wal-Mart because they had tired of second-class status in the workplace, and they refused to watch while their daughters and nieces and another generation of women were paid less and passed over for well-deserved promotions. Whatever happened, they had fought the good fight a€” and the support they felt that night sustained them, despite the odds.

After the oral arguments, the women of Wal-Mart stepped into the crisp Washington sunshine with their heads held high. Win or lose, their case had already brought about some major changes at the retailer. Two years after the lawsuit was filed, the company finally began posting management opportunities, and the “tap on the shoulder” system of promotions that had clearly favored male employees was eliminated. Later, the company restructured its pay system, erasing some (but not all) of the wage disparity. It also put in place training programs aimed at increasing the number of women managers. Only when it felt the heat of the class action was Wal-Mart willing to mend its ways.

What will happen to the women of Wal-Mart now that their class action has been disbanded? As a lawyer who was once part of the legal team that represented Betty Dukes, Chris Kwapnoski, Edith Arana and the other plaintiffs in this case, I can’t help but find the Supreme Court’s decision deeply disappointing, not just for the women but for all people who band together to challenge corporate practices that inflict widespread harm.

I know the plaintiffs are disappointed, too. But they haven’t come this far to give up now. The evidence of discrimination at Wal-Mart is not wiped out by this ruling, and although the case cannot proceed as a nationwide class action, these resourceful and determined women will regroup and continue their fight for justice and equality. They have no other choice.

NAM contributor Irma Herrera is a civil rights attorney who spent almost 15 years as executive director of Equal Rights Advocates, one of the main law firms in the Wal-Mart case.

Want to Know More?

» OneWorld Guide to Gender Issues Worldwide

ALL THE LATEST GLOBAL HEADLINES

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Supreme Court Tells Working Women, You're on Your Own (OneWorld.net)

Jun 21 (New America Media) - Sitting in the majestic paneled courtroom in the U.S. Supreme Court three months ago, it did not take long to get that dreaded sense that Betty Dukes and 1.5 million other current and former women employees at Wal-Mart were not likely to prevail in their epic 10-year battle against the nation's largest private employer.

On Monday, that premonition came true. The Supreme Court threw out several lower-court rulings and declared that the women’s claims of massive, persistent sex discrimination were not sufficiently similar to merit class-action status. Ladies, you are on your own!

In order to get the case certified as a class action, Dukes and her fellow plaintiffs had introduced vast amounts of evidence supporting their claims of discrimination. Women made up two-thirds of the Wal-Mart work force, yet held only one-third of management jobs. Wal-Mart had a far smaller proportion of women managers when compared to the other major retailers. Indeed, in 1999 (the most recent date for which data were available) Wal-Mart had a lower percentage of female managers than its top competitors had in 1975.

Other evidence from Wal-Mart’s own personnel records showed that women were paid less on average than their male counterparts in all job classifications, despite having higher performance ratings and more seniority than their male co-workers.

This evidence, along with more than 100 declarations from women employees around the United States, convinced a San Francisco federal court to certify the class in 2004, allowing the women to sue en masse and giving them a fighting chance against the corporate giant. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the class certification three separate times, albeit by a narrow majority. Wal-Mart was thrilled when the pro–big business Supreme Court agreed to hear its appeal.

To no one’s surprise, the court sided with Goliath. Where Wal-Mart’s women workers and their lawyers see group inequality in the form of common practices and policies that place women in a disadvantageous position, the Supreme Court’s conservative, all-male majority could only see 1.5 million individual women with specific, unrelated gripes about how much Wal-Mart pays them, and individualized complaints about promotional opportunities they may have been denied.

In my notes of the hour-long oral argument this past March, the conservative majority’s skepticism comes across loud and clear. Justice Kennedy: “Let’s suppose that experts’ testimony, sociologists and so forth, establish that in industry generally and in the retail industry (in particular), women still are discriminated against by a mathematical factor of X. You have a company that has a very specific policy against discrimination, and you look at their — the way their employees are ... treated, and you find a disparity by the same mathematical factor X. Does that give you a cause of action?” Translation into common English: If everyone else does it, how in the world can a woman claim there’s discrimination at Wal-Mart?

This same question was asked, in one form or another, by each of the conservatives (except Clarence Thomas, who asked no questions during oral argument, as is his custom). In the end, they decided to give Wal-Mart a€” a company well known for its union-busting policies and for profitting off the backs of its low-wage workforce a€” the benefit of their doubt. In a corporation with 3,400 stores located in 50 states, with an express policy forbidding discrimination, and where managers had substantial discretion as to how much employees were paid or who was promoted, the court's majority held that the plaintiffs could not establish that their claims of discrimination had enough in common to warrant suing en masse.

The dissenting justices — Ginsburg, Sotomayor, Kagan and Breyer — strongly disagreed. They found the evidence convincing that “gender bias suffused Wal-Mart’s corporate culture” and noted that the company’s policy of giving supervisors great discretion to make personnel decisions “has long been known to have the potential to produce disparate effects.” The justices (three of whom are female) argued that the suit should go back to the lower court for further determination as to whether the class action could proceed. The majority dismissed the class altogether.

On March 28, 2011, the night before the Supreme Court argument, the American Association for University Women and the Alliance for Justice hosted a reception for Betty Dukes and the other Wal-Mart plaintiffs. These working-class women were thrilled to be in Washington and proudly introduced their family members, who stood by them on the eve of the most public day in their otherwise ordinary lives. The women had spent a decade fighting Wal-Mart because they had tired of second-class status in the workplace, and they refused to watch while their daughters and nieces and another generation of women were paid less and passed over for well-deserved promotions. Whatever happened, they had fought the good fight a€” and the support they felt that night sustained them, despite the odds.

After the oral arguments, the women of Wal-Mart stepped into the crisp Washington sunshine with their heads held high. Win or lose, their case had already brought about some major changes at the retailer. Two years after the lawsuit was filed, the company finally began posting management opportunities, and the “tap on the shoulder” system of promotions that had clearly favored male employees was eliminated. Later, the company restructured its pay system, erasing some (but not all) of the wage disparity. It also put in place training programs aimed at increasing the number of women managers. Only when it felt the heat of the class action was Wal-Mart willing to mend its ways.

What will happen to the women of Wal-Mart now that their class action has been disbanded? As a lawyer who was once part of the legal team that represented Betty Dukes, Chris Kwapnoski, Edith Arana and the other plaintiffs in this case, I can’t help but find the Supreme Court’s decision deeply disappointing, not just for the women but for all people who band together to challenge corporate practices that inflict widespread harm.

I know the plaintiffs are disappointed, too. But they haven’t come this far to give up now. The evidence of discrimination at Wal-Mart is not wiped out by this ruling, and although the case cannot proceed as a nationwide class action, these resourceful and determined women will regroup and continue their fight for justice and equality. They have no other choice.

NAM contributor Irma Herrera is a civil rights attorney who spent almost 15 years as executive director of Equal Rights Advocates, one of the main law firms in the Wal-Mart case.

Want to Know More?

» OneWorld Guide to Gender Issues Worldwide

ALL THE LATEST GLOBAL HEADLINES

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Braving police, Saudi women drivers take to streets (The Christian Science Monitor)

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia – She was probably the first to put foot to pedal.

It was 12:44 a.m. and middle-of-the-night dark. She turned the ignition key, lit the headlights, and drove.

In the backseat, her supportive husband filmed his wife making history as the earliest participant in Friday’s campaign by Saudi women to get the right to drive on the roads of their country.

IN PICTURES: Behind the veil

“I felt great,” the university student said later in an email exchange. “I couldn't believe that I was in Riyadh and driving! I look forward for the day that all of this becomes as natural as men driving.”

The woman, who posted the video on YouTube, said she wanted to remain anonymous “because I'm afraid of the authorities.” She’s also not certain, she wrote, about how her extended family would react to news of what she called “my small mission.”

Overall, the driving campaign got off to a slow start with just shy of 50 women reporting – mostly via Twitter – by the evening that they had gotten behind the wheel in violation of the kingdom’s national ban on female drivers.

The campaign is perhaps the largest and most genuinely grass-roots campaign by Saudi women to demand one of the many rights they are denied in this country, which severely restricts female independence.

Under the guardianship system, women need the permission of their father, husband, or brother to marry, travel outside the country, work outside the home, and have certain kinds of medical procedures.

Though there is no law prohibiting women from driving, the government supports the social custom that women not drive, at least not in the urban areas. In rural parts of the kingdom, women drive regularly without interference.

Many senior members of the royal family and the government have no objection to women driving. But they are reluctant to upset conservatives, both men and women, who argue that their Islamic society should not follow the same pattern of women’s liberation as in Western societies.

The last time the driving ban was challenged in an organized fashion was in 1990 when more 48 Saudi women drove in a convoy around Riyadh for an hour. The women were harshly punished – banned from international travel and suspended from their jobs. Mosque preachers labeled them “whores.”

Later, the kingdom’s most senior religious figure issued a fatwa, or religious ruling, that said women should not drive. But 21 years later, that fatwa is no longer seen as valid by many Muslims, especially since women drive in every other Muslim-majority country in the world.

Other things have also changed. Some religious sheikhs are breaking their silence and speaking out against the austere hardliners, arguing that nothing in Islam prevents women from driving.

The concept behind Friday’s campaign, which was launched in March, is that since there is no law banning women from driving, they should go out and drive en masse to persuade the government to lift the ban. Women were advised not to congregate so as not to violate the ban on demonstrations.

In recent years an increasing number of women have driven, sometimes out of necessity. If caught by traffic police, they were held until their male guardian picked them up and signed a pledge that they would not allow the women to drive again.

By mid-evening Friday, there was no evidence of arrests.

It was a far different story last month, when the government took a tough line against one of the driving campaign organizers. After Manal al-Sharif posted a YouTube video of herself driving around the town of Al Khobar to encourage women to join the campaign, she was detained for nine days.

According to Saudi sources, she was released on orders of King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, who is seen as a supporter of women’s rights.

Traffic about the campaign was heavy on Twitter (much of which can be found at the #Women2Drive hashtag), which along with Facebook and YouTube was the main way it was organized.

Tweets poured in from Saudis and non-Saudis offering encouragement to women who drove or were planning to drive. Women who defied the ban and drove tweeted about the responses they got.

“I went to the supermarket and I noticed [that] some grandpa generation were upset but all the people were smiling,” tweeted Maial Shareef.

“I drove my dad’s car this afternoon. Delivered him to the jumah (Friday) prayer and back home,” wrote Mozah. “It went well. Some weren’t happy to see me pick him [up at] the mosque.”

And Tawfiq al-Saif, an author and community leader in the Eastern Province, commented that he was taken for a ride by his wife. It went “just fine,” he wrote. “[S]ome people looked surprised, others were smiling."

IN PICTURES: Behind the veil

Yahoo! News

Braving police, Saudi women drivers take to streets (The Christian Science Monitor)

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia – She was probably the first to put foot to pedal.

It was 12:44 a.m. and middle-of-the-night dark. She turned the ignition key, lit the headlights, and drove.

In the backseat, her supportive husband filmed his wife making history as the earliest participant in Friday’s campaign by Saudi women to get the right to drive on the roads of their country.

IN PICTURES: Behind the veil

“I felt great,” the university student said later in an email exchange. “I couldn't believe that I was in Riyadh and driving! I look forward for the day that all of this becomes as natural as men driving.”

The woman, who posted the video on YouTube, said she wanted to remain anonymous “because I'm afraid of the authorities.” She’s also not certain, she wrote, about how her extended family would react to news of what she called “my small mission.”

Overall, the driving campaign got off to a slow start with just shy of 50 women reporting – mostly via Twitter – by the evening that they had gotten behind the wheel in violation of the kingdom’s national ban on female drivers.

The campaign is perhaps the largest and most genuinely grass-roots campaign by Saudi women to demand one of the many rights they are denied in this country, which severely restricts female independence.

Under the guardianship system, women need the permission of their father, husband, or brother to marry, travel outside the country, work outside the home, and have certain kinds of medical procedures.

Though there is no law prohibiting women from driving, the government supports the social custom that women not drive, at least not in the urban areas. In rural parts of the kingdom, women drive regularly without interference.

Many senior members of the royal family and the government have no objection to women driving. But they are reluctant to upset conservatives, both men and women, who argue that their Islamic society should not follow the same pattern of women’s liberation as in Western societies.

The last time the driving ban was challenged in an organized fashion was in 1990 when more 48 Saudi women drove in a convoy around Riyadh for an hour. The women were harshly punished – banned from international travel and suspended from their jobs. Mosque preachers labeled them “whores.”

Later, the kingdom’s most senior religious figure issued a fatwa, or religious ruling, that said women should not drive. But 21 years later, that fatwa is no longer seen as valid by many Muslims, especially since women drive in every other Muslim-majority country in the world.

Other things have also changed. Some religious sheikhs are breaking their silence and speaking out against the austere hardliners, arguing that nothing in Islam prevents women from driving.

The concept behind Friday’s campaign, which was launched in March, is that since there is no law banning women from driving, they should go out and drive en masse to persuade the government to lift the ban. Women were advised not to congregate so as not to violate the ban on demonstrations.

In recent years an increasing number of women have driven, sometimes out of necessity. If caught by traffic police, they were held until their male guardian picked them up and signed a pledge that they would not allow the women to drive again.

By mid-evening Friday, there was no evidence of arrests.

It was a far different story last month, when the government took a tough line against one of the driving campaign organizers. After Manal al-Sharif posted a YouTube video of herself driving around the town of Al Khobar to encourage women to join the campaign, she was detained for nine days.

According to Saudi sources, she was released on orders of King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz, who is seen as a supporter of women’s rights.

Traffic about the campaign was heavy on Twitter (much of which can be found at the #Women2Drive hashtag), which along with Facebook and YouTube was the main way it was organized.

Tweets poured in from Saudis and non-Saudis offering encouragement to women who drove or were planning to drive. Women who defied the ban and drove tweeted about the responses they got.

“I went to the supermarket and I noticed [that] some grandpa generation were upset but all the people were smiling,” tweeted Maial Shareef.

“I drove my dad’s car this afternoon. Delivered him to the jumah (Friday) prayer and back home,” wrote Mozah. “It went well. Some weren’t happy to see me pick him [up at] the mosque.”

And Tawfiq al-Saif, an author and community leader in the Eastern Province, commented that he was taken for a ride by his wife. It went “just fine,” he wrote. “[S]ome people looked surprised, others were smiling."

IN PICTURES: Behind the veil

Yahoo! News

Saudi women defy driving ban

Women get into the backseat of a vehicle in Saudi Arabia's capital Riyadh on June 14, 2011.Saudi women say they feel disadvantage because they cannot driveAn online movement encouraged Saudi women to drive FridayReligious edicts, not specific laws, bar women from a host of activitiesWomen are emboldened to get behind the wheel

(CNN) -- Women put keys to ignitions Friday in Saudi Arabia to start up a roaring challenge to the conservative Islamic kingdom's prohibition of female drivers.

"It's a disadvantage for us," said Sulafa Kurdi who lived in the United States once and got her driver's license when she was 18.

"It's something that we want to do, and hopefully, it will happen," she said after driving to a Riyadh restaurant with her friends and cousin.

Fueled by "Women2Drive," a campaign demanding the right for women to drive and travel freely in Saudi Arabia, Kurdi and other Saudi women commanded streets and roads normally reserved for men.

Though there are no specific traffic laws that make it illegal for women to drive in Saudi Arabia. However, religious edicts are often interpreted as a prohibition of female drivers. Such edicts also prevent women from opening bank accounts, obtaining passports or even going to school without the presence of a male guardian.

Authorities stopped Manal al Sharif, 32, for driving a car May 21 and detained her the next day. She said she was forced to sign a form promising not to drive again and spent a week in jail.

Al Sharif has not been charged, but the case remains open and she may be called back, according to human rights activist Waleed Abu Alkhair. Her name has become a rallying cry for women demanding their rights.

The "Women2Drive 17th June," Facebook page includes a banner that reads "We are all Manal Sharif," and a quote from King Abdullah stating that "the day will come when women will be able to drive."

In an interview with CNN before her detention, al Sharif said she was determined to speak out.

"We have a saying," she said. "The rain starts with a single drop. This is a symbolic thing."

The Women2Drive campaign was expected to be a test of wills between the government and half of the nation's citizenry. However, campaign organizers were explicit in laying out conditions for participants.

Women were told to adhere to full Islamic dress. Wave the Saudi flag and plaster a picture of the king to show patriotism. It was best to have an international driving license if you planned to drive. And to have a man with you.

The campaign said it would not be responsible for any women who breached a list of 14 such principles. The were asked to show defiance but within societal confines.

A Riyadh man who went out to document what would be an unusual scene in Saudi Arabia said the streets were typically empty for a Friday morning, but that there were many fewer police officers than in March -- when online organizers had called for mass demonstrations.

"I'm thinking that the government is turning sideways," said the man, Ahmad Alafaliq. "They don't want to see it, they don't want to deal with it."

A Saudi woman told CNN her mother drove her and her sisters down Riyadh's main street on Thursday.

The woman, who asked not to be named because she was worried about harassment and possible reprisals, said no one bothered them.

"This is important for women here -- this is one of our rights," she said

Nadya Khalife, a Human Rights Watch women's rights researcher for the Middle East and North Africa, said the freedom of movement is a basic right. Saudi Arabia, she said, is the only country that bans women from driving.

Strict segregation by sex means women in Saudi Arabia can't travel without a male relative or take public transportation. Ironically, many women hire are forced to hire expensive private drivers or taxis to get around, forcing them to be in the company of unfamiliar men, which, said activists, does not make sense from a religious standpoint.

Khalife said what separates the latest campaign from other efforts to get women to drive is the degree to which it has relied on social media. Women who got behind the wheel were encouraged to shoot videos of themselves.

But Saudi women face challenges, Khalife said.

"They're up against society as a whole," Khalife said. "Some women may even face harassment or pressure from their families. Some women have clearly been in support, but others are saying they don't want to 'shame.'"

Osamah Alluaidan, an opponent of female drivers, posted on Facebook, "It is not a sin for women to drive but when women drive and disobey the Kingdom's guardians, that's the problem, this is unacceptable."

Khalife noted that some men have been supportive of their daughters, wives and sisters taking part in the driving campaign.

Alkhair, speaking Thursday from London, said he encouraged his wife to drive in Jeddah on Friday.

"I think after what the police and the interior ministry did to Manal al Sharif, a lot of women became afraid," he said. "The Interior Ministry has put a lot of police on the street. They want to send a message to all women."

But on Friday, Saudi women defied tradition, no matter how bumpy the road.

CNN's Eve Bower and Atika Shubert contributed to this report.

CNN

Saudi women to drive for change

Women2Drive is an initiative demanding the right for women to drive and travel freely in Saudi Arabia.Saudi Arabian women encouraged to drive FridayManal al Sharif is part of Women2Drive campaignShe claims woman are not breaking the law by driving in Saudi ArabiaReligious edicts limit activities of women

(CNN) -- Saudi women are being encouraged to challenge the status quo and get behind the wheel Friday.

Though there are no traffic laws that make it illegal for women to drive in Saudi Arabia, religious edicts are often interpreted as a ban against female drivers. One female motorist spent more than a week in custody in May, supporters said.

The day is expected to be a test of wills -- and authority -- between police and the campaign, which has been publicized by Facebook, Twitter and other social media. It was not clear late Thursday how many would participate.

A Saudi woman told CNN her mother drove her and her sisters down Riyadh's main street on Thursday.

The woman, who asked not to be named because she was worried about harassment and possible reprisals, said no one bothered them.

"I believe there will be women driving (Friday)," she said. "This is important for women here -- this is one of our rights."

Read Isobel Coleman's piece on the largest protest by Saudi women

This is important for women here -- this is one of our rights.
--Unnamed Saudi woman

Authorities stopped Manal al Sharif, 32, for driving a car May 21 and detained her the next day. She said she was forced to sign a form promising not to drive again and spent a week in jail.

Al Sharif has not been charged, but the case remains open and she may be called back, according to human rights activist Waleed Abu Alkhair.

Al Sharif is part of Women2Drive, an initiative demanding the right for women to drive and travel freely in Saudi Arabia.

In an interview with CNN before her detention, al Sharif said she was determined to speak out.

"We have a saying," she said. "The rain starts with a single drop. This is a symbolic thing."

Hundreds of women have joined the campaign to begin driving Friday. Some women with international licenses, such as al Sharif, began driving earlier.

Alkhair, speaking Thursday from London, said he encouraged his wife to drive in Jeddah on Friday.

"I think after what the police and the interior ministry did to Manal al Sharif, a lot of women became afraid," he said. "The Interior Ministry has put a lot of police on the street. They want to send a message to all women."

Strict segregation by sex means women in Saudi Arabia can't travel without a male relative or take public transportation. Many women hire expensive drivers or taxis to get around.

Since al Sharif's detention, several Saudi women have uploaded their videos onto the web.

Amnesty International said Saudi women should be allowed to seek more freedoms.

"Saudi Arabian authorities must stop treating women as second-class citizens and open the kingdom's roads to women drivers," the organization said.

CNN's Atika Shubert contributed to this report.

CNN

World's most dangerous locales for women: Why is India so high on the list? (The Christian Science Monitor)

By Tom A. Peter Tom A. Peter – Thu Jun 16, 9:53 am ET

Kabul, Afghanistan – A study released this week named Afghanistan the most dangerous country for women, with Pakistan and India following closely behind. But while serious problems exist for women in these places, women’s rights activists say there is also an emerging public awareness in all three countries about problems that were previously seen as too taboo to address in public.

“If you look at the Bollywood films and you see the fashion magazines coming out of both countries [Pakistan and India], you wouldn’t believe that there are other women locked up at home or their mobility is severely curtailed, but that is the case,” says Simi Kamal, chief of party for the gender equity program at the Aurat Foundation, headquartered in Islamabad.

“On the one hand, you will see many women out in the professional world – they own businesses, they’re in the banking sector, they’re in the teaching sector, all of those things – yet there are other women who have to face a whole series of harassments.”

The findings were released on Wednesday based on a poll conducted by TrustLaw, the Thomson Reuters Foundation’s legal news service. It asked 213 gender experts to rank countries by the perception of danger to women. It also looked at threats related to health, sexual violence, nonsexual violence, cultural or religious factors, lack of access to resources, and trafficking. The Democratic Republic of Congo was listed as the second most-dangerous country for women.

RELATED TrustLaw list of 5 most dangerous countries for women

AfghanistanWomen’s issues in Afghanistan have long been at the forefront of international human rights concerns. Especially during the rule of the Taliban, abuses were extremely well-documented.

Experts say there has been some progress over the past 10 years, with women increasingly taking roles in politics. Still, Afghan women, especially those in rural areas, face a number of rights abuses, such as forced marriages or being traded between families to settle disputes.

“Our government is not able to provide the rights to women, which they have in the law of Afghanistan. And women do not even have access to the rights that Allah gives them in our sharia [Islamic] law,” says Lal Gul Lal, chairman of the Afghanistan Human Rights Organization.

Some of the biggest threats facing women come from a dearth of infrastructure after three decades of conflict. One in 11 women die during childbirth and 87 percent of women are illiterate, according to the report.

According to some women's activists in Afghanistan, this latest report approaches women’s issues through a Western cultural lens and ignores the main issues facing the nation.

“If they stopped the war, money could go to make hospitals and provide education to women. Our children grew up on the streets because of this stupid war,” says Fatana Ishaq Gailani, founder and chairwoman of the Afghanistan Women Council in Kabul.

She argues that, health and access to education aside, from a cultural standpoint that Afghan women are far better off than Western women who appear “on television in ice cream ads, go out alone without men, and they have so many boyfriends.”

India and PakistanIn India and Pakistan, there is some relief that at least the problems facing women are entering the public discourse.

Pakistan was listed as the third worst place for women due to violent abuse and child and forced marriages, among other issues. In India, female feticide, trafficking, and child marriages were listed as the biggest problems resulting in its ranking as No. 4.

“We used to think of the domestic space as closed off, where all forms of violence were possible and the state could not step across the threshold of a private door. That no longer exists. The state and its laws are very much present in the domestic space,” says Radhika Chopra, a sociologist at Delhi University.

India’s willingness to report the problem of trafficking may make it appear worse than other countries that are less transparent, wrote the authors of TrustLaw’s report. Some 100 million people, mostly women and girls, are involved in trafficking in India.

Though there have been improvements in the legal framework developed to protect women, activists in both India and Pakistan report that, as with Afghanistan, those charged with enforcing the laws still show strong cultural prejudice.

“The laws aren’t always followed as they should be, because there are biases that exist in the police, in the court system, and the organizations and counselors who deal with women who have suffered violence. So then it becomes a mindset that is not prepared to accept women as equals or their bid for freedom,” says Mrs. Kamal.

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How will Afghan women fare in Taliban reconciliation? (Reuters)

KABUL (Reuters) – The gaggles of giggling schoolgirls in their black uniforms and flowing white hijabs seen across Afghanistan's cities have become symbolic of how far women's rights have come since the austere rule of the Taliban was toppled a decade ago.

While women have gained back basic rights in education, voting and work, considered un-Islamic by the Taliban, their plight remains severe and future uncertain as Afghan leaders seek to negotiate with the Taliban as part of their peace talks.

The United States and NATO, who have been fighting Taliban insurgents for 10 years in an increasingly unpopular war, have repeatedly stressed that any peace talks must abide by Afghanistan's constitution, which says the two sexes are equal.

But President Hamid Karzai's reticence on the matter, constant opposition by the Taliban, and setbacks even at the government level cast a shadow on the prospects of equality for the 15 million women who make up about half the population.

"I am not optimistic at all," said Suraya Parlika, 66, a Nobel Peace Prize nominee and member of the upper house of the Afghan parliament. "We do not know the agenda of the talks and this worries all women in Afghanistan."

"Women are at risk of losing everything they have regained," she told Reuters in her office at the All Afghan Women's Union, the country's most prominent women's rights group that she set up 20 years ago.

The dangerous business of fighting for women's rights in Afghanistan highlights just how precarious their situation is.

Parlika said Taliban militants have tried to kill her eight times. In the latest attempt, gunmen tried to shoot her through a window at her home but missed and blew a hole in the wall.

Others, such as the headmaster of a girls' school near Kabul, are not so lucky. He was gunned down by the Taliban last month for educating girls.

MIXED MESSAGES

Washington and NATO have backed Karzai's peace plan, which includes reintegrating mid-level Taliban fighters and reconciling with some leaders as well as talks.

One of the main conditions in the talks is that insurgents renounce al Qaeda. The Taliban have rejected any talks until all foreign troops have left the country.

U.S. President Barack Obama has said U.S. troops, who make up 100,000 out of around 150,000 foreign forces, will begin to come home gradually from July, with NATO eyeing a full handover of security responsibilities to the Afghans by the end of 2014.

"What they (women) fear is a power-sharing agreement between leaders that does not take their interests into account," said Martine van Bijlert, co-director of the Afghanistan Analysts Network in Kabul.

"At the moment there is no one standing up as a guarantor of the process, no one who says it's really important this is done well. There are a lot of mixed messages," she told Reuters.

Some have accused Karzai of holding back on women's rights to curry political support in the more conservative sections of society. One example is his passing of a family law in 2009 that legalized marital rape for Shi'ites, who make up 15 percent of the population.

In March, Karzai sacked the deputy governor of southern Helmand province after two women performed without headscarves at a high-profile concert.

Parlika said physical attacks on female lawmakers, and internal pressure from their male counterparts not to press women's issues, mean their presence in government is more about symbolism than actual change.

"The situation surrounding women can get very dark indeed," said one Western official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

"There are lots of challenges that need to be overcome and the international community must stay focused to make sure women are protected," said the official, an adviser in the talks.

RURAL VS. URBAN

Underlying the rights women have regained on paper since U.S.-backed forces overthrew the Taliban are the enormous social and economic hurdles they face in a country where more than 40 percent live below the poverty line.

Rights groups and Western officials warn of a "rural versus urban" split, saying the vast economic and religious divide means women in the countryside have not benefited from the end of Taliban rule and continue to live much as they did before.

Some warn this paves the way for women's rights being forgotten in the event of Taliban peace talks.

"Afghanistan is totally male-dominated, women suffer terribly, and this is worse in rural areas where they are economically dependent on men and where they cannot express their own will," Parlika said.

Ancient traditions such as 'baad', when a woman is given as compensation for crimes, are common in the countryside, where female illiteracy is over 90 percent and child marriages are still widespread despite being illegal.

In the Taliban strongholds of the south and east, many women still seek permission from a male relative to leave their homes, and the rule of law is upheld either by Taliban "courts" or by tribal elders, which almost always favor men.

For Hasina Aimaq, the manager of an eponymous fashion house sponsored by a non-governmental organization for women, finding seamstresses for her business in northern Baghlan province is a constant struggle.

"There are always problems with the father, always. They would even prefer them to beg than earn money from work as they think learning a skill is bad," Aimaq told Reuters next to a collection of high-heeled shoes with geometric silk patterns.

Aimaq said her 75 teenage female workers, who make velveteen purple jackets and delicate floral scarves, regularly receive written threats from the Taliban, urging them to quit working.

"They tell us to stay at home, but we will keep coming to work and keep sewing," she said, adjusting her navy blue hijab.

(Editing by Paul Tait and Miral Fahmy)

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Trial set for Ohio man accused of killing, dismembering 11 women

Anthony Sowell faces 85 counts related to the deaths of 11 women between 2007 and 2009.Jury selection starts Monday for the trial of accused serial killer Anthony SowellHe will be tried on 85 counts for the alleged rape and murder of 11 womenPolice say the convicted sex offender killed the women over a span of two yearsAuthorities allege Sowell hid their remains in and around his Cleveland homeRead more about this story from CNN affiliate WKYC.

(CNN) -- The case against Anthony Sowell is grounded in his Cleveland backyard.

There, in October 2009, investigators unearthed remains of five of the 11 women -- ages 25 to 52 -- found on Sowell's property.

On Monday, jury selection for Sowell's trial begins in Cuyahoga County, Ohio. Sowell faces 85 counts related to his alleged rape, murder and dismembering of the women between 2007 and 2009 -- charges to which he's pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity.

Since the bodies were discovered, other women have come forward alleging that Sowell also attacked them. In April 2010, prosecutors handed down an 10-count indictment against Sowell in connection with the alleged rape of a 34-year-old woman in his Cleveland home.

Sowell's lawyers have declined previous requests by CNN to explain their case, and the suspect has not been interviewed. But in January 2010, attorney John Parker told The Plain Dealer newspaper in Cleveland that he felt police violated Sowell's Miranda rights as he was being interrogated.

But those likely to decide Sowell's future have already had their first opportunity to take a measure of the man.

About 200 prospective jurors were introduced to the accused serial killer Friday morning at the Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court in Cleveland, county court administrator Greg Popovich said. They also met Judge Dick Ambrose, the presiding judge in the case, as well as the defense and prosecution teams.

Dressed in a polo shirt and khaki pants, and unencumbered by handcuffs or shackles (even though he was escorted by six deputies), Sowell addressed the jurors simply by saying, "Hello."

Popovich described the event as "unusual" but necessary to "ensure the integrity of the process in the interest of justice" -- though he didn't elaborate on how it did. Following the meeting, the potential jurors went through an hour-long orientation and then were asked to fill out a 32-page questionnaire.

Should they be tapped for the jury, they will sit through what Popovich estimates will be a six-to-eight week trial documenting the gruesome case against Sowell.

Sowell grew up in East Cleveland, joined the Marines at age 18 and traveled to California, North Carolina and Japan, authorities said. People who interacted with him after his 2005 release from prison, where he had served 15 years for attempted rape, said he appeared to be "a normal guy," known locally for selling scrap metal.

His inconspicuous two-story home sits in a dilapidated neighborhood known as Mount Pleasant, where one in five homes were in foreclosure and at least a third of residents got food stamps, according to a 2010 study by Case Western Reserve University's Center on Urban Poverty and Community Development.

Neighbors and even a city councilman had failed to realize that the stench wafting in the area around Sowell's home was human flesh, not a byproduct of a nearby sausage factory.

Moreover, the disappearance of the 11 women -- many of whom lived nearby -- went largely unnoticed for almost two years, with only four of them even being reported missing. Many of his alleged victims struggled with drug addiction at some point in their lives, with court records showing that many resorted to stealing and prostitution to support their habits.

In late 2008, Gladys Wade told police that a man in a gray hoodie offered her beer, and when she declined, punched her in the face several times. Wade said that he then tried to rape her, dragging her toward his home, adding that she got out only after "gouging his face."

Police investigated Wade's complaint, with one police report noting blood droplets on Sowell's walls and steps. But officers told CNN affiliate WKYC that the case was dropped after Wade declined to press charges.

After Wade's complaint, six more women would disappear.

Then, on September 23, 2009, a 36-year-old Cleveland woman told police a story eerily similar to those of Wade and the woman whose 1989 account led to Sowell's first conviction for attempted rape. She said he'd invited her into his home for beer, punched her in the face, then began performing oral sex on her -- releasing her only after she promised to return the next day.

Sowell was then arrested. More than a month later, police entered his house and found two bodies rotting in his attic. These were the first of the 11 bodies they'd eventually discover, in various states of decay, on his property.

Most of the women whose remains were found in and around Sowell's home were strangled by ligature -- which can include a string, cord or wire -- and at least one was strangled by hand, officials said. Seven still had ligatures wrapped around their necks. A skull is all that remains of one victim. It was found wrapped in a paper bag and stuffed in a bucket in the home's basement.

While the prosecution will press its case against Sowell in the coming weeks, this may not be the end of his story -- even if he is eventually given a death sentence.

Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Bill Mason has said that his cold case unit is reviewing unsolved murders that occurred during the time Sowell lived in Cleveland and East Cleveland to see if there are any connections. Mason said the group is working its way through 75 cases.

InSession's Chris Perry and CNN's Stephanie Chen contributed to this report.

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When it Comes to Virtual Goods, Men Outspend Women 9 to 1 (PC Magazine)

Women love to shop: it's a common stereotype but one study shows that it doesn't always prove true. As far as the purchase of virtual goods in mobile games goes, men outspend women nine to one, social gaming company MocoSpace has found.

Boston-based MocoSpace culled data from 1,500 anonymous gamers on its mobile platform to determine the different habits men and woman have when it comes to gaming. The study revealed that 53 percent of MocoSpace gamers are male and 47 percent are female. Men spend a bit more time playing games every day, with an average of 21 minutes versus an average of 19 minutes for women.

While men and women seem to spend similar amounts of time playing games, men spend much more on virtual goods. Sixty-nine percent of male gamers buy virtual goods while only 31 percent of women do the same. But men are responsibly for the overwhelming majority of virtual goods that are purchased, buying 90 percent of them.

MocoSpace games include such titles as Street Wars, Stage Hero, and Happy Farms. Founded in 2005, there are 17 million players on the MocoSpace platform.

According to AppData, MocoSpace averages 15,348 daily average users on Facebook.

Another social gaming platform, Zynga, is rumored to be filing for an initial public offering as early as next week. Zynga is behind such popular games as FarmVille and CityVille and has around 250 million users playing its games each month. While Zynga reportedly brought in $400 million in revenue last year, critics have said that the rumored IPO is more evidence of the hotly-debated tech bubble.

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Afghans say NATO air strike kills 12 children, two women (Reuters)

LASHKAR GAH, Afghanistan (Reuters) – An air strike called in by NATO-led troops in southern Afghanistan killed 12 children and two women, Afghan officials said on Sunday, one of the worst civilian death tolls by foreign forces in months.

A U.S. Marine base came under fire from insurgents in Taliban stronghold of Helmand on Saturday, the Helmand governor said in a statement, leading the base to call for help from the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF).

"ISAF's air strike took place on two civilian houses. Unfortunately 14 innocent civilians were killed and six civilians wounded," the Helmand governor's statement said.

It said seven boys, five girls and two women were among the dead. Three children were among the six wounded, it said.

An ISAF spokesman in Kabul said: "We are aware of the reports that alleged civilians were killed yesterday in Helmand." He said an assessment team had been sent to the area and would issue its findings shortly.

The mistaken killing of civilians by foreign troops, usually during air strikes or "night raids," is a major source of friction between Afghan President Hamid Karzai and his Western backers, and complicates efforts to win support from ordinary Afghans for an increasingly unpopular war.

On Saturday, Karzai ordered the Defense Ministry to take control of so-called "night raids," saying Afghan troops should be carrying out the sensitive operations themselves.

Afghans say the raids, carried out in darkness on houses suspected of harboring insurgents, often lead to civilian casualties.

Residents and local officials from Helmand's Nawzad district, where the air strike took place, said the attack began at around 11 p.m. local time (0630 GMT) on Friday night.

Bereaved male relatives cradled the bodies of several young children on Sunday, who were wrapped in bloody sheets and placed side to side, and brought them in the back of a truck to the provincial capital, Lashkar Gah, Reuters pictures showed.

"My house was bombarded in the middle of the night and my children were killed ... the Taliban were far away from my home, why was my house bombed?" relative Noor Agha told Reuters.

The NATO air strike comes at a time of high anti-Western sentiment in Afghanistan and days after deadly protests by thousands of people against a night raid by NATO troops in which four people, including two women, were killed.

Twelve people were killed during those violent protests and clashes with police in usually peaceful northern Takhar province and more 80 were wounded.

In February, four days of joint operations by Afghan and foreign troops killed 64 civilians in the eastern Kunar province, including many women and children.

That assault followed a NATO rocket attack last July which killed 39 civilians, almost all women or children, in Helmand.

Under a plan agreed by NATO leaders in Lisbon last year, foreign troops will begin handing over security responsibilities to Afghan troops from July, with a plan to withdraw all combat troops from Afghanistan by the end of 2014.

Despite the presence of some 150,000 foreign troops, violence in Afghanistan last year reached its deadliest phase since U.S.-backed Afghan forces toppled the Taliban in 2001, with record casualties on all sides. This year is following a similar trend.

The Taliban this month announced the start of a long-awaited "spring offensive" vowing to carry out attacks, including suicide assaults, on foreign and Afghan troops and government officials.

(Writing by Amie Ferris-Rotman; Editing by Paul Tait)

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Stroke risks fade when women stop taking estrogen, study finds

By H. Darr Beiser, USA TODAY

Many menopausal women take estrogen pills; many also fear its effects.

EnlargeCloseBy H. Darr Beiser, USA TODAY

Many menopausal women take estrogen pills; many also fear its effects.

The latest study bolsters previous evidence that concerns about breast cancer and heart attacks are largely unfounded for those who take the hormone for a short period of time to relieve hot flashes and other menopause symptoms.

Estrogen-only pills are recommended just for women who have had a hysterectomy, and the study focused only on that group. About 25% of women in menopause have had hysterectomies. Other women are prescribed a combination pill of estrogen and progestin because for them, estrogen alone can raise the risk for cancer of the uterus.

The study results don't really change the advice doctors have been giving for several years now: Take hormones to relieve menopause symptoms in the lowest possible dose for the shortest possible time.

The women in the study took estrogen for about six years and were evaluated for about four years after stopping. Slightly increased risks for strokes and blood clots that were found while they took the pills disappeared during the follow-up. Unfortunately, the bone-strengthening benefit of estrogen disappeared, too. Once women ended it, they had just as many hip fractures during the follow-up as women who'd taken dummy pills.

The research also found that women who started taking estrogen-only pills in their 50s fared better after stopping than women who'd started in their 70s

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