Angelina Jolie urges NATO to tackle sexual violence in war

BRUSSELS: U.N. refugee agency special envoy Angelina Jolie called on NATO on Wednesday to help stop the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war, as the Hollywood star broadened her international efforts to protect women’s rights.

Jolie, who earlier this week visited a Syrian refugee camp in Jordan, made her appeal to the U.S.-led alliance’s top decision-making body, the North Atlantic Council, in Brussels, and later met NATO military commanders.

“Violence against women and children, particularly sexual violence, is an increasing feature of conflict,” Jolie told a news conference at NATO headquarters alongside the alliance’s Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg.

“This is rape used as a weapon to achieve military or political goals. It affects men and boys as well as women and girls,” Jolie said.

NATO, which counts 29 members and has missions from Kosovo to Afghanistan, has agreed to help report on sexual violence in war to help bring perpetrators to justice and challenge the idea that rape is an unavoidable aspect of conflict.

Jolie, a mother of six who last year released her film “First They Killed My Father” about Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge regime in the 1970s, said she had met victims of sexual violence in conflict and was trying to be a voice for them.

Expressing frustration at the lack of assistance available to victims, Jolie said she hoped that NATO could help by raising standards in other militaries through its training programmes abroad, as well as promoting the role of women in the military.

Jolie singled out the plight of Rohingya refugees fleeing violence in Myanmar and what she said was the inadequate response of many governments around the world.

“I‘m very concerned about the Rohingya, I‘m very angry at the response … I‘m very concerned about the stories of the 10-year old girls being raped,” she said.

“We should all hang our head on how little we have been able to do,” she added.

With some 65 million people forced from their homes by conflict as of the end of 2016, Jolie said the sheer scale of the refugee crisis worldwide felt overwhelming.

The post Angelina Jolie urges NATO to tackle sexual violence in war appeared first on ARYNEWS.

Comments

Accountability court hears assets case against Ishaq Dar

ISLAMABAD: An accountability court in Islamabad on Wednesday resumed the hearing of a reference filed against former finance minister Ishaq Dar by the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) for allegedly accumulating assets beyond his known sources of income. Judge Muhammad Bashir is recording the statement of a prosecution witness, Ishtiaq Ahmed. At the previous hearing, the accountability judge had reserved his verdict on an application filed by two co-accused seeking acquittal in the case. Naeem Mehmood and Mansoor Rizvi, who are directors of Dar’s companies, had filed the application requesting the judge to exonerate them from all charges for want of evidence. Qazi Misbah, the counsel for the two co-accused, contended the prosecution has failed to provide compelling evidence to prove the allegations leveled against his clients. The third co-accused President National Bank of Pakistan (NBP), Saeed Ahmed, had already filed an application before the court for his acquittal wh...

SFA raids several restaurants in Karachi, imposes fine

KARACHI: The Sindh Food Authority (SFA) on Friday raided several restaurants in city’s North Nazimabad area over unhygienic conditions, ARY News reported. According to the SFA, one of the restaurants was found utilizing the used oil multiple times. The items were also not properly frozen while crockery for serving the food was also not clean. The team imposed a fine of Rs 50,000 on the restaurant. The SFA team found hygiene standards were sheerly compromised in food making to the core. The food inspectors said they had previously served notices to the food outlets, but the restaurant owners apparently turned a blind eye to it. Raids were also conducted in district Malir and Gulshan-e-Hadeed. Sanitary conditions and lack of fumigation facilities were found at the restaurants in some of the Malir outlets. The SFA team also raided a bakery ‘Friend Bakers’ and imposed a fine of Rs 20,000 over poor hygiene. Similarly another roadside restaurant was fined Rs 20,000 for neglecting he...

Trump says US generals feel Beirut blast was likely an ‘attack’

WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump on Tuesday cast a massive explosion in Beirut as a possible attack, despite statements by Lebanese leaders that it was likely caused by highly explosive material that had been stored at warehouses in the capital for years. “The United States stands ready to assist Lebanon,” Trump said at a White House briefing of Tuesday’s explosion, which killed at least 78 people and injured thousands. “It looks like a terrible attack.” When asked later about his depiction of the explosion, Trump said that he had met with some U.S. generals who feel the blast was not “some kind of a manufacturing explosion type of event.” He told reporters that according to these unnamed generals “they seem to think it was an attack. It was a bomb of some kind.” The Pentagon referred questions to the White House. Two U.S. officials, speaking on the condition of anonymity, said it was unclear where Trump was receiving his information but that initial information did not appear...

Siasat Wala Blog

Search This Blog