The War on Girls –By Jonathan V. Last | WSJ (Book Review)

Mara Hvistendahl writes that women in Asia with access to technology are choosing to have boys over girls, which has led to an imbalance of gender that has left the region “missing” 160 million women (Photo: Public Affairs)

Since the late 1970s, 163 million female babies have been aborted by parents seeking sons

Mara Hvistendahl is worried about girls. Not in any political, moral or cultural sense but as an existential matter. She is right to be. In China, India and numerous other countries (both developing and developed), there are many more men than women, the result of systematic campaigns against baby girls. In “Unnatural Selection,” Ms. Hvistendahl reports on this gender imbalance: what it is, how it came to be and what it means for the future.

In nature, 105 boys are born for every 100 girls. This ratio is biologically ironclad. Between 104 and 106 is the normal range, and that’s as far as the natural window goes. Any other number is the result of unnatural events.

Yet today in India there are 112 boys born for every 100 girls. In China, the number is 121—though plenty of Chinese towns are over the 150 mark. China’s and India’s populations are mammoth enough that their outlying sex ratios have skewed the global average to a biologically impossible 107. But the imbalance is not only in Asia. Azerbaijan stands at 115, Georgia at 118 and Armenia at 120.

What is causing the skewed ratio: abortion. If the male number in the sex ratio is above 106, it means that couples are having abortions when they find out the mother is carrying a girl. By Ms. Hvistendahl’s counting, there have been so many sex-selective abortions in the past three decades that 163 million girls, who by biological averages should have been born, are missing from the world. Moral horror aside, this is likely to be of very large consequence.

Excerpt, read:  The War on Girls –By Jonathan V. Last | WSJ (Book Review)

Related: In Asia, The Perils of Aborting Girls and Keeping Boys | NPR (Book Review)

 

Happy 50th Birthday, Amnesty International!

On 28 May, Amnesty International celebrated 50 years of independent campaigning to end grave abuses of human rights. Fifty years which have seen the movement grow from its early beginnings as a small office in London, staffed by volunteers, to a truly global movement of more than 3 million supporters, members and activists.

Amnesty International’s vision is for every person to enjoy all the rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international human rights standards.

Amnesty International Celebrates 50 Years of Defending Human Rights

 

Mexican Human Rights Activist Granted Political Asylum in the U.S. –By Valeria Fernández | New America Media

EL PASO, Texas — Cipriana Jurado never imagined her fight for human rights in Ciudad Juarez, “the murder capital” of Mexico, would lead her to flee her country in defense of her life.

“The problem is that the federal and state government has been blind to what’s going on in Juarez. For them we are just numbers, collateral damage,” said Jurado.

Jurado was granted a political asylum request last Friday, making her the first case in recent history in which the U.S. government recognized that a human rights activist was persecuted by the military in Mexico, according to her attorney Carlos Specter.

“The complaint was based on the fear Jurado had of returning (to Mexico) for her criticism and her documenting of abuse perpetrated by the military,” said Specter.

The Office of Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) said they couldn’t confirm the decision for confidentiality rules and that they don’t keep statistics on the reasons why the U.S. government grants asylum.

The lack of statistics makes it hard to know whether Jurado’s case is among the first of its kind, said Karen Musala, clinical professor of law and director of the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at the University of California Hastings College of the Law.

But she agrees with Specter that historically, politics have gotten in the way of granting political asylum. When it comes to Mexico, she said, there is an underlying fear that due to its proximity to the United States, the numbers of people seeking this protection could grow.

Musala also believes political asylum can be granted not only due to political persecution by the government but when the government can’t protect its citizens from non-state actors, “whether it’s narco-traffickers or individuals.”

In fiscal year 2010, the United States granted political asylum to 21,113 people, 192 of them from Mexico, according to statistics from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).  According to Specter, about 90 percent of asylum cases presented in the United States are refused “for political reasons.”

“They still don’t recognize that there’s violence coming from the state towards the Mexican community, specifically from the federal officers and the military,” said Specter, adding that is why Jurado’s case is so significant.

Jurado, a 46-year-old single mother, applied for asylum in March, almost a year after her longtime friend Josefina Reyes, another human rights activist who had denounced military abuses, was gunned down in Guadalupe, a small town near Juarez on the West Texas border. She holds backs her tears as she remembers the testimony of some of the witnesses.

“She fought. We’ve always said that if they try to take us it wouldn’t be alive, because we fear torture so much,” she said.

Jurado and her friend Josefina Reyes had been publicly outspoken against the military since 2007, when the first troops started arriving in Juarez as part of Mexican President Felipe Calderón’s war on drugs.

The city was already known for the violent murders of hundreds of women that were never solved. The presence of the military, she said, took the violence and impunity to another level. In Juarez and surrounding areas, close to 8,000 people have been killed in the last three years, when the war on drugs escalated.

“In Juarez there’s no fight against drug trafficking. In Juarez there are armed groups murdering people that are unarmed,” she said.

Jurado came to Juarez to work in a maquila when she was 13. She founded the “Centro de Investigación y Solidad Obrera” (Center for Investigation and Worker Solidarity) from her home to fight for workers’ rights and had been investigating femicides in the city for decades. But soon she found herself documenting a new kind of case: grievances from locals who said the Mexican military had kidnapped their family members, tortured and sometimes murder them.

“They’ll take them to the military base and then they’ll start torturing them, so they’ll plead guilty to smuggling drugs or being ‘sicarios’ – that’s what they call paid assassins here,” she said. “We started seeing forced disappearances and extrajudicial murders.”

It was during her investigation into the disappearance of Saúl Becerra Reyes that she began feeling that her life was in danger.

Becerra was reportedly taken by the military on Oct. 21, 2008 with five other young men who were incarcerated in a military base, accused of possession of drugs and weapons. One of the arrestees testified that he and Becerra had been tortured, according to a report in Mexico City newspaper El Universal. After that, he said, he never saw Becerra again. Becerra’s body was found on the side of the road in April 2009, while Jurado was investigating the case.

In an article published in El Universal in July 2009, Jurado said that what could have happened to Becerra was that, “como en muchos otros casos, se les pasó la mano con la tortura” (as in many other cases, they went too far with the torture).

When his body was found, she started receiving threats. There were several attempts to break into her home, documents were stolen from her office and at one point her 19-year-old son was followed and threatened on the street.

Jurado was urged by several human rights organizations including Amnesty International, which was assisting her in her investigations, to seek asylum in the United States.

But it was a difficult decision to make. She felt a responsibility to continue the work she had started to press the government to investigate hundreds of unsolved cases of murders and disappearances.

She was reminded of an earlier incident, in 2008, when she thought she was going to be killed. A group of agents from Mexico’s Federal Agency of Investigations took her from her home without explanation. She was released 24 hours later, and told she had been arrested for obstructing the public way during a protest back in 2005.

But when she saw Josefina’s children at the funeral for her longtime friend and colleague, she knew what she had to do. “They couldn’t even say goodbye because her coffin was closed,” she said. “I just thought, I don’t want my children to be in this situation.”

She took a trip to Chicago to speak about violence in Juarez. When her visa expired in December 2010, she didn’t return to Mexico.

Excerpt, read: Mexican Human Rights Activist Granted Political Asylum in the U.S. –By Valeria Fernández | New American Media

 

Syria Accused of Torturing Second Teenager to Death –By David S. Morgan | CBS

(WARNING: Graphic video)

The body of a 15-year-old Syrian boy, bearing signs of what activists called torture, was returned to his parents six weeks after the boy disappeared.

Video footage of the boy’s body obtained by Al Jazeera from a Syrian source shows what appear to be gruesome wounds: Riddled with bullet holes, the boy’s body is missing an eye and several teeth, his neck and leg broken. A large part of his lower face is now a large hole.

Hundreds in the town of Jeeza mourned the death of Thamer al-Sahri Wednesday. The boy had vanished six weeks ago along with his friend, Hamza al-Khatib, a 13-year-old whose tortured remains were released by Syrian authorities in late May.

Hamza’s body was covered in burns and scorch marks – signs of being tortured by electric shocks and cigarettes. Hamza’s neck had been broken, his arms shot, and his genitals cut off. The torture of Hamza became an international rallying cry against the regime of President Assad.

Excerpt, read: Syria Accused of Torturing Second Teenager to Death –By David S. Morgan |CBS



Related videos:

• Torture in Syria (Video)
• CNN: “Rampant Torture” in Syria  (Video)

 

UN Council Adopts Historic Resolution Supporting Equal Rights for Gays –By Lisa Schlein | VOA

The United Nations Human Rights Council has adopted an historic resolution that seeks to give gays and lesbians rights equal to those enjoyed by heterosexuals.  The resolution passed by a narrow margin and over the vigorous objections of African and Arab countries.

After a long debate,  the critical vote was taken.

The overflow audience burst out into applause before the president of the U.N. Human Rights Council, Sihasak Phuangketkeow, had a chance to announce the results of the vote.  A giant video screen showed the final tally was 23 votes in favor of ending discrimination against gays, lesbians, bisexual and transsexual people, 19 against and three abstentions.

The Obama administration has been a staunch supporter of the resolution, and U.S. Ambassador Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe said the United States is thrilled by the outcome of what she called this simple but historic resolution.

“Today, we have taken an important step forward in our recognition that human rights are indeed universal,” Donohoe  said. “We recognize that violence against a person because of who they are is wrong.  The right to choose, who we love and to share life with those we love is sacred.  Further, we send the unequivocal message that each human being deserves equal protection from violence and discrimination.  Today, we make history in the fight for basic fairness and equality.”

But not all countries were as upbeat or thrilled with the outcome.  Arab and African states strongly opposed the resolution.  Pakistan’s ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, Zamir Akram, speaking on behalf of the Organization of the Islamic Conference, said the OIC was seriously concerned that the Council was discussing controversial notions of sexual orientation.

He added there was no legal basis in any international human rights instruments for dealing with individual sexual interest and behavior at the United Nations.

The Nigerian representative, speaking on behalf of the African group, was particularly scathing and critical of South Africa, which was the main sponsor of the resolution.  Ositadinna Anaedu accused South Africa of breaking ranks with the African region and siding with the West.

He said African countries oppose racism and discrimination, but quoting the Nigerian president he said individual and national rights are not a matter for international concern.

“Strongly rejects any attempts to undermine international human rights system by seeking to impose concepts by turning to social matters including private, individual conduct that fall outside the internationally agreed human rights legal work,” Anaedu said.  “Taking into account that such attempts constitute an expression of disregard for the universality of human rights.”

Despite this criticism, South Africa remained resolute in its conviction that all people are equal and deserve equal rights.

The resolution states “no one should be subject to discrimination or violence due to sexual orientation or gender identity.”

It expresses grave concerns at acts of violence and discrimination, in all regions of the world against gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender individuals.  The resolution also commissions a study on discriminatory laws and violence against individuals based on their sexual orientation and gender identity.

Reprint: UN Council Adopts Historic Resolution Supporting Equal Rights for Gays –By Lisa Schlein |VOA

 

Out in America | PBS Documentary (Video)

Emmy award-winning director Andrew Goldberg and PBS, in association with Oregon Public Broadcasting, today announced a new national PBS special, OUT in America. The one hour film will make its national premiere on PBS in June, in conjunction with National Gay & Lesbian Pride Month.

OUT in America is an uplifting collection of unique, transformative stories and inspiring personal narratives told through the lens of the country’s most prominent LGBT figures and pioneers, as well as many average, yet extraordinary, citizens from Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender communities. The program weaves together diverse stories – from urban and rural America, from the heartland to New England, from San Francisco to Harlem. Deeply moving and often humorous, viewers will get a glimpse of awakenings, first crushes, unlikely soul mates, intimacy and liberation. While separated by circumstance and upbringing, the film’s subjects are all united in their shared experiences of self-discovery, coming out, pride and love as well as a triumph over adversity and a true sense of belonging. Against the backdrop of historical events, each also traces their own hopes, struggles, influences and contributions towards advancements in equality and broad social change.

Featured interviews include TV personality Andy Cohen (Bravo TV Host), famed Tales of the City author Armistead Maupin, country music star Chely Wright, humorist Kate Clinton, as well as legendary LGBT activists James Hormel (philanthropist), Urvashi Vaid (former Executive Director of the pre-eminent civil rights organization National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, recently cited in Out Magazine’s list of most influential men and women in America) and Dr. Patricia Hawkins (psychologist renowned for her early work with HIV patients). Other influential lesbians, gay men, bisexuals and transgender people in the film include: Reverend Peter Gomes, who came out on the steps of Memorial Church at Harvard; PJ Serrano, Puerto Rico’s first openly gay and HIV positive political candidate; a transgender police lieutenant, who transitioned while on active duty; a Muslim lesbian from the country of Mauritius; a gay rancher; the organizer of Capital Queer Prom; a Latino rapper; a West Point graduate and former Captain in the US Army; a drag queen; a great-grandmother; and “The Harolds,” a giddy bi-racial couple in their 80s, who reminisce, in unison, about their five decades together.

Review by Amos Lassen

 

30 Years of AIDS –By Fauci & Folkers | The Advocate

“The global HIV/AIDS epidemic is an unprecedented crisis that requires an unprecedented response. In particular it requires solidarity — between the healthy and the sick, between rich and poor, and above all, between richer and poorer nations. We have 30 million orphans already. How many more do we have to get, to wake up?” ~Kofi A. Annan, Fmr. Sec. General of the United Nations

Thirty years ago, the first five cases of what is now known as the acquired immune deficiency syndrome were reported in the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. The amount of knowledge gained since then has been extraordinary, and the pace at which research findings have been translated into lifesaving treatments and tools of prevention is unprecedented, although much remains to be done with regard to delivering the fruits of this research to the people who need them most.

The discovery of the human immunodeficiency virus as the cause of AIDS in 1983-1984 was followed by an understanding of how HIV leads to AIDS; the natural history and epidemiology of the disease; the creation of a diagnostic blood test; and the development over the years of more than 30 antiretroviral drugs. The approval of the first protease inhibitors in 1995-1996 paved the way for powerful, multi-drug antiretroviral therapy. The many combination regimens now available using different classes of antiretroviral drugs have dramatically improved the quality of life and extended the life expectancy of people with HIV. An HIV-infected person properly treated with this combination therapy — and provided other needed care and services — now can expect to live for decades after being diagnosed.

Antiretroviral treatment regimens also can prevent HIV infection. When given to pregnant HIV-infected women and their newborns, these drugs have been enormously successful in preventing mother-to-child transmission of HIV. Moreover, just three weeks ago, a rigorous, controlled clinical trial conducted in nine countries confirmed another potent way to apply treatment as prevention.

The study results were striking: Among more than 1,700 heterosexual couples in which one partner was HIV-infected and the other was not, starting combination antiretroviral therapy immediately in the infected partner when blood tests indicate his or her immune system is still strong resulted in a 96% reduction in HIV transmission to the uninfected partner, compared with deferring treatment until the same tests showed the immune system to be weaker.

This recent report confirms that combination therapy not only benefits the infected individual but also can reduce the risk of transmitting the virus to others. By confirming that this type of therapy can do double duty as treatment and prevention, this study has energized the medical, public health, and activist communities. In addition to its role in protecting babies from infection, “treatment as prevention” to block sexual transmission now can be added to our toolkit of proven HIV prevention interventions, which also includes behavioral modification, condom distribution, the provision of clean needles and syringes to injection drug users, medically supervised adult male circumcision, and other approaches.

Meanwhile, other recent progress in HIV research gives us hope that we soon will have additional prevention tools. Notably, a once-a-day pill combining two antiretroviral drugs was shown to reduce the risk of HIV acquisition in men who have sex with men (MSM), and an antiretroviral-based, vaginally applied gel did the same for heterosexual women.

Although a protective HIV vaccine remains elusive, we are encouraged by the recent demonstration that a vaccine tested in Thailand provided modest protection against HIV. Researchers now are examining blood samples and data from the Thai trial to determine how the vaccine prevented HIV infections, information that will help guide efforts to improve on those results.

Scientists also are pursuing many other research avenues, including structure-based vaccine design. With this approach, researchers characterize in exquisite detail key molecules on the HIV virus and use these structures to design new components for next-generation HIV vaccine candidates.

Entering the fourth decade of HIV/AIDS, our task is to build on these advances and deliver scientifically validated interventions to everyone who needs them, both in the United States and abroad. Six in ten HIV-infected people in developing countries who need combination antiretroviral therapy are not receiving it, which puts their health and that of their sexual partners at risk.

Domestically, access to treatment and care also is not optimal. A recent analysis estimated that of the 1.1 million people living with HIV in the United States, approximately 20% are unaware of their infection. And within the entire group of infected people, only about 19% have a viral load that has been driven to undetectable levels by combination therapy. Both at home and globally, greater numbers of HIV-infected individuals need to be identified early in the course of their disease through expanded voluntary HIV testing programs and linkage to appropriate care and antiretroviral treatment.

In addition, prevention programs using proven tools must be dramatically “scaled up,” refined, improved, and made more cost-effective. At the same time, we must continue to develop additional effective prevention strategies.

We also must find innovative approaches to curing HIV/AIDS by eradicating or permanently suppressing the virus in infected people, thereby eliminating the need for lifelong antiretroviral therapy. In this regard, important new research is being undertaken by the National Institutes of Health and other organizations. A robust research effort is critical to address the malignancies, cardiovascular and metabolic complications, and premature aging associated with long-term HIV disease and/or antiretroviral therapy.

Despite these challenges and the huge burden of this modern-day plague, we now look at the fight against HIV/AIDS – and our chances of prevailing – with considerably more optimism than we previously have felt. With the medical and public health tools now or soon-to-be available, controlling and ending the global HIV/AIDS pandemic are feasible goals.

Unfortunately, we are in a difficult situation of considerable global constraints on resources to support this goal. Every effort must be made to efficiently apply existing resources so that proven interventions are delivered in the most cost-effective manner. In addition, public-sector, commercial and philanthropic commitments to HIV/AIDS research and implementation of proven findings must be sustained and strengthened with the investment of additional resources to ensure that HIV treatment and prevention services are universally available to the people who need them, wherever they live.With a global commitment, we can control and ultimately end the HIV/AIDS pandemic. On this commemoration of the 30-year anniversary, let us recommit ourselves to that goal.

This column is provided by Kaiser Health News, an editorially independent news service of the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan health-care policy organization that is not affiliated with Kaiser Permanente.

Reprint: 30 Years of AIDS –By Anthony S. Fauci & Gregory K. Folkers |The Advocate

 

Tortured Boy Becomes Face of Syrian Uprising –By Dominic Waghorn | Sky News

Hamza al Khatib disappeared during demonstrations on April 29 in the south of the country. His mutilated body was returned to his family a month later. In a gruesome video posted on the internet, apparent medical examiners point to gunshot wounds on his corpse.

They claim to have found bruises on his arms and legs, say his neck has been broken and he has been tortured. They also claim his genitals were mutilated.

The body is partly decomposed.

It is impossible to verify the claims, although the puncture holes in his chest and arms look like gunshot wounds. The Syrian government claims Hamza was killed in a shoot-out between armed gangs and guards, but says that there is no evidence of torture.

In a sense the truth about his death is less important than the impact of the video (Warning: Graphic content).

Hamza has been compared to Mohamed Bouazizi, the vegetable seller whose self-immolation sparked the Tunisian revolution.

His story is also reminiscent of Khaled Said‘s, the Egyptian whose death in police custody began the Facebook campaign that started the revolution there.

Hamza al Khatib, 13, who was tortured and murdered by the government has become the face of the Syrian uprising (Photo: AP).

Syria’s uprising has lasted 12 weeks without a focus or symbol.

Despite unleashing the full force of its military on protestors the regime has been unable to quell the unrest. Large protests are continuing, but neither side has yet gained sufficient momentum to overcome the other.

Reprint: Tortured Boy Becomes Face of Syrian Uprising –By Dominic Waghorn | Sky News

Related: We are all Hamza Alkhateeb (facebook page)

 

Egyptians Decry Protesters’ ‘Virginity Tests’ | TIME/ AP

Photo: Reuters/ Fayaz Kabli

(CAIRO) — Egyptian activists and bloggers are pressing Egypt’s military rulers to investigate growing accusations of abuses against protesters, including claims that soldiers subjected female detainees to so-called “virginity tests.”

Bloggers say they will hold a day of online protest on Wednesday to voice their outrage. Amnesty International raised the accusations of virginity tests in a May report. It said 18 female protesters held in military detention reported that they were threatened with prostitution charges and forced to undergo “virginity tests.” They also said the were tortured, beaten up and given electric shocks.

The allegations surfaced after a crackdown on a March 9 protest in Cairo by crowds calling on the military to speed up a transition to democracy after Hosni Mubarak’s ouster.

Reprint:  Egyptians Decry Protesters’ ‘Virginity Tests’ | TIME/ AP

 

Teen Katya Koren Allegedly Stoned to Death for Entering Beauty Pageant | CBS News

Reports allege that Katya Koren was stoned to death for participating in beauty contests. The investigation is ongoing. (Photo: Courtesy of facebook)

A teenage Muslim girl’s body was found dumped in a forest the Crimean peninsula one week after she was reported missing. Local media initially reported that she was stoned to death by suspects claiming the 19-year-old has violated Sharia law by taking part in a beauty contest, a British newspaper reports.

Will Stewart of the Daily Mail writes that Koren’s appeared to have suffered head injuries and been strangled. However, the Daily Telegraph writes that local police are claiming “her killing had nothing to do with sectarian violence and that the girl had been killed by a psychologically troubled classmate who had given her a lift on his moped and then robbed and possibly raped her before battering her to death with a rock.”

Sergei Reznikov, a senior policeman involved in the case, told the Telegraph: “A student did it, killing his classmate. There is no other underlying reason, neither religious nor linked with inter-ethnic conflicts.”

Initial reports had indicated that three Muslim youths killed her, saying her death was justified under Islamic law because taking part in a beauty contest is a violation of it.

The Daily Mail reported that one 16-year-old suspect under arrest told police Koren had “violated the laws of Sharia.”

According to an official report on a Crimean government website, the 16-year-old classmate confessed to her murder, and gave as his reason, “I just wanted to kill her.”

While the area is home to some 250,000 Muslims, incidents of Sharia Law being enforced are almost unheard of, the Telegraph reports. The 16-year-old suspect allegedly has a history of mental health issues, and is being evaluated currently for whether he is of sound mind.

Muslim Girl in Beauty Contest Stoned to Death | CBS News