ACROSS THE Middle East and North Africa, hundreds of thousands of people have taken to the streets demanding change. They have toppled dictatorships and threatened undemocratic regimes. But in Iran, the oppression and abuse of any who dare to speak out against the government continues.
The participation of women in the Egyptian revolution didn’t come as a surprise to us, nor do we view it as an extraordinary phenomenon. Women are part of every society and form a part of the social, political and economical spectrum. It is history that tends in most cases to ostracize the participation of women [...]
“The world doesn’t have to choose between the Taliban and the US government. All the beauty of the world—literature, music, art—lies between these two fundamentalist poles.”
Mahboubeh Abbasgholizadeh, a women’s rights activist, is a founding member of the Stop Stoning to Death Campaign and the Iranian Women’s Charter. She was director of Entesharat-e Banoo (Banoo Publications) and Entesharat-e Jamee Iranian (Iranian Society Publication). She was the director of the Association of Women Writers and Journalists NGO. She is currently a Reagan-Fascell Democracy Fellow at the National Endowment for Democracy.
Musicians have not been silent in the movement that brought down Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. Perhaps the most popular song of the Egyptian revolution is by Mohamed Mounir, a singer so revered, he’s known as “The Voice of Egypt.”
by: Farah Mokhtareizadeh Upon Ali’s pillow drew odes from farmers of the Oikumene, they whose dirges lamented silence. Curious hands dug and sought the seeds of heaven, they whose omens split open silence. Jesus summons Joseph through colour of time, to coat Potiphar’s rhyme, draw God’s dream to deign and thread open [...]
In Iran, many human rights lawyers find themselves jailed or threatened with legal action. At the same time, some are criticized by peers who say they sometimes overlook clients’ best interests in their determination to take a stand.
Ballet Afsaneh, the professional performance ensemble of the Afsaneh Art & Culture Society, is based in the San Francisco Bay Area of California in the USA. This dynamic group presents performances and activities featuring dance, poetry, and music of the Silk Road —the historic trade route stretching 7,000 miles across the continenet of Eurasia from [...]
Feminist Association of Tunisian Women for Research and Development.
Physical and sexual violence against women in Iran, including violence perpetrated by state security forces, is rapidly increasing.
As Zohra explains, “Your [US] leaders say they are here to secure Afghanistan, especially for the women. The reporters happily wrote stories about how the Taliban did not let women to go to school. And this is true; many of our women cannot even to read. But now girls cannot go to school, and where is the Taliban? It is not the Taliban who are stopping the girls. What mother would let her child to go to school if they think a bomb will drop on them? For the girls does it matter from which hand the bomb drops?”
