Everyone has the right to life-saving interventions during or outside of crises.[ii] And yet, women and girls’ rights to bodily autonomy and safe abortion have been some of the first rights to be conveniently sacrificed under the guise of prioritizing COVID, as if health was a zero-sum game. That includes free, safe and legal abortion and comprehensive abortion and post-abortion care, without which women, girls and gender-non-conforming persons are forced to seek unsafe clandestine abortions or to carry unwanted pregnancies to term, in complete violation of our rights.
Files: Women's and girls' rights
26 Sep 2020
In particular, the paper reviews three problems surrounding the implementation of the two strategies, namely, first, the absence of data that feeds the indicators previously adopted in the two strategies that are indispensable for their evaluation, and their lack of availability in the few cases in which data are collected. And secondly, lack of commitment to evaluation and review which leads to the difficulty of social accountability. And finally, in the absence of a clear overall vision of how to implement reproductive health policies, as evidenced by the multiplicity of entities responsible for the issue, lack of coordination between them, and the instability of the regulatory frameworks that govern the work of the National Population Council. The paper concludes with a number of recommendations aimed at addressing the three problems and avoiding them in any future planning.
EIPR hopes that the prosecution’s decision not to proceed with the referral of Menna Abdel Aziz to trial is a precedent that will be generalized to the rest of sexual violence cases, through the prosecution’s use of its inherent right to suspend investigations or counter-reports that the victim of sexual violence may face once they report the incidents of abuse.
EIPR had previously and repeatedly warned that the precedent of accusations being brought against a victim and survivor of rape and kidnapping sends a clear message to women and girls that reporting sexual assaults they are subjected to, may end up in them being charged as accused and lead them to prison, hindering any community efforts seeking to support women and girls in their quest to recover from the aftermath of sexual violence crimes that they may be exposed to.
EIPR calls upon the Public Prosecution again to use its authority, and to take the decision best suited for the safety of the victim, Menna Abdel Aziz (Aya), to drop all charges against her and release her immediately, so that she can begin recovering from the psychological and physical effects of the attacks that she was subjected to at the hands of the accused.
The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) called on the Ministry of Interior and the Prisons Authority to assume their legal responsibility in providing the simplest forms of human contact in light of the continued suspension of visits for prisoners’ families, consistent with the rights stipulated in the Prison Regulation Law. EIPR demanded that the ministry and the Prisons Authority allow detainees and prisoners to communicate with their families and lawyers.
In a statement yesterday, the Public Prosecution announced the transfer of Menna Abdel Aziz (Aya) to a Ministry of Social Solidarity shelter hosting victims of abus
EIPR Calls for the Immediate Release of Menna Abdel Aziz. Therefore, appeal to the Prosecutor General to immediately release- Aya- known as “Menna Abdel Aziz," and to drop all charges against her and to be cognizant of her position as a rape victim/survivor.We also demand the support of the National Council for Women to Menna Abdel Al-Aziz. In light of the attack she was subjected to and to ensure her legal right.
28 Mar 2020
In times of major social crisis, a gendered and feminist perspective exposes the priorities and biases of public policy. It is also an important lens for evaluating the capacity of policies -or lack thereof- to meet the needs of women and vulnerable social groups as a whole, while highlighting their disproportionate impact on these groups, which constitute the majority of the population. For these reasons, today we launch a gender tracker to monitor the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic on women and other vulnerable social groups in Egypt. We hope that a gendered perspective will allow opportunities to remedy measures that do not consider gendered impacts or avoid public policies that could harm certain groups
