Nightmares

According to a report produced by the Women's Environment and Development Organisation, in follow-up to the 1985 Beijing conference, many women are worse off now than they were 10 years ago. For example:

Mukhtaran Bibi thought her nightmare was over when the men who gang-raped her - on orders from village elders - were sentenced to death more than two years ago. But yesterday the nightmare began again.

The victim of Pakistan's most notorious rape case wept bitterly after a court in the southern city of Multan overturned the verdict against three of the four alleged rapists and two tribal elders, and quashed the death sentence against the sixth.

The article goes on to look at Ms Bibi's situation in some detail. The article ends, however, rather oddly:

"Honour" killings and punishments are usually sanctioned through the panchayat system, which has no legal standing but is still prevalent in many rural towns. Last week elders in another Punjabi village ordered that a two-year-old girl be married to a man 33 years her senior. The betrothal was in compensation for an adulterous affair committed by her uncle.

Yesterday the actor Meryl Streep listed Pakistan and Britain among dozens of countries that have reneged on promises to revoke laws discriminating against women, which were made at a UN conference in Beijing 10 years ago.

"A woman cannot vote in Kuwait. She cannot drive in Saudi Arabia. She is barred from working on military submarines in Britain. In Pakistan, if a woman is raped she must have four Muslim adult male witnesses to secure justice, failing which she may herself be considered guilty of fornication," Streep said.

Just think of all those poor British women wanting to work on submarines. It's a nightmare.

Update: Mukhtaran Bibi is upset that her assailants will be living near her but she's still one brave woman:

"Yes, there is danger," she said by telephone afterward. 'We are afraid for our lives, but we will face whatever fate brings for us.'"