The Guardian: Kathryn Bigelow Makes History as First Woman to Win Best Director Oscar
Kathryn Bigelow, celebrating above with presenter Barbra Streisand, broke through last night to become the first Oscar winning female director. Her low-budget Iraq war film, The Hurt Locker, about a bomb disposal team, was the big winner at the ceremony. It took six academy awards, including those for best picture and best original screenplay. The Hurt Locker triumphed the over the 3D blockbuster Avatar, directed by Bigelow's former husband, James Cameron.

KABUL — Female Afghan police officer honoured by Hillary Clinton: Montreal Gazette, March 07
Col. Shafiqa Quraishi has an improbable dream. It is that, before too long, women will assume command positions in the Afghan National Police. A policewoman for 28 years, Quraishi is a towering exception in a country where most women dare not leave their homes without their husband’s or father’s permission, and then only if cloaked from head-to-toe in the infamous, shapeless, anonymous, usually powder-blue dress known as a burka.

"No one will give your rights to you as a gift, you have to take them," Quraishi told about 300 women who, most unusually for Afghanistan, all had their faces uncovered at a recent ceremony to mark International Women’s Day.


News on News: March 05 - Sky News Marks International Women’s Day with All-Female Line-up
Sky News today announced that it will be marking International Women’s Day on Monday 8th March with a day of female-led broadcasting. From sunrise to midnight, the news channel will be presented and produced exclusively by women in support of the globally renowned day, which honours the economic, political and social achievements of women with hundreds of events around the world.

Iran Women Rights Defenders Continue Undeterred by Prison Detention
Elahe Amani, Women News Network, March 03
"As sports stadiums closed the doors to women attending sports events; as family courtrooms denied the rights of women to custody in divorce; as “proper” women’s dress became part of a hidden discourse of Iranian social criticism calling dress code enforcement officers “Chastity Guards” and “Morality Police;” women working in the field of speaking publicly on the issues of gender equality have been placed in ever increasing danger."

Women's News Network: EU members in 12 nations work together to end the practice of female genital mutilation
Amnesty International Ireland and the European Union Institutions have launched a campaign to put an end to a global practice that has had a grave “detrimental impact on the health and well-being of girls,” says a new Amnesty/EU report. The practice is FGM – Female Genital Mutilation, which is the “non-therapeutic” removal, cutting and change in otherwise healthy external female organs.

It is an act that is wrapped in cultural practice, as “old fashioned” mothers believe it will help their daughters stay healthy, find husbands and live a “proper” life in society.

BBC News: Americas " Women at War - Sexual Assault"
"After she finished school Marti Ribiero joined the Air Force Reserve and a few years later, in March 2003, she was deployed to Iraq.
While she loved her job as a public affairs specialist, from the time she arrived she was routinely harassed and called Air Force Barbie.
I had no idea how difficult it would be," she told the BBC World Service.
"My father, who is a retired military colonel, thought the world of me for joining the military.
You're supposed to carry your weapon at all times in a combat zone," she said.
But I put my weapon down and walked away to smoke a cigarette and that was when I was attacked.
She was then dragged behind some power generators and raped. "If I had kept my weapon maybe I would have been able to prevent it," she says.

BBC News UK - Women Say Some Rape Victims Should Take the Blame - Survey
A majority of women believe some rape victims should take responsibility for what happened, a survey suggests.

Almost three quarters of the women who believed this said if a victim got into bed with the assailant before an attack they should accept some responsibility.
One-third blamed victims who had dressed provocatively or gone back to the attacker's house for a drink.

The survey of more than 1,000 people in London marked the 10th anniversary of the Haven service for rape victims.

Women's News Network: Haiti womens micro-lending bank brings big cash to rescue
Able to quickly reach a well-developed network of women throughout the country, an alternative banking system performs while the Haitian economy is in shambles
by Peggy Simpson: A micro-credit program and banking system for more than 200,000 women in Haiti has come to the rescue of the Haiti economy in the wake of the devastating earthquake.

At a time when Haitian commercial banks remain closed, Fonkoze, the Haitian branch of the Grameen Bank of Bangladesh, mobilized over one weekend to get funds to its members in rural towns as well as Port-au-Prince.

Between 2 a.m. and 2 p.m., last Saturday, January 23, Fonkoze brought in two million dollars in cash from their U.S. bank and distributed it by helicopters to regional offices in the most remote parts of the country.