President Arif Alvi wants Pakistanis to talk about family planning and we’re here for it

He posted a powerful video on Twitter that urged people to destigmatise talking about family planning and reproduction.

Photo: AFP

President Arif Alvi recently shared a video on Twitter that got a lot of people talking. The video is about family planning and reproduction and urged people to destigmatise these topics for a healthier Pakistan.

"National health has a very deep connection to mother and child health. We should be giving priority to things that are important. Practice family planning for prosperity. Keep a check on the number of children. Make good health a reality. Don’t ignore this topic. Discuss it and spread the message. The informational video covers a range of social issues represented by different characters of the working class who are discouraged and disregarded for their efforts due to the associated stigma around the aforementioned topic of family planning and the wellbeing of individuals involved in the process," he wrote in Urdu.

This isn't the first time President Alvi has spoken about the importance of family planning. In June, he said there is a need to educate people about family planning and monitoring the growing population in the country.

The informational video he shared covers a range of social issues represented by different characters who are discouraged and disregarded for their efforts due to the associated stigma around the topic of family planning and the wellbeing of individuals involved in the process. It illustrates how people often bury their heads in the sand when it comes to conversations about family planning or reproduction. The brown paper bags or khaki lifafey used in the video convey people's embarrassment and shame when it comes to talking about this very important issue.

The video's tagline is "Soch ko khaki lifafey se azaad karo, baat karo [liberate your thoughts from the brown paper bag, talk about it."

There is also a constant reiteration for everyone to be equally present in the discussion whether it is a young girl trying to ask her teacher a question during anatomy class or a wife trying to introduce family planning alternatives to her husband.

There was a lot of support for the initiative and the president's words on Twitter. People hope it will finally ignite a much-needed conversation regarding an issue that is often brushed aside in shame and embarrassment.

We're so glad to see the president using his platform to spread information and awareness about a very important cause. In Pakistan, people often turn the other way when it comes to talking about reproduction and family planning. Most young women in Pakistan are familiar with brown paper bags — we're often told to hide our period products in them, as if they're shameful. But there is no shame in talking about reproduction and health and, as the video says, we need to get rid of the figurative brown paper bags when it comes to important discussions.

The president's support for this campaign comes in the lead up to World Contraception Day on September 26 and despite his message having its fair share of detractors, we hope it starts a conversation among the people who need it most.

Many users said it is important to share this campaign on other popular media platforms besides Twitter as well.

Are Hindu reformers anti-Hindu?

Jawed Naqvi

Published September 14, 2021 -

The writer is Dawn’s correspondent in Delhi.


LIKE other religions Hinduism has faced challenges from ancient times from within its fold and outside. Hindutva is a modern invention and the idea of a right-wing militarist nation state it panders to would not be possible before the advent of the nation states that came with the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648. Some Muslim ideologues opposed the movement for Pakistan also on similar lines, saying there was no sanction for a nation state in Islam.

The three-day international conference on ‘Dismantling Global Hindutva’ ended on Sunday with important insights into Hinduism itself, but the discussions also revived memories of the pitfalls of similar projects and criticisms attempted in the recent and distant past.

One takeaway from the conference was that critiquing Hindutva, the militant philosophy that set out to model Hindus on the European fascism of the 1930s (by replacing European Jews with Indian Muslims and Christians as targets of hate) would remain incomplete if B.R. Ambedkar’s call for the destruction of the Hindu caste system remained unheeded. Ambedkar canvassed for equal and secular rights for everyone, starting with the liberation of the Dalits from Hinduism’s Brahminical hold and women from its patriarchal fold.

Read: How to dismantle Hindutva?

Organisers of the conference offered a word of caution. “To equate Hinduism and Hindutva is to fall into the narrow, bigoted, and reductionist fiction that instrumentalises Hinduism by erasing the diverse practices of the religion, the debates within the fold, as well as its conversations with other faiths. If the poet A.K. Ramanujan reminds us about the importance of acknowledging Three Hundred Ramayanas, then Hindutva seeks to obliterate that complexity into a monolithic fascism.”

Hinduism as we know it today has been in ferment since its inception.

A scholarly intervention made a less-discussed argument that underscored many commonality of views between Hindutva practitioners and Zionist settler class Jews in occupied Palestine. Akanksha Mehta particularly focused on the affinities between women activists of Hindutva and Jewish settler women. She introduced a different perspective to the currently overstated comparisons between the Taliban and Hindutva practices. Their colonial project and the economic underpinning of Hindutva and Zionism together with hidebound social and gender iniquities perpetuated within both groups present a remarkable similarity.

Ambedkar had noted the absence of a defining feature of Hinduism other than the caste. There were anti-idolatry Hindu sects and there were worshippers of deities and images and nature. In Bengal, they worship Durga as slayer of evil and protector of her followers. In swaths of Uttar Pradesh the role is given to Hanuman — sankatmochan, who clears the path of personal and social impediments. In Maharashtra, Ganapati is the vighna-haran or remover of obstacles dogging the followers.

Ambedkar listed Hindus who followed Muslim customs, observed circumcision and buried their dead. He pointed to Muslims who called Brahmin and Muslim priests to together preside over their weddings. It is a relic of the mediaeval Bhakti movement that Muslims and Hindus are entwined in the worship of common saints, particularly in Punjab. Atheists and monotheists also came out of the Vedic fold in early Hinduism and its accompanying Brahminical practices. Nastikas took a materialist view of the world and were opposed to Brahminical rituals. They were shunned as a class as were followers of Buddha and Mahavira.

I got a call from a close friend from Mumbai on Friday, a Jain with a modern lens. “I’m calling you to forgive me for any wrong I may have done you,” he said to my complete surprise. It was part of a period of Jain rituals, Sumedh Shah confided. It was observed over several days and ended with the quest for forgiveness from friends and family. The discussion veered around to a Jain belief that they were the original Indian atheists. And since Mahavira was the 24th teerthankar, a contemporary of Buddha around 600 BC, the claim would tend to put the atheism of Jains ahead of the Hindu nastikas.

Be that as it may, the point is that Hinduism as we know it today has been in ferment since its inception, not unlike other religions that branched off from their original purposes of peace and harmony, as Swami Vivekanand observed, into puritanism, mysticism and even bloodletting by acquiring weaponised and sectarian forms.

For close to two centuries in India, Hindu reformers have been trying to tweak Hinduism. Of these the most persistent but not entirely successful lot belonged to the Bengal Renaissance — from Ram Mohan Roy (1772-1833) to Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941). The question is: were the reformers anti-Hindu or Hindu-phobic, to use the term thrown by many right-wing Hindus at their critics. Supporters of militant Hindu groups in the US and India have used such terms to describe and even threaten rival Hindus against critiquing India’s current tryst with what is otherwise regarded as a great religion of the world.

The Bengal Renaissance canvassed support for banning child marriage, encouraging widow remarriage and scientific education, discouraging superstition and sati — the practice of Hindu widows being forced to sit on their husband’s funeral pyre.

The Bengal effort was, however, a social movement largely aloof from politics. The synthesis of politics and social reforms was to flower with Gandhi. When he arrived on the scene from South Africa, the political churning against colonialism had already spread from Bengal to Maharashtra and Punjab, but it had acquired pronouncedly Hindu motifs. The use of religion for anti-colonial mobilisation also tempted Muslim leaders like Maulana Azad. He applied the Bengal model to unfolding events in Turkey to woo Muslims to the Congress.

Gandhi strove to use religion to bring Hindus and Muslims together, but his attempt at reforming Hinduism was slammed as vacuous by Ambedkar, and as too emasculated for a fascist project by leaders like Savarkar and Golwalkar. It may not be wrong to ask, therefore: if Ambedkar failed to annihilate the Hindu caste system, what’s the chance the virulent Hindutva project could be dismantled with well-meaning intellectual cogitation?

The writer is Dawn’s correspondent in Delhi.

jawednaqvi@gmail.com

Published in Dawn, September 14th, 2021

Why Pakistan's new school textbooks are sparking backlash over gender

Should you judge this book by its cover? A father and son sit on the sofa doing homework while a mother and daughter sit on the floor. Critics have slammed these books for their outdated gender depictions.


Pakistan's new school textbook has sparked backlash in Pakistan

Pakistan's ruling party Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) launched its revised Single National Curriculum (SNC) in August this year, deeming it "a milestone to end disparity in the education system."

Following the recent release of the curriculum's accompanying new textbook, many have taken to social media to criticize what they view as patriarchal gender norms in the book.

The outrage is similar to criticism of the new curriculum by education experts, activists and the public who argue that it fails to promote and include gender equality, religious minorities and cultural diversity.

Women Action Forum released a statement, condemning the SNC as "based on ideological imperatives rather than pedagogical ones and will seed society with divisive thinking."

Judging a book by its cover

The cover of the Grade 5 English textbook depicts a father and son studying on a sofa, while the mother and daughter study on the floor. Both the mother and daughter are also covering their heads with a hijab and most of the covers of the textbooks show even young girls donning the hijab. Usually, girls begin wearing hijab when they reach puberty. In the same textbook, women leaders are cited as "supporters of men."

The textbooks were slammed for showing girls doing household chores

Girls and women are mainly depicted as mothers, daughters, wives and teachers. They are not included in acts of play or exercise. Only boys are seen playing and exercising, while girls are included in images where they are mere bystanders.

"Girls and women in Pakistan are excelling at sports right now. They are representing the country at the Olympics. They are climbing K2. Then why are the textbooks not reflecting this but rather excluding them from physical activity and competitive sports?" asked Baela Raza Jamil, CEO of Idara-e-Taleem-o-Aagahi (ITA) Center for Education and Awareness.

The textbooks have also drawn backlash for the depictions of head coverings for young girls and women.

Activist and sociologist Nida Kirmani told DW that the messaging around girls' clothing in the textbooks follows the messages the government has already been giving citizens about women's modesty and dress. Prime Minister Imran Khan recently caused outrage after making comments linking the rise in sexual violence to women's clothing.

"These books seem to be pushing a certain kind of dress on all girls and women but we know there exists all kinds of veiling practices in Pakistan, not just one way of dress," added Kirmani.

Ayesha Razzaque, technical advisor to the Ministry of Federal Education and Professional Training, told DW that while there are instances of women being portrayed as policewomen or pilots, it is an exception to the rule and adds to the "gendered tokenism" prevalent in the curriculum.

According to her, proponents of the SNC from the far-right are cherry-picking such examples to dismiss criticism and give credibility to an agenda in the curriculum made to appease Pakistan's religious right-wing supporters.
Why were the books designed like this?

Razzaque argued that these stereotypical depictions exist because no gender or intersectional lens was utilized in the design of the books.

"Books that are meant to shape young minds need to have a consistent theme and tone interwoven into the curriculum, the SNC is lacking that. If a gender lens was applied at the design, we would definitely have very different messages and learning," she added.

Due to the lack of an inclusive perspective, the SNC does not reflect the "rich diversity" of Pakistan, especially when it comes to the multiplicity of women's experiences.

Justifications for the SNC by conservative groups, that Islamic countries such as Indonesia and Malaysia also depict girls and women with headscarves in their books, are surfacing.

Jamil from ITA hit back at these, telling DW that in a country like Pakistan where the female population disproportionately suffers from discriminatory customary traditions, by losing autonomy and subject to violent threats, the symbolism of head covering as a norm can lead to greater systematic violence against women.

"Where are all of us in the textbooks? Only a certain kind of Pakistani female reality is being shown and expectations of women to act that way are being reinforced. If we are to have gender parity, it has to start at a very young age," Jamil added.
New curriculum poses additional challenges

Pakistan's former chair of the Higher Education Commission, Tariq Banuri, told DW that he fears that the SNC will further "confuse" the education system in the country.

He added that the lack of representation of women, religious minorities and cultural diversity poses the risk of creating more divide than bridging differences.

"We risk another generation who can't question their learning. This is an insidious problem that we are faced with," he added.

Banuri commented, "The SNC was supposed to promote creativity and critical thinking but it is instead much of the same curriculum as the past years and is not of the quality to produce a generation of free-thinkers and innovators."

He added that more privileged students will be able to offset the conservative teachings with more analytical supplements but disadvantaged students will continue to suffer from such an education.

This looks set to pose a challenge to the aim of the SNC that was envisioned under the slogan, "One Nation, One Curriculum."

The southern province of Sindh has already rejected the SNC, deeming it "haphazard" and "sexist."



Nasir Hussain Shah, provincial minister for local government, tweeted: "We rejected this SNC because of the kind of message it is giving to our country's youth. This cover is giving the wrong message putting mother and daughter on the ground. We should instead teach our future generations that women are the crowns of our society."

Germany: Coal tops wind as primary electricity source

In the first half of 2021, coal shot up as the biggest contributor to Germany's electric grid, while wind power dropped to its lowest level since 2018. Officials say the weather is partly to blame

Although Germany is looking to boost renewable energies, coal unseated wind power

 as the country's main electricity source this year

Despite efforts to boost renewable energy sources, coal unseated wind power as the biggest energy contributor to the German network in the first six months of 2021, according to official statistics released on Monday.

The data comes as Germany looks to speed up its exit from coal-powered plants after years of mounting pressure from climate experts and activists over the country's dependence on coal and its detrimental impact in fueling the climate crisis.

But the latest figures also reveal the challenges that lie ahead with the country's energy shift.

What did the data show?

Data published by the Federal Statistics Office (Destatis) found that the production of electricity from "conventional" energy sources rose by 20.9% this year, compared to the first half of 2020.

In total, conventional energy sources — including coal, natural gas and nuclear energy — comprised 56% of the total electricity fed into Germany's grid in the first half of 2021.

Coal was the leader out of the conventional energy sources, comprising over 27% of Germany's electricity. 

Wind power's contribution to the electric grid, on the other hand, dropped significantly compared to the previous year — from 29% to 22%.

Wind had been the top producer of electricity, but has now logged its lowest figures since 2018.

Why did renewable energy dip?

Renewable energies in total dropped during the first half of this year — going from the top producers of electricity to comprising 44%.

But what led to wind power's sudden fall? Statistics officials said the weather was partly to blame.

A lack of wind from January to March this year sharply reduced the amount of electricity produced by Germany's wind turbines. In contrast, stormy weather in the first quarters of 2019 and 2020 sharply boosted the electricity produced.

Germany is seeking to have wind, solar, biogas, and other renewable energy sources play a bigger role, as the country looks to completely phase out nuclear power by 2022 and coal-fired power plants by 2038.

rs/wmr (AFP, Reuters)

Methane: What's the big deal?

With much of the climate conversation centered around cutting carbon dioxide, less attention is paid to a more potent, less common and sometimes smellier greenhouse gas: methane.


Leaky natural gas pipelines are a huge source of 'fugitive' methane emissions

There's a reason why carbon dioxide has become the bogeyman of the climate crisis, considering just how much of it we've pumped into the atmosphere. We haven't stopped at CO2, however. Oh no, we've added methane into the toxic mix. While the gas, also known as CH4, has become almost synonymous with cattle flatulence, there's acutally much more to it than that. And it's nothing like as funny as a fart. Or a burp, which are the bigger bodily offenders.

Scientists estimate that although methane only accounts for 3% of emissions since 1750, it is linked to as much as 23% of historic warming. In other words, the stuff is potent. Really potent. As in, a single ton of methane causes roughly the equivalent warming of at least 28 tons of CO2 over the course of a century. And in the last two decades alone, we've managed to increase our output by 10%.

Reducing the amount that seeps into the atmosphere could be a secret weapon in the climate fight. In fact it could, according to a recent UN Environmental Programme (UNEP) report , avoid 0.3 degrees Celcius of warming by the 2040s.

Capping global heating to 1.5 degrees C by 2050 is a key aim of the IPCC 2015 Paris Climate Accord

Let's just do that then ...

If only it were that simple. Methane is not only the natural gas that supplies power stations and heats homes, it's also the stuff that wafts from landfills, rice paddies, the intestines of ruminants, wetlands, and in some instances, supposedly "green" hydropower reservoirs.

All told, the world emits 570 million tons of CH4 a year. We humans are responsible for 60% of that, with the gold medal going to farming. Partly, but not only, as a result of gassy livestock, the agricultural sector causes the same amount of warming as 788 million cars, which is more than half of the world's 1.4 billion-strong fleet.

Silver goes to none other than the fossil fuel industry, with the waste sector snatching bronze.

Fossil fuel infrastructure is a major, and avoidable, source of methane. Damaged and poorly maintained gas pipes leak the gas through patchable holes and processes, leading to what are commonly called "fugitive emissions." If they were better maintained, the equivalent of 1.83 billion tons of CO2 could be saved. And what's more, the natural gas saved from patching up the leaks would more than pay for the upgrades.

Fossil fuel operations are a major source of methane emissions

Sounds like a CH4 win-win

Hmmm. Yes, infrastructure improvements could reduce leaks, and tracing them is becoming easier thanks to satellite imaging that detects them, thereby making it harder for fossil fuel companies to hide or deny the flaws in their systems.

And by the same token, recovering burnable methane from waste could be financially incentivized. Landfill gas projects across the world are already capturing methane to burn. In the US, 70% of these LFGs produce gas for electricity generation. And at least we can use methane to burn.

But that's not ideal, since it produces carbon dioxide, which, as we've already established, is the bogeyman of the climate crisis.

Methane recovery system in place at a landfill in Marshall, Michigan, US

Why is it always so complicated?

That's a good one, but hang on, there's more. Because although we can change dodgy pipes, we can't exactly replumb our farmyard friends, which makes shrinking our animal's methane footprint a tad trickier.

That said, we can go some way to mitigating the problem by changing what we feed them. Something called FutureFeed, for example, does exactly that: it's a livestock feed that contains 3% Australian seaweed which has been shown to reduce emissions by 80%. Just a little bit of dietary greens cuts back on cow burps. Not bad going.

An easier option would be to change what we eat. Less meat and dairy equals fewer animals, equals fewer gases being belched out into the atmosphere.
Cutting down on meat can't be the answer to everything...

Not everything, but it ticks a couple of boxes. But we don't need to go there now. Not when we could be talking permafrost.

Most of the methane from livestock comes from the burps of ruminants like cows and lamb

Permawhat?

Permafrost. Thing is, as the Arctic heats up, areas of Earth that have been locked in frozen slumber for many millennia, are starting to thaw. And as that happens, they're not only revealing pristine condition — albeit dead — big cat species lost long ago to extinction, but thousands of years' worth of methane and CO2.

Some of this former icescape then transforms into new wetlands, which release methane into the atmosphere, helping temperatures to rise. Thawing permafrost could increase non-human methane emissions by 80%. And that, in turn increases the likelihood of droughts, fires, flooding and other extreme weather events everywhere around the world.


Thawing permafrosts in Siberia and nothern Canada could transform into methane intensive wetlands with a heating Arctic

Great. So where does that leave us?

With a gap between what's needed and what is actually being done. The latest IPCC report laid bare just how quickly we need to cut global greenhouse gas emissions before things get even worse.

While it might be impossible to do away with man-made methane emissions completely, cutting them even a little could generate time enough to develop green technologies, such as low-carbon planes and ships.

What's more, methane emitted at ground level forms ozone which can damage respiratory health. According to the UNEP, reducing CH4 output by45% could prevent 255,000 premature deaths per year.

Like many climate and environmental issues, policymakers are the ones with the power to affect meaningful, lasting change. But even as individuals we can make a contribution by (whether we like it or not), cutting back on burgers, palm oil and flying. Giving these industries our money sends them a seal of approval to continue with business as usual. But that, we have seen by now, is the one thing the planet cannot afford to let happen.

New Zealand: Maori party launches petition for country's name-change

New Zealand's indigenous political party has called on the parliament to officially change the country name to Aotearoa. The petition also seeks to "restore the original Te Reo Maori names for all towns, cities" by 2026.

 

The Maoris are the country's largest ethnic minority, representing 16.5% of the population

New Zealand's Maori party on Tuesday launched a petition on its website to officially change the country's name to Aotearoa – a longstanding demand of the indigenous group.

Aotearoa translates to "land of the long white cloud" in the Te Reo Maori language and is often used as a name for the Pacific island nation.

"It's well past time that Te Reo Maori was restored to its rightful place as the first and official language of this country. We are a Polynesian country, we are Aotearoa," said Rawiri Waititi, co-leader of Te Pati Maori.

The indigenous party also called for the national parliament to "identify and officially restore the original Te Reo Maori names for all towns, cities, and places right across the country by 2026."

"Tangata Whenua [indigenous people] are sick to death of our ancestral names being mangled, bastardized, and ignored. It's the 21st Century, this must change," Waititi said in a statement.

The Maoris are the largest ethnic minority, representing 16.5 percent of the population.

Te Reo Maori became an official language of New Zealand in 1987, alongside English.

Rawiri Waititi has challenged other conventions, such as the requirement to wear a tie in Wellington's Parliament

'No historical credibility'

The name Aotearoa, however, has a contested history, not least as it is believed to have originally been used to refer only to the North Island, rather than the country as a whole.

New Zealand's former deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters criticized the petition as "left-wing radical bulldust."

"Changing our country's name and town and city names is just dumb extremism," said Peters, the leader of the nationalist New Zealand First party.

"We are not changing to some name with no historical credibility. We are for keeping us New Zealand," he tweeted.

Last year, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern stopped short of backing a similar proposal.

"I hear more and more often the use of Aotearoa interchangeable with New Zealand and that is a positive thing," she has said in response to a question on the issue, according to the New Zealand Herald.

Over the years, government officials and even some companies have used Aotearoa interchangeably with or alongside New Zealand, including on citizen's passports.

The name New Zealand comes from the colonial era when cartographers from the Netherlands named it after the westernmost province Zeeland.

as/msh (dpa)

Historian brings to light story of the dressmakers of Auschwitz

When she read about a 'tailoring studio' in Auschwitz, historian Lucy Adlington set out to find more about the death camp inmates employed as dressmakers.

Marta Fuchs, the head seamstress at the "Obere Nähstube"

Speaking from London, Lucy Adlington describes how she was browsing through archive documents from the 1930s and 1940s to learn about what it was like for women during the war. "I came across a reference to a fashion salon in Auschwitz, but there was very little information," she said.

Adlington set out to look for clues to find out more about the former dressmakers. In the process, she discovered inspiring stories of resistance and survival. The author and historian's findings are now being published in a new book titled "The Dressmakers of Auschwitz," out on September 28.

The 'Upper Tailoring Studio'

In the late 1930s and early 1940s, Hedwig Höss, the wife of the Nazi commandant of the Auschwitz death camp, ran a fashion salon in Auschwitz that employed female prisoners. Known as the "Obere Nähstube," or "upper tailoring studio," the salon designed and tailored high-end outfits for the Nazi elite.

Historian Lucy Adlington calls it a "hideous anomaly" that stood in jarring contrast to the atrocities committed by the Nazis against the 1.3 million prisoners at the death camp.

The Nazis had always understood the power of clothing, from uniforms to high fashion, notes Adlington. Magda Goebbels, the wife of Hitler's propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, did not shy away from wearing Jewish creations.

"What a complete disconnect. You are dressed in filthy rags and these SS wives are coming in saying, ‘Darling, make me a new gown,'" Adlington told DW.

Hunya Volkmann, a seamstress at Auschwitz who survived and later settled in Berlin

Finding the dressmakers

Initially, the historian only had a list of first names of the seamstresses: Irene, Renee, Bracha, Hunya, Mimi, and so on. Trying to find women's first and last names in records is tricky, she explained.

Many women went by nicknames, or changed their names when they later married. Some Jewish women also adopted Hebrew names after the war.

In 2017, Adlington reimagined these women in a young adult novel titled "The Red Ribbon" (published in German in July 2021 as "Das Rote Band der Hoffnung").

Her fictional account of the dressmakers tells the story of four young women, Rose, Ella, Marta and Carla, who stitch clothes at the dress shop at the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp as a means of survival in a hostile environment.

"I didn't have enough information, so I imagined what would it be like to be a young woman sewing in Auschwitz for the commandant's wife," the author recounted. "And when this novel came out, people started getting in touch with me to say, 'Well, actually, that was my aunt, that was my mother, that was my grandmother.'"

Adlington soon had a "strong sense that history is not buried; it's people's lives," she said.

The researcher began to reach out to families of the Auschwitz dressmakers and in 2019 she met a surviving seamstress in San Francisco, Bracha Kohut, who was 98.

"That was an amazing connection," she said. "And I'm looking at her thinking, this is the same woman whose experiences I've been reading about. Here she is. I'm trying to understand how she, at such a young age, could endure that trauma."

Lucy Adlington (left) with 98-year-old Bracha Kohut, a surviving Auschwitz dressmaker
The dressmakers' underground resistance

For many prisoners, working at the tailoring studio was a way to survive. The head seamstress was a woman named Marta who deliberately created the fashion salon as a haven.

"She wanted to save as many women as she could. So yes, they had clean clothes. They had the opportunity to wash. And as one woman said, they had meaningful work," said Adlington.

"So instead of being treated worse than animals … as slaves who were traumatized building the gas chambers that would murder them and their families, they actually had something beautiful to do. I think that must have been incredible for their self-esteem."

But women at the tailoring studio weren't just making beautiful dresses and biding their time. Many secretly helped underground resistance movements by using their relatively privileged positions to communicate with people outside the camp.

Watch video02:10 Gerhard Richter confronts Germany's past

"They collected medicines and distributed them. They stole whatever they could … and I think most one of the most important thing is that they kept up morale," the author said.

"They were able to access newspapers and secretly listen to radios so that they could say, 'look, the allies have invaded France. D-Day has happened, hang in there."

Head seamstress Marta was also preparing to escape Auschwitz to tell the outside world about the atrocities of the Nazis, Adlington added.
A labor of love

While Adlington was able to speak to Bracha Kuhot and the other dressmakers' families for her book, she hasn't been able to find traces of the outfits that were tailored by these women.

The silk suit made by Hunya Volkmann for her niece

"To my knowledge, no clothes are known to have survived from this fashion salon. There was an order book in the salon that one witness says had the names of the highest Nazis in Berlin in it, so customers from Berlin were ordering their clothes from Auschwitz. But the orders had not survived," the author told DW.

However, Adlington, a collector of vintage clothes herself, said one of the dressmakers who survived Auschwitz later stitched a silk suit for her niece.

"Her niece sent me the suit. So I have a suit made by one of the dressmakers, and it makes me cry whenever I see it. It's so beautiful to think of what she had to do in the camps to survive — this woman named Hunya," said Adlington, who reiterated that their work was essentially slave labor.

"But this suit that she made for her niece was sewn with love."

Pro-choice demo held outside home of conservative US Supreme Court justice

Issued on: 14/09/2021 - 

Pro-choice advocates demonstrate outside the home of US Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh in Chevy Chase, in the suburbs of the US capital 

Nicholas Kamm AFP

Chevy Chase (United States) (AFP)

Scores of pro-choice protesters rallied outside the home of US Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh following the top legal body's decision not to block a hugely controversial law banning abortion in Texas.

Some 60 people chanted "my body, my voice" as they marched through the affluent neighborhood in capital Washington, closely watched by police.

"I believe that currently the Supreme Court is infringing on our rights and Brett Kavanaugh is a big part of that," said 18-year-old demonstrator Sophia Geiger.

Although the Supreme Court enshrined a woman's right to an abortion in the landmark 1973 case known as Roe v. Wade, Republican-led conservative states are attempting to roll back access through legislation.

The courts have regularly blocked such attempts, but a Supreme Court shifted to the right by Donald Trump -- who appointed Kavanaugh -- refused to strike down the latest Texas law banning terminations after six weeks.

"We've had multiple women's marches... and clearly, they have not gotten the message," Geiger said. "So now we want to inconvenience him."

Nadine Bloch, a member of the ShutdownDC group and the event organizer, said they were demonstrating outside Kavanagh's home "to make our voices heard".

"We're starting with Brett -- we haven't said we're not going to go to any others," she said.

A 75-year-old Texas woman, who gave her name as Nancy, said she had been fighting for decades, remaining vigilant even after Roe v. Wade.

"I have been marching starting in the 60's, I have been supporting choice, not abortion, choice, my entire life," she said.

Echoing the concerns of civil rights groups, she said restricting abortions would disproportionately affect those already marginalized by society.

"The only ones who will be hurt are the poor people, who also are the minorities in many, many cases," she said.

The Texas law has been strongly criticized.

President Joe Biden said it "blatantly violates" constitutional rights established under Roe v. Wade, while campaigners have called it "cruel, unconscionable, and unlawful."

© 2021 AFP

Libya: Could Moammar Gadhafi's family stage a comeback?

The children of the country's brutal and erratic former dictator are getting more popular as elections approach. They could benefit from an increasingly fragmented political scene.

    

After almost 42 years in power, Moammar Gadhafi's reign ended in 2011

This week, the Gadhafi name was in the headlines again. Saadi Gadhafi, the third son of former Libyan dictator, Moammar Gadhafi, was released from prison on Sunday. Reports indicated he left the country for Turkey immediately after his release.

Saadi had been held in a prison in Tripoli for seven years, charged with crimes against protesters during the country's 2011 uprising that toppled his father's regime and also of the 2005 murder of a popular Libyan soccer player, Bashir al-Rayani, who had been openly critical of the Gadhafi regime. A court of appeal had already acquitted Saadi, who played football professionally, of the latter in 2018.

According to agency reports, Saadi, 47, was only released last week because of negotiations between senior tribal figures, the country's interim prime minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah and Fathi Bashagha, a former interior minister, who has a chance of becoming the country's prime minister after elections in late December.

Saadi Gadhafi, who was released from a Tripoli prison on Sunday, seen here in 2015

Some locals in the city of Tripoli were skeptical about the motivations of those who had arranged Saadi's release. "In my opinion, all of this is because of political agreements between those people who are close to the presidency," Abdellatif Dakdak, a fuel engineer, told pan-African broadcaster, Africanews.

Political ambitions

Long-time Libya observers believe those dubious locals may have a point: As the country's December 24 election nears, the Gadhafi name is likely to become increasingly important.

Moammar Gadhafi ruled Libya for over four decades until his regime was brought down by a revolution in 2011. Of his seven sons, three were killed during the violent uprising that followed.

Afterwards, remaining members of his family — sons Mohammed and Hannibal, daughter Aisha and wife Safia — were granted asylum in Oman. Hannibal, 45, is thought to be in custody in Lebanon after being arrested there in late 2015, on charges related to the case of a Lebanese cleric who disappeared in Libya in 1978. Hannibal's wife and children apparently have refugee status in Damascus in neighboring Syria.

Saif al-Islam withdrew from Libyan politics in 2008, saying he was frustrated with the pace of change

But perhaps the most significant scion of the Gadhafi family today is 49-year-old Saif al-Islam, the only family member who has political ambitions at the moment, sources said.

After the uprising Saif was captured by tribal militias in Zintan, in northwestern Libya. He was released by them in 2017 and is thought to still be living among his former captors. In July, in an interview with the New York Times, the first he had given a Western publication for years, Saif hinted at a presidential bid this year.

Potential comeback

It may sound strange to international observers but there is a genuine chance for the son of Moammar Gadhafi, a ruler renowned for his eccentricity and brutality, to make some kind of political comeback in Libya.

Mostly this is due to the increasingly fragmented nature of the Libyan political scene at the moment.

In the recent past, the country's various factions were more easily classified. For example, in 2011, they were either pro-revolutionary or pro-Gadhafi. Over the past few years as civil war broke out, they could be split into eastern or western factions, as the two major groups fighting for control of the country had strongholds at either end of the nation. Rebel military commander Khalifa Haftar was based in the east and Fayez al-Sarraj headed an internationally recognized government in the west.

Libya's interim prime minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah (center left) in Berlin in June

"There is no actor or group that can clearly dominate the Libyan political scene," confirmed Tim Eaton, a senior researcher at Chatham House and the author of a report on the evolution of Libya's war economy.

"It has become very complicated and very localized. It's like a game of 3D chess with different leaders and networks trying to forge alliances, or perhaps working on certain things together but on a limited basis." 

For example, as Eaton wrote in a detailed analysis of the Libyan military, Haftar has tried to integrate Gadhafi loyalist officers into his own senior leadership since 2016 "in an attempt to expand his military alliance."  

No ideology

"The Libyan political landscape is really fragmented on a cellular level and incredibly politically fluid," added Mohamed Omar Dorda, one of the co-founders of for-profit consultancy Libya Desk, which has worked with German think tanks, including the Konrad Adenauer and Friedrich Ebert foundations, and is well networked inside the country and with the former regime.

"Traditional alliances are a thing of the past. Now everyone is talking to everyone and people who were arrested back in 2011 and completely sidelined, are starting to look like they could become a go-to alliance," Dorda told DW.   

Dorda believes the negotiations around the recent release of prisoners like Saadi Gadhafi are part of that alliance-building. These political mergers are no longer ideological, he noted, they're purely transactional and about political power. Which is where the Gadhafi family comes back into it.  

Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi at a press conference in Paris in 1973

President Gadhafi?

They are still popular with some Libyans and could make for potential allies too, even for those who previously considered them enemies. "There are people in Libya who would agree that, given the events of the past few years, the country was better off under Gadhafi," Eaton explained. 

"Some of these are the same people who would explain the troubles of the past few years as being caused by terrorists or by foreign interference. There are people in Libya who never abandoned the Gadhafis and places right across the country still flying the green flag," he said, referring to the fact that Moammar Gadhafi chose green for the Libyan flag in 1977.  

Saif al-Islam (left on poster) was seen by some as a potential reformer in his father's regime

"There is certainly a constituency for Saif," Eaton said.

Dorda argues that Saif "has a good chance of performing well in elections or, if he were not to run and took up a kind of kingmaker role where he supports another candidate, he's all but guaranteed a position of power."

Eaton is a little more skeptical. "Although you need to be careful of the sources, some polling certainly suggests he's the most electable name – and he [Saif] would draw a lot of confidence from that," Eaton conceded. 

"But it's difficult to see how he could rise back to prominence," the Chatham House analyst argued. "He can't operate out in the open and is not able to move freely around Libya, nor does he have any armed forces loyal to him. It seems a bit far-fetched to me."