News

On October 5 2013 the international community of birth rights defenders, women’s rights activists and advocates for women’s sexual and reproductive rights mark a sad three year anniversary of Agnes Geréb’s confinement. Quoting the statement by Donal Kerry, the International spokesperson for the Campaign for Justice for Dr. Agnes Geréb “Three years in confinement is a very long time. Three years in confinement when you have done nothing wrong is a very, very long time.”

As civil society feminists and women actors, we articulate our voices and efforts through activism, to promote and guarantee the exercise of Human Rights, sexual rights and reproductive rights, as well as for peace and violence-free lives, by searching for economic and social alternatives to ensure social justice.

We are taking selfies to a whole new level. Sexual and reproductive health and rights organizations and activists from 50 countries contributed photos and messages on why abortion should be safe and legal in their country.

We congratulate the Nigeria SRHR movement for pushing for it and the Imo State House of Assembly with its successful enactment. This victory is an advance for women not only in Imo state, but in Nigeria as a whole.

We need to hold governments accountable to their existing commitments, and continue to take action to ensure that national policies effectively guarantee access to safe, legal, affordable, accessible, high quality, youth friendly abortion services, along with information about how to locate and access such services. It is also vital that this existing commitment on access to safe and legal abortion be included in the outcomes and recommendations of the ICPD, MGD review processes that will inform the development of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the Post2014-2015 development agenda.

The US Supreme Court in a 6-2 decision ruled that the Policy Requirement of the Anti-Prostitution Loyalty Oath, from the U.S. Leadership Act of 2003, violated the First Amendment, and is therefore unconstitutional. It implies that US organisations working overseas on HIV prevention no longer have to comply with this provision, which unfortunately still does apply to the foreign organisations including that sex workers led groups.

..violence against women also constitute systematic denial, withholding and obstruction of access to reproductive health services, including access to safe and legal abortion because of its detrimental effect on the lives of women and girls. This type of violence is structural or institutional violence.

Jalila Khamis Koko is a member of the opposition party Sudan Peoples’ Liberation Movement – North (SPLM-N), which was banned in September 2011. She is a member of the Nuba ethnic group from Southern Kordofan. She was arrested on 15 March 2012 at her home in the capital, Khartoum, by agents of the National Security Services (NSS). She was transferred to Omdurman prison, after spending three months in solitary confinement in the NSS detention centre, where she has been detained ever since. During this time, her physical and mental state has considerably deteriorated.