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NEWS & LETTERS, July-August 2011
Women World Wide
by Artemis
The reactionary majority of the U.S. Supreme Court gutted all future class action suits by throwing out the case against Wal-Mart, which has discriminated against over 1.5 million women workers as well as implemented extreme anti-union policies. Not surprisingly, big business was delighted with the verdict.
The International Criminal Court at the Hague, Netherlands, issued arrest warrants for Libyan leader Qaddafi, his son and intelligence chief for crimes against humanity. Rebels have taken cell phones containing videos from Qaddafi loyalists showing them committing rape and torture, and Libyan psychologist Siham Sergewa has interviewed 259 refugees who had been raped.
The Organization of Women's Freedom in Iraq (OWFI) reported that pro-democracy activists demonstrating in Baghdad's Tahrir Square in June were brutally attacked by armed men in plain clothes, who arrived by the thousands on chartered buses. It was obvious that they had been sent by the Al-Maliki regime, which had broken its promise to the demonstrators to enact reforms. They targeted the women for brutal sexual assaults.
On June 17, the UN Human Rights Council passed the first ever UN resolution to focus on human rights violations based on sexual orientation and gender identity. The resolution requests the High Commissioner for Human Rights to prepare a study on violence and discrimination and calls for a panel discussion at the Human Rights Council.
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