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URGENT ALERT: Stop the minimum age of marriage for girls in Egypt from being reduced to as low as 9 years old
Equality Now issued an urgent alert today calling on Egyptian authorities to stop the minimum age of marriage from being reduced to as low as 9 years old for girls. If adopted, girls could be married off by their families without their consent putting them at risk of physical and psychological harm. In addition, amendments to legislation limiting a mother’s custody of her children upon divorce have also been introduced. Please call upon Egyptian authorities to stop these proposed changes, which would further harm and marginalize girls and women.
Take action here:
http://org2.democracyinaction.org/o/6208/p/dia/action/public/?action_KEY=10539
Please click on the following link for further information:
http://www.equalitynow.org/take_action/child_marriage_action
Equality Now was founded in 1992 to work for the protection and promotion of the human rights of women around the world. Working with national human rights organizations and individual activists, Equality Now documents violence and discrimination against women and mobilizes international action to support their efforts to stop these human rights abuses. Through its Women’s Action Network of concerned groups and individuals around the world, Equality Now:
- distributes information about human rights violations
- takes action to protest these violations
- brings public attention to human rights violations against women
About Equality Now
Equality Now was founded in 1992 to work for the protection and promotion of the human rights of women around the world. Working with national human rights organizations and individual activists, Equality Now documents violence and discrimination against women and mobilizes international action to support their efforts to stop these human rights abuses. Through its Women’s Action Network of concerned groups and individuals around the world, Equality Now:
distributes information about human rights violations
takes action to protest these violations
brings public attention to human rights violations against women
The Women’s Action Network is committed to voicing a worldwide call for justice and equality for women. Issues of urgent concern to Equality Now include rape, domestic violence, reproductive rights, trafficking of women, female genital mutilation, and the denial of equal access to economic opportunity and political participation.
Human rights violations against women have historically been denied the attention and concern of international organizations, national governments, traditional human rights groups and the media. Meanwhile, hundreds of millions of girls and women around the globe continue to endure debilitating and often fatal human rights abuses.
India: A 10-year-old girl is rescued by a flight attendant who notices her crying. Her father has sold her to the 60-year-old Saudi Arabian man sitting next to her for the equivalent of US$240.
- Kenya: At a boarding school, 300 boys attack the girls' dormitory. Seventy-one girls are raped. Nineteen are trampled to death in the stampede to escape. The school's vice principal remarks, "The boys never meant any harm against the girls. They just wanted to rape."
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Brazil: A man who confessed to stabbing his wife and her lover to death is for the second time acquitted of murder by an all-male jury. The acquittal is based on the argument that he acted in legitimate defense of his wronged honor.
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Ireland: A 14-year-old girl, raped by the father of her best friend, learns she is pregnant. She is prohibited from travelling to England where abortion is legal. Only when she indicates she will commit suicide if forced to carry the pregnancy to term does the Supreme Court allow her to proceed.
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United States: A 51-year-old woman is stabbed 19 times and killed by her former boyfriend as she waits inside a courthouse to extend an order of protection. Twice before he had been charged with harassment. Both times the charges were dropped.
These are only a few instances of abuses which occur every single day. Human rights violations against women must be documented, publicized--and stopped. We need Equality Now.
For more information, visit www.equalitynow.org Back to main Spotlight page
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