Category Archives: Women

‘He treated me as a slave’: Women face rising violence amid war in Yemen

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Civil war has drastically cut support services for women already at high risk of violence while displacing others who are now vulnerable to armed groups

Rima* was married the year civil war erupted in Yemen. She was 15 and for much of the time over the next five years, her husband kept her chained to a wall in their home in central Yemen. “He didn’t treat me as a wife, he treated me as a slave,” says the 21-year-old.

An aunt eventually took pity on Rima, taking her to a psychosocial support centre in the town of Turba, 90 miles (145km) north-west of Aden. According to a doctor there, Rima now suffers from a neurological disorder brought on by the constant beatings.

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Kate Winslet: ‘I’ve been asked so many times about the intimate scenes’

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Kate Winslet on facing down misogyny in film, strange lockdown habits and the unexpected joys of fossil hunting

A man is adjusting the angle of his laptop. “Hello!” he waves. Is that a dishwasher behind him? A little wooden knick-knack, painted with “Let’s Dance” in a jaunty font, balances on an Aga. I have landed in a cheery overlit garage, somewhere on the south coast. And then the nice man moves to the side and bloody hell there’s Kate Winslet. Movie-star Kate Winslet – “Hiya!” – in a smart black jacket with her hair tied back, and that famous smile where it looks like she’s trying not to laugh at a filthy joke.

The man is her husband, Ned [Abel Smith, previously Ned Rocknroll] and the garage is their “little barn”. “It’s not actually a particularly nice little barn,” she says, her energy very much that of a kindly lady doing your bra fitting at Marks & Spencer – I like her immediately. “But over here, can you see the amazing sink? That’s from the set of Mildred Pierce. It’s got shit taps. But I do like to try to take a little something from my films. I took all the curtains from the cottage in The Holiday…” Her children, Mia (20, her daughter with her first husband Jim Threapleton), Joe (16, from her second marriage, to Sam Mendes) and Bear (born in 2013 soon after she married Ned) keep cutting them up, smaller and smaller: “To, like, upcycle their jeans. Also, I did a film called All the King’s Men where Jude Law and I had to do this snogging scene at a table, where we snog, snog, snogged our socks off. And it was so fabulous. As the scene was happening I kept thinking: ‘I’m going to have to buy this table.’ So I did!”

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Smuggled diary tells how abducted women survived Boko Haram camp

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There was a rescue campaign on Twitter, but the women taken from a Nigerian school were saved by their strength and diplomacy

The resistance began three months after the young women were taken from their school dormitory by Islamist militants and hidden in the depths of a forest. It would end in direct confrontation and disobedience, and an unlikely victory which saved their lives.

But as the extremists of Boko Haram drove them through the bush to camps beyond the reach of any rescue, freedom was years away.

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Nepal proposes ‘ridiculous’ ban on women travelling without permission

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Activists warn new anti-trafficking law requiring permission from families to travel is evidence of ‘deep-rooted patriarchal mindset’

A proposed law in Nepal that would ban women from travelling abroad without permission from their families and local government officials has been called unconstitutional and “ridiculous”.

The proposals, introduced by the Department of Immigration last week in an attempt to prevent women being trafficked, would require all women under 40 to seek permission before they visit Africa or the Middle East for the first time.

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Europe launches recruitment drive for female and disabled astronauts

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European Space Agency aims to take on 26 people for missions to the Moon and eventually to Mars

European space chiefs have launched their first recruitment drive for new astronauts in 11 years, with particular emphasis on encouraging women and people with disabilities to join missions to the Moon and, eventually, Mars.

The European Space Agency (ESA) said on Tuesday that it was looking to boost the diversity of its crews as it cavassed for up to 26 permanent and reserve astronauts.

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‘People want imperfection’: Hiam Abbass on Succession, Ramy and playing complex women

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She is enigmatic Marcia Roy in Succession, but as the Egyptian-American mother in the award-winning Ramy, she’s a hoot. The Palestinian actor examines her many-layered roles

You would be hard pressed to find two TV characters in 2021 with less in common than Marcia Roy and Maysa Hassan. The former is the enigmatic, sophisticated wife of billionaire patriarch Logan Roy in the HBO hit Succession. While the series is dominated by huge personalities, she is a mysterious presence – albeit one who is despised by Logan’s children. The latter, on the other hand, is an open book – the unfiltered, sometimes offensively so, Egyptian-American mother of the title character in the Golden Globe-winning comedy Ramy.

But they are played by the same actor, Hiam Abbass, whose ability to switch from calamity to calm speaks to a varied career across theatre, cinema and, latterly, award-winning television series. Though she has lived in Paris since the late 80s, the Palestinian actor was born in Nazareth, Israel, and started her career with the then-burgeoning Palestinian National Theatre, El-Hakawati. Though the company toured Europe, it was far from an easy existence back at home. “The Israeli authorities didn’t like all of the activities happening at our theatre,” explains Abbass, a warm presence who is fluent in English, Arabic, French and Hebrew. “They would come in and close it down. Part of my work there was dealing with how, politically, we could stay open. Travelling to Europe opened my eyes a little to the possibility of breathing some different air. It was hard to work all the time to justify your being.”

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Stateless, stuck and desperate: the militants’ wives trapped in Kashmir

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Hundreds married to men who travelled to Pakistan for militant training now find themselves stateless

Under dark skies in Kashmir’s heavily militarised town of Kupwara, Saira Javed mournfully recalled her happy childhood.

Recounting her early life in Karachi, a bustling metropolis over the border in Pakistan, she spoke vividly of her father, Abdul Latif, who would take their large family on weekend picnics and of the moonlit nights she spent dying her hands with henna.

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Women need male guardian to travel, says Hamas court in Gaza Strip

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Rollback in women’s rights could spark backlash as Palestinians plan elections later in the year

A Hamas-run Islamic court in the Gaza Strip has ruled that women require the permission of a male guardian to travel, further restricting movement in and out of the territory that has been blockaded by Israel and Egypt since the militant group seized power.

The rollback in women’s rights could spark a backlash in Gaza at a time when the Palestinians plan to hold elections later this year. It could also solidify Hamas’s support among its conservative base at a time when it faces criticism over living conditions in the territory it has ruled since 2007.

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Lawyers seek justice for women jailed for killing abusive partners

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A failure to account for previous violence has led to at least 20 unsafe murder convictions, campaigners claim

It was a specific moment in which she thought she might die that drove Stella to the brink. “He had strangled me at the bottom of the stairs and that frightened me because you can get punched in the face or your hand broken, but I had never lost my breath before,” she recalled.

For Nicole, she was “pushed over the edge” when violence by her partner triggered a post-traumatic response to historic abuse by other men. “I was getting flashbacks of abuse ... everything came to a head and I just lost it.”

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Contraceptive pill could be sold over counter in UK first

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Public consultation led by the MHRA is looking for views on the potential reclassification of two pill types

Two types of the contraceptive pill could be sold over the counter for the first time, the government has announced.

As part of a public consultation, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) is looking for opinions on the reclassification of two progestogen-only pills.

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Death of nurse detained over Covid curfew highlights violence faced by Honduran women

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The death of Keyla Martínez, 26, is being treated as a murder – she is one of 29 women killed in the country so far this year

Keyla Martínez screamed for help from inside the police cell, but no one came to save her.

Martínez, a 26-year-old trainee nurse from La Esperanza, western Honduras, died in police custody last weekend after being detained for breaching a coronavirus curfew.

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Margaret Snyder obituary

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Founding director of Unifem, the United Nations development fund for women

When Margaret Snyder first started working for the UN in Addis Ababa in 1971, programmes for African women centred around healthcare and support for children. Snyder, who has died aged 91, established the first UN regional women’s programme to change that perception. She went on to launch the UN’s development fund for women (Unifem) and became affectionately known as the “UN’s first feminist”.

Her job in Ethiopia was to help establish a women’s programme at the UN Economic Commission for Africa (ECA) to support women in their roles as farmers, entrepreneurs and often family breadwinners. The programme evolved into the African Training and Research Centre for Women (ATRCW).

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Moufida Tlatli, first Arab woman to direct a feature film, dies aged 73

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Tunisian director of multi-award-winning The Silences of the Palace broke the mould with films about the trauma suffered by generations of women

Moufida Tlatli, the pioneering Tunisian film-maker hailed as the first Arab woman to direct a feature film, has died aged 73. News media said that she died on Sunday, with the news confirmed by the Tunisian ministry of culture.

Tlatli remains best known for her breakthrough 1994 feature The Silences of the Palace, a lyrical study of a woman’s return to an abandoned royal residence, which tackled the themes of exploitation and trauma as experienced across generations of Arab women. It won a string of international awards, including the Sutherland trophy at the London film festival for the most “original and imaginative” film of the year, and was named as one of Africa’s 10 best films by critic and director Mark Cousins. The film was inspired by her mother’s difficult life; in 2001, Tlatli told the Guardian she “was riven with guilt … It was so insupportable, exhausting, suffocating.”

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Jackie Kay on Bessie Smith: ‘My libidinous, raunchy, fearless blueswoman’

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As a black girl growing up in 1970s Glasgow, poet Jackie Kay developed a passion for Bessie Smith. In this extract from her new book, she remembers the wild spirit who helped her find her true self

I was adopted in 1961 and brought up in a suburban house in a suburban street in the north of Glasgow. A small, semi-detached Wimpey house. Outside our house is a cherry-blossom tree that is as old as me. It doesn’t seem the most likely place to be introduced to the blues, but then blues travel to wherever the blues lovers go. In my street and in the neighbouring streets to Brackenbrae Avenue, I never saw another black person. There was my brother and me. That was it. The butcher, the baker and the candlestick-maker were all white. (Although I never actually met a candlestick-maker – has anyone?)

So the first time I saw Bessie Smith, it really was like finding a friend. I saw her before I heard her. My father – a Scottish communist who loved the blues – bought me my first double album. I was 12. The album was called Bessie Smith: Any Woman’s Blues and produced by CBS Records ( John Hammond and Chris Albertson; Albertson went on to write her biography). I remember taking the album off him and poring over it, examining it for every detail. Her image on the cover captivated me. She looked so familiar. She looked like somebody I already knew in my heart of hearts. I stared at the image of her, trying to recall who it was she reminded me of.

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More deaths, worse care? Inquiry opens into NHS maternity ‘systemic racism’

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Childbirth rights group supports examination into disproportionate health outcomes

An urgent inquiry to investigate how alleged systemic racism in the NHS manifests itself in maternity care will be launched on Tuesday with support from the UK charity Birthrights.

The inquiry will apply a human- rights lens to examine how claimed racial injustice – from explicit racism to bias – is leading to poorer health outcomes in maternity care for ethnic minority groups.

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Radical, angry, creative: British women lead a screen revolution

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The Golden Globe nominations prove that the industry is in the throes of a sea change for female writers and directors

Corks popped across the film industry when three female directors made history by getting Golden Globe nominations last week. Alongside Regina King and Chloé Zhao was British newcomer Emerald Fennell, until now best known as Camilla in The Crown and for stepping into Phoebe Waller-Bridge’s shoes as show runner on Killing Eve. Her alarming feminist thriller, Promising Young Woman, picked up a clutch of coveted nominations.

“When those directors’ names were announced I ran around the room screaming,” said Jessica Hobbs, one of the directors on The Crown. “I messaged Emerald who couldn’t believe it. I told her I knew it was coming.”

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How Covid could be the ‘long overdue’ shake-up needed by the aid sector

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Analysis: as need outstrips funding, experts are making the case for overhauling ‘old-fashioned’ donor-recipient narratives

This year one in every 33 people across the world will need humanitarian assistance. That is a rise of 40% from last year, according to the UN. More than half of the countries requiring aid to help deal with the coronavirus pandemic are already in protracted crises, coping with conflict or natural disasters.

Even before Covid-19 threw decades of progress on extreme poverty, healthcare and education into reverse, aid budgets were heading in the wrong direction. In 2020, the UN had just 48% of its $38.5bn (£28bn) in funding appeals met, compared with 63% of $29bn sought in 2019.

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Tokyo 2020 chief pressed to resign after saying women talked too much at meetings

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Yoshiro Mori said he would not stand down after saying female participants meant meetings tended to ‘drag on’

Yoshiro Mori, the head of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics organising committee, has apologised for making sexist remarks about “talkative” women in sports organisations, but said he would not resign.

Mori, a former Japanese prime minister with a history of demeaning remarks, told a meeting of the Japanese Olympic Committee (JOC) this week that meetings attended by too many women tended to “drag on” because they talked too much.

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Worker at H&M supply factory was killed after months of harassment, claims family

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Fashion brand to investigate the death of 20-year-old Jeyasre Kathiravel, reportedly killed by supervisor at Natchi Apparels

The family of a young garment worker at an H&M supplier factory in Tamil Nadu who was allegedly murdered by her supervisor said she had suffered months of sexual harassment and intimidation on the factory floor in the months before her death, but felt powerless to prevent the abuse from continuing.

H&M said it is launching an independent investigation into the killing of Jeyasre Kathiravel, a 20-year-old Dalit garment worker at an H&M supplier Natchi Apparels in Kaithian Kottai, Tamil Nadu, who was found dead on 5 January in farmland near her home.

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‘Making our home safe again’: meet the women who clear land mines

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After decades of war, more and more women are working to remove lethal mines and IEDs from the fields and cities of their homelands. It’s dangerous, but it’s helping to rebuild their lives

As a child, Hana Khider dreamed of Sinjar. Born and brought up in Syria, she remembers her mother telling her stories about the district in northern Iraq where her relatives lived. “I always imagined it in my mind,” she says, smiling over our video call. “It was beautiful and peaceful.” Today, Sinjar is her home. She lives with her husband and three children in a village close to Mount Sinjar, which she describes as “very special to our community”. Khider is Yazidi and they believe the mountain was the final resting place of Noah’s Ark. The rocky peak has long been considered a sacred refuge for persecuted people.

It was the mountain that saved her and more than 40,000 other Yazidis when they fled Islamic State in August 2014. Driven from their villages, they camped on the mountain for months – some for years – after a genocide that, according to the UN, saw 5,000 Yazidis massacred and up to 7,000 women and girls captured and sold as sex slaves to Isis members. “We feared for our lives,” Khider, now 28, says, explaining how Isis fighters surrounded the mountain. Luckily, she escaped to Kurdistan, where she lived in an internally displaced persons (IDP) camp until her village was liberated. Her family returned in May 2016. A few months later, she applied to work as a deminer at the Mines Advisory Group (MAG), a charity that finds and clears mines in places of conflict.

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