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Asma al Assad: Just a wife to her President husband?

Asma al Assad

Asma al Assad. Wife of Syria’s president, Bashar al Assad. Like many young Syrians, I believed in her. She was educated in England and ever since she became Syria’s first lady, she devoted herself to different civil projects. I liked how she took part in public life, helped out with women’s development projects and tried to be close to the Syrian people.This image lasted until the Syrian revolt began in March 2011.

Date

01.06.2012 | 12:32

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Children suffer labor pain

It was a freezing cold December morning in India. I was wrapped up in my thick blanket.  The alarm buzzed, coupled with my mother panicking about her early morning list of “to-dos”.

Date

29.05.2012 | 11:35

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Removing hurdles for Afghan girls in school

Women in Afghanistan suffered severely under the Taliban regime. They were prevented from going to school and working. Today, the country depends on help from abroad to guarantee schooling for girls.

Date

24.05.2012 | 8:14

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The globalization of ideal beauty

Female beauty is often defined by the Western fashion elite in Milan or New York. But more and more German magazines are speaking out against it. Internationally, there are a multitude of different agendas.

“I’ve really had enough of the tyranny of fashion. That’s why I live in Berlin. Berlin is a lot freer,” explained the Spanish-Colombian fashion designer Ricardo Ramos. In fashion capitals such as Paris and New York, it’s a very different story.

Date

24.05.2012 | 8:03

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Oscar-winning acid attack film sparks controversy in Pakistan

Some of the survivors of acid attacks portrayed in a recent documentary about their fates fear reprisals if the film is broadcast in Pakistan. Acid crime affects hundreds every year.

In February, there was jubilation in Pakistan when Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy became the first Pakistani filmmaker to win an Academy Award. “Saving Face,” Obaid-Chinoy’s 40-minute documentary, is about the victims of acid attacks in Pakistan.

It focuses in particular on two women, Zakia and Rukhsana, who fight to rebuild their lives after being attacked by their husbands, and ôn the Pakistani-born plastic surgeon Mohammad Jawad who tries to restore people’s faces by using artificial skin substitutes, grafts and other surgical techniques.

Date

24.05.2012 | 6:41

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Born to die…….it is a girl child

 

I have always been a “Daddy’s girl”. And I am proud to be one too. But being a privileged one doesn’t make me insensitive.  Coming from a country like India where the birth of a girl child is still considered a curse, it makes me wonder if we have really come a long way as a country.

 Living in my world as an educated, urban, independent woman I became a bit selfish. I didn’t realise that the old order of societal norms still prevailed around me. In the process of my own transition from being a much loved daughter, sister, friend to a much loved wife I had certainly become less aware of what was going on in Indian society. And the birth of a girl child is one case in point.But two incidents in a row changed it all and woke me up with a start. It was the 15 March 2012; I was browsing the Indian news channels and e-newspapers. One name that made headlines was Baby Falak, a two year old girl who died of cardiac arrest. It was her third cardiac arrest in three months. She was admitted in a hospital in Delhi on 18 January 2012 with a fractured skull and human bite marks on her body.

Date

08.05.2012 | 11:47

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Too much, too early: underage marriage

 

What should a poor father do if he has two options to choose from? Either he has to marry off his five-year-old daughter to his rival’s six-year-old son as a settlement of a dispute or give the rival one million Pakistani rupees (some 8,333 euros) as a settlement.

If answering that one is difficult, try this one. What should a 14-year-old girl in a typical rural area of Pakistan do when she wants to go to school or say play dolls with her friends when her newborn is crying waiting to be fed?

Date

07.05.2012 | 15:16

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