Washington, Dec 29: India is facing "very very big" challenges in gender justice, a top UN Women official has said, adding that the government has "prioritised" women's issues in its policies and programmes but there is a need for greater momentum.
Lakshmi Puri, assistant secretary-general of the United Nations and deputy executive director of UN Women, called for setting up special courts for hearing cases of violence against women and providing gender-responsive training to police.
She said Prime Minister Narendra Modi has prioritised women issues in his policies and programmes.
"He (Modi) has prioritised it (gender equality and gender issues) in every programme, every mission that he has launched. He has put gender equality in the middle of that. Jan Dhan Yojana is a very big win for women. In Swachh Bharat Abhiyaan, he is highlighting more gender-related issues. Similarly, Skills India, Digital India..." she told PTI.
Considered a guiding force in driving the women related agenda of the UN, Puri said, "We would, of course, like to see greater momentum in regard to some of these initiatives going forward."
Puri, who was acting head of UN Women from March to August 2013, noted that the challenges being faced by India in the arena of women equality and gender justice are "very very big".
In addition to addressing the challenges being faced by women in cities, she underscored the need for safety of women in rural areas in India.
"Rural women face different types of violence and the more disadvantaged amongst them, marginalised amongst them, the poorest face different types of violence. So that needs to be addressed. The number, the scale, the scope of the challenges are so big that sometimes the impact cannot be seen immediately, she said.
Despite India making considerable progress in the last 70 years, the country is still facing the challenge of patriarchal social and cultural norms that hold back women, she rued.
There is still high-level of girl aversion and boy preference which has led to sex selection, against which Prime Minister Modi launched the beti bachao, beti padhao campaign, she added.
"We have progressed considerably in the last 70 years. Whether you're looking at women's economic empowerment, whether you're looking at consciousness about gender equality and women's empowerment. Whether you're looking at political participation and leadership, there is some progress, she said.
On this whole issue of violence against women, what I see as progress is the consciousness and people recognising particularly domestic violence and its criminalisation. That's a really big, Puri said in response to a question.
While women have made considerable progress in the education field, but translating that to their participation in the formal workforce and access to finance has been disturbing, she said.
Now preparing to leave the UN Women to join her husband Hardeep Puri, the Union Minister of State with Independent Charge in the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs, next month, Lakshmi Puri said there is a need for greater representation of women in the Parliament and judiciary.
She joined the UN 14 years ago through the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) as Director of the flagship Division of Trade in Goods, Services and Commodities of UNCTAD and then as Acting Deputy Secretary- General.
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India facing huge challenges in gender justice: UN Women official
Agencies
December 29, 2017
Trump ordered killing of Iranian commander Soleimani
News Network
January 3,2020
Washington, Jan 3: US President Donald Trump ordered the killing of Iran Revolutionary Guards commander Qasem Soleimani, who died in Baghdad "in a decisive defensive action to protect US personnel abroad," the Pentagon said Thursday.
"General Soleimani was actively developing plans to attack American diplomats and service members in Iraq and throughout the region. General Soleimani and his Quds Force were responsible for the deaths of hundreds of American and coalition service members and the wounding of thousands more," the Department of Defense said.
Following Soleimani's death, Trump tweeted an image of the US flag without any further explanation.
"US' act of international terrorism, assassinating General Soleimani—the most effective force fighting Daesh (ISIS), Al Nusrah,Al Qaeda, is extremely dangerous & foolish escalation. US bears responsibility for all consequences of rogue adventurism." said Iran Foreign Minister Javad Zarif.
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United States donates 100 ventilators worth $3 million to Pakistan
News Network
July 3,2020
Islamabad, Jul 3: The US embassy here in a statement on Friday said the Trump administration through the US Agency for International Development (USAID) “donated a shipment of 100 brand-new, state-of-the-art ventilators” to Pakistan.
The ventilators arrived in Karachi on July 2 and will be sent to hospitals across Pakistan.
“This donation delivers on President Donald Trump’s generous offer of these critically-needed supplies and supports Pakistan’s urgent response to the pandemic,” the embassy said.
Made in America, the ventilators are valued at about $3 million and reflect the latest in cutting-edge medical design and technology, it said.
They are compact, easily deployable, and will enable Pakistan to more effectively treat patients suffering from Covid-19.
The US-Pakistan health partnership to curb the spread of the novel coronavirus is helping to improve and expand laboratory testing, disease monitoring, case tracking, infection prevention and control and patient care, the embassy said.
The US has contributed nearly $27 million in new funding so far to this vital partnership that is growing every day. "We are also thankful for Pakistan's contribution of medical supplies to help fight coronavirus in the US," the embassy said in the statement.
Ambassador Paul Jones said, “The US stands with Pakistan in its fight against the coronavirus. These American-made ventilators will help Pakistani patients in the most acute need of medical care."
The announcement comes days after Pakistan said it had started producing locally designed ventilators.
Pakistan reported 78 more deaths from the coronavirus in the past 24 hours, raising virus-related fatalities to 4,551 while the total number of confirmed cases has increased to 221,896.
On Friday, the health authorities said 1,13,623 persons have recovered from the coronavirus, surpassing the number of active Covid-19 infections in the country for the first time.
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Mahatma Gandhi’s statue outside Indian Embassy in Washington DC desecrated
News Network
June 4,2020
Jun 4: Mahatma Gandhi’s statue outside the Indian Embassy in Washington DC was vandalised with graffiti and spray painting by unknown persons allegedly involved in the ongoing protests in the US against the custodial killing of African-American George Floyd.
This has prompted the mission officials to register a complaint with the local law enforcement agencies.
The incident is reported to have taken place on the intervening night of June 2 and 3 in Washington DC.
The Indian embassy has informed the State Department and registered a complaint with local law enforcement agencies, which are now conducting an investigation into the incident.
On Wednesday, a team of officials from Metropolitan Police in consultation with the Diplomatic Security Service and National Park Police visited the site and are conducting inquiries.
Efforts are on to clean up the site at the earliest.
Vandalism of the statue of the apostle of peace comes during the week of nationwide protests against the custodial killing of African-American George Floyd in Minneapolis on May 25.
Several of these protests have turned violent which many times has resulted in damage of some of the most prestigious and sacred American monuments.
In Washington DC, protestors this week burnt a historic church and damaged some of the prime properties and historic places like the national monument and Lincoln Memorial.
One of the few statues of a foreign leader on a federal land in Washington DC, the statue of Mahatma Gandhi was dedicated by the then Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee, in the presence of the then US president Bill Clinton on September 16, 2000, during his state visit to the US.
In October 1998, the US Congress had authorised the government of India to establish and maintain a memorial “to honour Mahatma Gandhi on Federal land in the District of Columbia."
According to the Indian Embassy website, the sculpture of Mahatma Gandhi is cast in bronze as a statue to a height of 8 feet 8 inches. It shows Gandhi in stride, as a leader and man of action evoking memories of his 1930 protest march against salt-tax, and the many padyatras (long marches) he undertook throughout the length and breadth of the Indian sub-continent.
The statue, the design of which was created by Gautam Pal, is a gift from the Indian Council for Cultural Relations (ICCR). The pedestal for the statue of Mahatma Gandhi is a block of new Imperial Red also known as Ruby Red a block originally weighing 25 tonnes reduced to a size of 9'x7'x3'4". It now weighs 16 tonnes.
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