Peter Walker Mothers in Yama, Niger, crowd with their children to be admitted to the MSF screening field centre for malnourished children. Photograph: Dan Chung for the Guardian Niger is the worst country on earth in which to be a mother, according to a report by Save the Children. The charity’s annual Mothers’ Index...
Emine Saner Sadaf Rahimi, an Afghan boxer, practices at a boxing club in Kabul. Photograph: Musadeq Sadeq/ASSOCIATED PRESS If it’s unusual to see a woman representing Afghanistan at the Olympic Games, her choice of sport is even more surprising. Sadaf Rahimi – the only female member of the national team, and only the third female Olympic athlete...
Lizzy Davies Fawzia Koofi was elected as an MP in 2005 and became the Afghan parliament’s first female deputy speaker. Photograph: Graeme Robertson for the Guardian The questions came thick and fast but the woman sitting on the podium in a pink headscarf and high heels took them all in her stride. The Taliban,...
Megan Carpentier Republican presidential hopeful Ron Paul. Photomontage by Jamie Turner Photograph: Guardian If you told a liberal in 2008 that progressives ought to give Republican Texas Congressman Ron Paul a chance because he was the most anti-war candidate on the ballot, you would have been laughed out of the room – or, more...
The appalling case of Gulnaz (Afghan woman jailed for being raped to be freed – if she marries her attacker, 2 December) is a stark reminder of how much is at stake over women’s human rights in Afghanistan, as it moves ever closer to talks with the Taliban and a future without international forces...
Andy Beckett Helen John, 73, with a banner protesting against unmanned drones being based at RAF Waddington. Photograph: Christopher Thomond for the Guardian ‘I’ll be wearing a T-shirt with ‘No More Assassinations by RAF Drones’ on it,” says Helen John, matter-of-factly, when we arrange to meet by phone. She is 73. She has recently been in...
