OPINION

International Women’s Day, 2022

To be Just, the Energy Transition Must Include & Empower Women

By Lucia Cortina

The writer is Climate Change and Energy Policy Advisor, UNDP, Panama
 
The following opinion piece is part of series to mark International Women’s Day, March 8.

A nurse on a maternity ward in a rural hospital powered by solar energy through the UNDP-led Solar for Heath initiative in Zimbabwe. Credit: Karin Schermbrucker for Slingshot/UNDP

PANAMA CITY, Mar 7 2022 (IPS) - Access to clean energy improves women’s lives in a myriad of ways. It supports access to education and quality healthcare, opens new economic opportunities, and reduces unpaid domestic labour and gender-based violence. Yet too often, the sector as a whole – from industry to policymaking – still fails to include women as energy users, decision-makers and agents of change of the energy transition.

To succeed, the energy transition must be just. It must be done in a way that delivers sustainable energy access for all, leaving no one behind. It must be done with women. Here are three ways the clean energy sector and related policies can help to unleash the power of women for a just energy transition.

1. Accelerating action on clean cooking, which is a vast health crisis impacting women disproportionately

Household air pollution leads to a staggering 3.8 million premature deaths each year — nearly half of all air pollution-related deaths – and 60% of which are women and children. This is driven by a lack of access to clean technologies and fuels for cooking, which directly impacts a third of the world’s population yet receives little attention and action. 2.6 billion people rely on solid fuels for cooking, which comes at significant health and social costs that disproportionately impact women and children. Most of them live in sub-Saharan Africa, in the world’s poorest and most remote communities.

In these communities, women and children are often in charge of collecting wood for cooking and heating, spending up to 18 hours a week doing so. They are vulnerable to sexual violence on their routes. They also breathe in harmful gas every day from open fires or inefficient stoves while cooking.

A woman using an electrical blender in a remote village in Cambodia. Cerdit: Okra Solar

Clean cooking solutions such as electrical or more efficient stoves not only improve the lives of billions of women by freeing up time that can be used for education, income-generating activities, or rest and leisure; it also saves millions of women’s and children’s lives each year.

Yet too often, clean cooking is not seen as the policy priority it is. While a lot of progress has been made in the past decade when it comes to access to electricity – with the share of people lacking electricity decreasing from 1.2 billion in 2010 to 759 million in 2019 –, relative progress on clean cooking has been much slower, with the share of people lacking access to clean cooking only decreasing from 3 billion to 2.6 billion since 2010. This lack of progress maintains gender inequalities. Women’s energy needs must be identified, prioritized, and adequately addressed. This includes involving women in the design and promotion of clean cooking technologies to ensure that these adequately meet their needs.

2. Empowering women with new economic opportunities

Beyond clean cooking, access to clean energy can also open up new economic opportunities for women by supporting livelihoods and generating new sources of income.

In Yemen for instance, with UNDP’s support, a group of women have set up a private solar micro-grid near the frontlines of the conflict– bringing much-needed electricity from clean energy to their community while earning an income and pushing gender boundaries. In Peru, an energy school trains women to become clean energy entrepreneurs by teaching them to install, maintain and commercialize solar panels and improved cookstoves.

In India, in the remote village of Khunti in Jharkhand, women entrepreneurs produce face masks and sanitary pads thanks to solar-powered, electric sewing machines – enabling women to earn an income while providing women in rural areas with much-needed menstrual hygiene products.

Access to clean energy, especially when it supports the productive uses of energy, is a powerful means to advance socio-economic development in a way that reduces inequalities and increases women’s resilience. When this gender perspective is foreseen and included in clean energy projects and policies, these become transformational for the entire community.

3. Improving women’s representation at all levels of the clean energy sector

The energy sector is one of the sectors with the lowest levels of women representation – even though the renewable energy sector fares better than the fossil fuel sector, with women representing on average 32 percent of the renewable energy workforce compared with an average of 22 percent in the oil and gas sector.

But while the energy transition is expected to create 30 million jobs worldwide by 2030, current predictions show that the proportion of women in the clean energy sector will decrease because the subsectors expected to drive this job creation such as in construction and electric machinery equipment, are the ones with the lowest women representation.

The clean energy sector must do more to identify and address the barriers preventing women from entering and thriving in the sector.

To be just and effective, the energy transition must be done with all parts of society – including with women, and in a way that addresses women’s needs and preferences.

Women need to be included as agents of change not only as beneficiaries. As part of UNDP’s Sustainable Energy Hub, UNDP’s gender and energy strategy ensures that gender is a pillar of our programming on energy, and feeds in every policy and program that we support countries with.

‘Turn the clock forward on women’s rights’: UN chief’s International Women’s Day message

WFP Niger. ED at the Satara market garden site where WFP is 

implementing a resilience Programme

7 March 2022

Ahead of International Women’s Day, celebrated on 08 March, UN Secretary-General António Guterres has insisted that the world “cannot emerge from the pandemic with the clock spinning backwards on gender equality”.

Mr. Guterres highlighted the contribution that women have made to ending the COVID-19 pandemic, hailed the ideas, innovations and activism that are changing our world for the better, and welcomed more women leaders across all walks of life.

However, as the UN chief pointed out, women and girls have frequently borne the brunt of the consequences of the virus spreading worldwide, which have included girls and women being shut out of schools and workplaces, led to rising poverty and rising violence, and seen women doing the vast majority of the world’s unpaid but essential care work.

To remedy the situation, Mr. Guterres called for guaranteed quality education for every girl, massive investments in women’s training and decent work, effective action to end gender-based violence, and universal health care.

Other measures recommended by the UN chief include gender quotas, that could result in the world benefiting from more women leaders.

© IFAD/FAO/WFP/Petterik Wiggers

Irrigation schemes enable smallholder farmers, particularly women and young people, to have greater access to water.

Women and climate action

The theme for this year’s International Women’s Day is “gender equality today for a sustainable tomorrow”, underscoring the fact that women bear a disproportionate burden of the impacts of the climate crisis, and that they need to be central to the solutions for a sustainable planet.

The Action Coalition for Feminist Action for Climate Justice, is helping to make sure that this happens. The Coalition, which brings together governments, private sector companies, the UN system and civil society, is part of a drive to bring about global action and investment, with a focus on financing for gender-just climate solutions.

These include increasing women’s leadership in the green economy, building women’s and girls’ resilience to climate impacts and disasters, and increasing the use of data on gender equality and climate.

To find out more about the ways that women are leading the fight against the climate crisis, read our feature series, “Women Building a Sustainable Future”.

UN observance of International Women’s Day 2022

The United Nations observance of International Women’s Day will be held virtually on 8 March, 10 – 11.30AM UTC–5 (New York time).

The year 2022 is pivotal for achieving gender equality in the context of climate change, and environmental and disaster risk reduction, which are some of the greatest global challenges of the twenty-first century. Without gender equality today, a sustainable future, and an equal future, remains beyond our reach.This year’s IWD observance is in recognition and celebration of the women and girls who are leading the charge on climate change adaptation and response, and to honour their leadership and contribution towards a sustainable future.

Senior UN officials will be speaking at the event, including Secretary-General António Guterres, Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed, and Abudallah Shahid, the President of the General Assembly.

WHO?

'Queen of Ice' Oksana Baiul Leads Move to Rescue Threatened Ukraine Athletes

1994 Olympic figure skating gold medalist Oksana Baiul attends Las Vegas Ukraine rally for peace. (Brett Forrest / SOPA Images/Sipa via AP)

By John GizziSunday, 06 March 2022

Fearing assassination of athletes in Ukraine, the first Ukrainian woman to win a Gold Medal at the winter Olympics is trying to get them out of their embattled country and to the U.S.

"We’ve got to save Ukrainian figure skaters from being killed by the Russians and get them over here,'Oksana Baiul told Newsmax on Sunday.

Newsmax spoke to the skating legend (whose official name has been Baiul-Fiorina since her marriage to oil, gas and energy expert Carlo Fiorina) a day after she addressed a rally in Las Vegas, Nevada supporting her fellow Ukrainians.

The woman known in her homeland as the "Queen of Ice" for her triumph in figure skating at the 1994 Winter Olympics explained to us that she is establishing a fund to bring figure skaters from Ukraine to the U.S.

She has “no doubt whatsoever” many are on a “"blacklist" to be murdered by covert agents of the Russian government.

“I’m not a politician, but I certainly know how Russia operates," said Baiul, who lives in the U.S. but remains in close touch with friends who are under fire in Ukraine. In many cases, the Olympian told us, her friends avoid the assault from Russia by living underground in the metro subway system.

Baiul strongly believes the "blacklist" includes high-profile athletes, entertainers, and President Volodymyr Zelensky and his chief of staff Andriy Yermack.

(It was widely reported in the last week that Zelenskyy survived three assassination attempts orchestrated by killers hired by Russian President Vladimir Putin. Others share Baiul’s belief in the existence of a blacklist of Ukrainians  Putin wants executed—notably Temuri Yakobashvili, Georgia's former ambassador to the U.S. and someone who has dealt with Russia for years, who told us “there was a blacklist of Georgians marked for execution when Russia invaded South Assetia [a province of Georgia] in 2008.  I know because I was on it).

Baiul predicted her fellow Ukrainians "are not going to give up—especially the younger generation, who believe in democracy and are fighting for it."

John Gizzi is chief political columnist and White House correspondent for Newsmax. 

EXPLAINER: Why WNBA players go overseas to play in offseason

Phoenix Mercury center Brittney Griner (42) looks to pass as Chicago Sky center Candace Parker defends during the first half of game 1 of the WNBA basketball Finals , Sunday, Oct. 10, 2021, in Phoenix. Griner was arrested in Russia last month at a Moscow airport after a search of her luggage revealed vape cartridges. The Russian Customs Service said Saturday, March 5, 2022, that the cartridges were identified as containing oil derived from cannabis, which could carry a maximum penalty of 10 years in prison. The customs service identified the person arrested as a female player for the U.S. national team and did not specify the date of her arrest. 

(AP Photo/Ralph Freso, File) | Photo: AP

By DOUG FEINBERG
Updated: March 06, 2022

Russia has been a popular destination for WNBA players like Brittney Griner over the past two decades because of the money they can make playing there in the winter.

With top players earning more than $1 million - nearly quadruple what they can make as a base salary in the WNBA - Griner, Breanna Stewart, Diana Taurasi, Sue Bird and Jonquel Jones have been willing to spend their offseason playing far from home. It's tough for WNBA players to turn down that kind of money despite safety concerns and politics in some of the countries where they play.

The 31-year-old Griner, a seven-time All-Star for the Phoenix Mercury, has played in Russia since 2014. She was returning from a break for the FIBA Women's Basketball World Cup qualifying tournaments when she was arrested at an airport near Moscow last month after Russian authorities said a search of her luggage revealed vape cartridges.

On Saturday, the State Department issued a "do not travel" advisory for Russia because of its invasion of Ukraine and urged all U.S. citizens to depart immediately, citing factors including "the potential for harassment against U.S. citizens by Russian government security officials" and "the Embassy's limited ability to assist" Americans in Russia.

Turkey, Australia, China and France also have strong women's basketball domestic leagues where some of the WNBA's best play in their offseason.

WHY RUSSIAN SALARIES ARE SO HIGH

Russian sports leagues have been able to pay top players these high salaries because some of the teams are funded by government municipalities while others are owned by oligarchs who care more about winning championships and trophies than being profitable. There are stories of Russian owners putting up players in luxury accommodations and taking them on shopping sprees and buying them expensive gifts in addition to paying their salaries.

In 2015, Taurasi's team, UMMC Ekaterinburg - the same one Griner plays for - paid her to skip the WNBA season and rest.

"We had to go to a communist country to get paid like capitalists, which is so backward to everything that was in the history books in sixth grade," Taurasi said a few years ago.

The Russian league has a completely different financial structure from the WNBA, where there is a salary cap, players' union and collective bargaining agreement.

The WNBA has made strides to increase player salaries and find other ways to compensate players in the last CBA, which was ratified in 2020. The contract, which runs through 2027, pays players an average of $130,000, with the top stars able to earn more than $500,000 through salary, marketing agreements, an in-season tournament and bonuses.

The CBA also provides full salaries while players are on maternity leave, enhanced family benefits, travel standards and other health and wellness improvements.

WHO PLAYS THERE?

More than a dozen WNBA players were playing in Russia and Ukraine this winter, including league MVP Jones and Courtney Vandersloot and Allie Quigley of the champion Chicago Sky. The WNBA confirmed Saturday that all players besides Griner had left both countries.

Almost half of the WNBA's 144 players were overseas this offseason, although stars Candace Parker, Bird, Chiney Ogwumike and Chelsea Gray opted to stay stateside.

WILL THIS LAST?

From purely a basketball stand point, the CBA will make it more difficult for WNBA players to compete overseas in the future. Beginning in 2023, there will be new WNBA prioritization rules that will be enforced by the league. Any player with more than three years of service who arrives late to training camp will be fined at a rate of 1% of base salary per day late. In addition, any player who does not arrive before the first day of the regular season will be ineligible to play at all that season. In 2024 and thereafter, any player who does not arrive before the first day of training camp (or, with respect to unsigned players, finish playing overseas) will be ineligible to play for the entire season.

The WNBA typically begins training camp in late April and the regular season starts in early May. Some foreign leagues don't end before those dates.

___

More AP women's basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/womens-basketball and https://twitter.com/AP_Sports

Stolichnaya vodka rebrands as Stoli to distance itself from Russia

 Stoli is actually manufactured and bottled in Latvia

By Conor Skelding
March 5, 2022 

The manufacturer of Stolichnaya vodka announced that it will be shortening the spirit's name to Stoli.

SOPA Images

One Stolichnaya — er, Stoli — please.

The famous Russian-themed vodka is now just to be known by its nickname “Stoli,” one of the companies behind the brand said in a news release.

The move is a “direct response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine,” Stoli/SPI Group said Friday.

“While I have been exiled from Russia since 2000 due to my opposition to Putin, I have remained proud of the Stolichnaya brand,” billionaire Yuri Shefler, Stoli Group CEO, said in a statement. “Today, we have made the decision to rebrand entirely as the name no longer represents our organization. More than anything, I wish for ‘Stoli’ to represent peace in Europe and solidarity with Ukraine.”

Stolichnaya was first distilled in the Soviet Union in 1938. Despite growing calls to ban Russian vodkas in the United States, Stoli is actually manufactured and bottled in Latvia, according to the company’s website.

Calls for boycotts of Russian-made vodka in response to the invasion of Ukraine are gaining momentum in the US and abroad.REUTERS/Jonathan Alcorn

Ownership of the brand is disputed between Shefler’s Stoli Group, which is based in Latvia, and Sojuzplodoimport, a firm owned by the Russian state.

Sojuzplodoimport did not immediately return a request for comment.

WANT REAL VODKA DRINK POLISH POTATO VODKA

MACHISMO IS MISOGYNY 

Brazilian politician’s sexist remarks about women fleeing Ukraine spark outrage

By Ben Kesslen
March 6, 2022 

Brazilian Congressman Arthur do Val referred to female Ukrainian war refugees as "easy" during a trip to Ukraine.

Vincent Bosson/Fotoarena via ZUMA Press

A right-wing Brazilian politician disgustingly described fleeing Ukrainian women as “easy” and “total goddesses” during a recent trip to the war-ravaged nation.

São Paulo Congressman Arthur do Val, 35, made the vile comments while he was supposed to be on a diplomatic mission last week to witness the devastation of the war first-hand and raise awareness of the plight of Ukrainians.

But Do Val sparked outrage after Brazilian media leaked secret recordings of him discussing the trip in such crude terms that he had to suspend his campaign to be São Paulo’s governor.

“I’ve just crossed the border on foot between Ukraine and Slovakia. Bro, I swear to you … I’ve never seen anything like it in terms of beautiful girls. The refugee queue … it’s like 200 meters long or more of just total goddesses,” he said, according to the Guardian. “It’s some incredible s–t … The queue outside Brazil’s best nightclub … doesn’t come close to the refugee queue here.”

The outlet said Do Val also called Ukrainian women “easy because they’re poor.”

Do Val made the sexist comments about the refugees during a diplomatic visit to Ukraine.AP Photo/Markus Schreiber

Do Val suspended his campaign to be São Paulo’s governor after the leaked audio emerged.

Twitter/@arthurmoledoval

Brazilian media reported that he made degrading remarks about security guards at the border of Ukraine and Slovakia, too, and said, “Just unbelievable, dude. As soon as this war’s over, I’m coming back.”

The wife of Ukraine’s former ambassador to Brazil condemned the politician and said, “Show some respect, you punk,” the Guardian said.

Do Val blamed a lack of water and access to a shower for his words, saying he became “over-excited” and “talked nonsense,” the outlet reported.

An online petition called for Da Val to be suspended from the Brazilian parliament has already reached more than 56,000 signatures.

TRAINED BY AMERICAN COPS

Israeli soldiers kill teenager in occupied East Jerusalem

Israeli army claims Yamen Jafal threw Molotov cocktails at army checkpoint

Enes Canlı, Mücahit Aydemir |07.03.2022


JERUSALEM

Israeli soldiers killed a 16-year-old Palestinian boy in the town of Abu Dis in occupied East Jerusalem, the Palestinian Health Ministry said Sunday.

Soldiers shot dead Yamen Jafal, who they claimed threw Molotov cocktails at an army checkpoint, the ministry said in a statement

The Israeli army claimed in a statement that two people threw Molotov cocktails at the checkpoint, saying one of them died and the other fled after soldiers opened fire.

Images were shared on social media of the Israeli police using tear gas in Abu Dis.

On Sunday, another Palestinian youth was killed by Israeli forces in Jerusalem’s Old City. Israeli police released a statement claiming the 19-year-old wounded two police officers in a knife attack

Dozens of Palestinians have been killed by Israeli forces in recent months for allegedly attempting to carry out stabbing or car-ramming attacks. Palestinian rights groups, meanwhile, accuse Israeli forces of deliberately killing Palestinians with no risk to their lives.

Israel occupied East Jerusalem during the 1967 Arab-Israeli war. In 1980, it annexed the entire city in a move never recognized by the international community.

*Writing by Gozde Bayar

India’s invisible female construction workers: underpaid and overworked

Construction is the second largest industry in India after agriculture, but women who form the sector's backbone face low pay and mounting debts fuelled by the pandemic

Taniya Dutta

New Delhi

Mar 07, 2022

Only a week after her infant died suddenly at four months, while sleeping, Seema had to rush to work, toiling up and down a six-floor building under construction near India's capital.

Her son, 2, covered in mud and gravel, played nearby as the mother struggled to balance a stack of bricks on her feeble frame.

Three years ago Seema and her husband, also a construction worker, were thrilled when they arrived in Noida, a satellite city outside New Delhi.

Pic 5 Ms Seema and her husband, also a construction worker, were thrilled when they came to Noida, a satellite city outside capital Delhi from Bhagalpur in one of India’s most impoverished Bihar state

They came from Bhagalpur, in Bihar, one of India’s most impoverished states.

But last week, the 20-year-old hurriedly buried the baby and returned to work, afraid of losing out on the daily meagre earnings that support her family.

“My heart is broken, but I had no time to mourn. If I don’t work, I won’t get paid,” Seema, who uses only one name, told The National.

“My body is too weak and I can barely breathe because of the weight of the bricks but I have another son to feed.”

Women like Seema, toiling hard at construction sites, are a common sight across India.

Like their counterparts in many other sectors, women get a raw deal because of gender bias, despite making equal contributions to the industry.

Construction is the second largest industry in India after agriculture, contributing significantly to the country’s economy.

There are more than 40 million workers engaged in the sector, of which 49 per cent are females, as per the latest data from the Ministry of Labour and Employment.

About 65.68 per cent of the registered workers are in the age group of 16-40 and another 35 per cent are aged above 40.

Invisible workforce

FILE PHOTO: Construction workers work on a site of a residential building in Mumbai, India, November 30, 2016. REUTERS / Shailesh Andrade / File Photo

Construction has traditionally been a male-dominated industry, but an army of invisible women remain the backbone of the workforce.

Most women labourers are illiterate and married off at a young age, often joining their husbands in cities where they are recruited by contractors.

They work as concrete mixers, diggers, stone breakers and brick haulers, but are never considered skilled enough to work as masons or carpenters.

Yet even at those lower levels, women are paid less than their male counterparts.

A male labourer makes up to 500 rupees ($7) a day but a woman, who does equal physical labour, is paid 300 rupees ($4) a day and often allowed to work only 15 days a month.

In addition to the hard labour, they have to fulfil many family responsibilities, including cleaning and feeding the children and husband.

They even toil when they are pregnant and resume work soon after giving birth.

At construction sites, women can often be seen working hard as their newborns sleep in makeshift cloth cradles.

“I worked until seven months into my pregnancy and resumed work a month after delivery," Seema says. "If I rest, we cannot survive on my husband’s income.”

READ MORE

Why India's economy will be hit hard by the latest surge in oil prices

They lack amenities such as clean toilets and basic safety equipment, making the women prone to hazards and exposure to construction pollution.

Their hands and feet are exposed to the cement mixture, causing skin diseases and scoliosis from inhalation of cement dust.

Activists say the women labourers suffer because of low levels of awareness and gender discrimination.

Organisations such as the Self Employed Women’s Association (Sewa) — India’s largest female trade union, say most women labourers are unaware of their rights.

“These women hardly get any facilities because their employers do not feel the need to provide those facilities and the women never question them,” Lata, who also goes by single name, vice president of Sewa’s Delhi Union, told The National.

“They work more, compared to men working at one place, as these women climb scaffolding carrying bricks, facing hazards yet they are not respected,” she said.

Ms Lata said that frequent migration from one city to another leaves them without any social security benefits that provide maternity, health and pensions in their home states.

“The contractors recruit them from villagers and keep sending them from one place to another. There needs to be awareness and co-ordination among all the states,” Ms Lata said.

Cycle of Debt

Many women are forced to work in the construction industry to supplement the family income.

Others want to pay off debts that may have arisen after failed farming ventures, while raising children and, in recent years, due to the pandemic.

Labourers work on a pillar of an under-construction flyover along a road in New Delhi on February 15, 2022. (Photo by Money SHARMA / AFP)

The pandemic upturned the lives of tens of millions of people around the world but the Indian migrant workers were among the hardest hit by lockdowns and economic disruptions.

Most of the casual workers were out of work for months after India imposed a lockdown in March 2020 to curb the spread of Covid-19.

Many took loans to survive the bad times and now are working to pay off those debts.

“My husband took a loan of 50,000 rupees ($650) during the Covid pandemic. I have to work now to help him pay it off,” Mohsina Bibi, 25, said.

The working conditions also take a toll on the mental health of these women as they are forced to live away from their children.

While most give birth in cities, they leave their children with grandparents in villages at a young age for care as they struggle to live in makeshift tents or buildings under construction to save money.

Sulochana Kumari, a 32-year-old worker from Panna in central Madhya Pradesh state has three children — two sons, 15 and 14 and one daughter, 11, who live with their grandparents.

A school dropout, Ms Kumari was a homemaker before she started working a few years ago when her children grew older and the family needed more money.

“It is not easy to live without your children. I miss them every day,” Ms Kumari told The National.

“This work is very hard. My whole body hurts but if I do not work, we will never have enough money to save for our children,” she said.

Updated: March 07, 2022, 

Pakistan's women rally for rights despite threats from right-wing groups

Marches and vigils taking place throughout major cities in run-up to International Women’s Day

People take part in a march organised by activists in Islamabad before 

International Women's Day is celebrated on March 6. AFP

Shahzeb Jillani

Mar 07, 2022

Women across Pakistan are gearing up for rallies despite threats of violence and intimidation by right-wing groups.

Public vigils, poetry recitals, seminars and marches have taken place in cities in the run-up to International Women’s Day on Tuesday.

Celebrations of the annual event have polarised people in Pakistani. In 2018, Aurat March, which is Urdu for Women's March, was observed by a few thousand young, educated and mostly upper-middle class participants.

READ MORE

Women's campaigner Maliha Abidi is the ultimate breakthrough accidental activist

Four years on, it has grown into a potent social movement across class and ethnicity, rattling conservatives.

Religious parties, such as the Jamaat-e-Islami and Jamiat-e-Ulema Pakistan (F), have denounced the march and its organisers as “anti-Islamic”. They have taken issue with some of its slogans, such as “my body, my right” (mera jism, meri marzi).

Organisers are accused of demanding greater promiscuity and acceptance of same-sex relations, while promoting obscenity. During the past two years, religious parties have held rival “modesty marches “.

“They want to frame the debate as feminism versus religion,” said activist and President of Women Democratic Front (WDF), Ismat Raza ShahJahan, from Islamabad. “But it is not so simple. For us, this movement is about regaining our political and economic rights.”

A march in the run-up to International Women's Day. AFP

Imran Khan sympathetic to critics of march

Pakistan’s Minister of Religious Affairs, Noorul Haq Qadri, this month wrote to Prime Minister Imran Khan, asking him to declare March 8 as International Hijab Day. Mr Khan, once a playboy cricket star who has reinvented himself as a born-again Muslim politician, is widely seen as sympathetic to critics of the march.

“Protest is our constitutional right and no government can take that away from us,” said Leena Ghani, an artist and march volunteer in Lahore. “The police have assured us protection for our main rally on Tuesday.”

Ms Ghani said Women’s March organisers have no issue with their opponents holding a rival rally. “All we ask is they take place at a different time and at a separate location to avoid any violence or attacks on us,” she said.

Opponents of the Aurat March have sought to discredit the organisers as foreign-funded, non-governmental groups. Participants have previously faced threats of rape and death on social media.

Last year, opponents of the march circulated edited images accusing participants of blasphemous slogans. In Pakistan, scores have been lynched and killed in mob violence relating to often-baseless accusations of blasphemy.

But Pakistan’s civil society appears largely undaunted.

“Our voice is getting louder,” said Amar Sindhu, a prominent civil rights activist and a volunteer for the Women Action Forum in Hyderabad. “Yes, there is a backlash by repressive forces. But we are gradually gaining space. It will be a long and hard struggle.”

A Female Entrepreneur Attempts to Break

Into Male Dominated Agriculture Industry

in Pakistan

March 06, 2022 
Saman Khan

The business model for farming produce in Pakistan has been the same for years. However, a young female entrepreneur is attempting to change the male dominated multibillion dollar industry by cutting out the middleman all together. VOA’s Saman Khan has filed this report from Manawala, Pakistan narrated by Bezhan Hamdard.

End selling EU citizenship to the rich through golden passports: MEPs

by KOSTA PAPADOPOULOS



Members of the European Parliament have called for an end to the so-called ‘golden passports’ which allow rich people to obtain EU citizenship in exchange for investment.

A new report calls for the EU to ban the sale of citizenship by investment schemes and to regulate residence by investment schemes. The schemes confer EU citizenship or resident status on non-EU nationals in exchange for financial investments.

Report author Sophie in ‘t Veld (Renew Europe, the Netherlands) said: “The bar for what counts as an investment has been too low for too long. EU residency should only be awarded to people who are investing in the real economy and who can be trusted to be legitimate investors without criminal backgrounds.”

These schemes are characterised by having minimal to no requirements of physical presence and offer a fast track to residency or citizenship status in an EU country compared with the obstacles of seeking international protection, legal migration or naturalisation through conventional channels. Once granted their new status of residency or citizenship, the beneficiaries of the schemes immediately start enjoying freedom of movement within the Schengen area.

The report produced by Parliament’s civil liberties committee calls the schemes “objectionable from an ethical, legal and economic point of view”.

Three countries currently have citizenship by investment schemes: Malta, Bulgaria (where the government has tabled legislation to end it) and Cyprus (only processing applications submitted before November 2020). Twelve EU countries currently operate residence by investment schemes. The minimum investment levels range from €60,000 to €1,250,000.

A study has estimated that more than 130,000 people have obtained residence or citizenship in EU countries via these schemes with the total investment estimated at €21.4 billion from 2011 to 2019.

Red carpet for shady people

The report says that the existence of passport-for-cash schemes affects all EU countries because a decision by one member state to grant citizenship for investment automatically gives rights in relation to other countries. These rights include freedom of movement, the right to vote and stand as a candidate in local and European elections and right to access the single market for economic activities.

The schemes can affect other EU countries because of the risks of corruption, money laundering, security threats, tax avoidance, pressure on the real estate sector and an erosion of the integrity of the internal market.

Meanwhile, EU countries do not always consult the available EU databases or exchange information on the outcome of such checks and procedures, according to the committee report. It expresses concern that some countries were reported to have accepted applicants for citizenship who did not meet the security requirements.

In ‘t Veld said: “A lack of scrutiny meant that the red carpet was rolled out for corruption and money laundering. Shady people paid large sums of money to obtain access to the EU. Communities have not benefited from these sums, but instead suffered from corruption. Journalists investigating some of the people coming in have sometimes faced grave consequences. In more ways than one, the whole of Europe bears the burden of practices that marginally benefit some governments.”

The European Commission launched infringement procedures against Cyprus and Malta in 2020 concerning their citizenship by investment schemes and the report calls on the Commission to advance those procedures.

Gas or cash?

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has further catapulted the schemes into the spotlight in recent weeks.

Parliament President Roberta Metsola tweeted. on 25 February: “The Kremlin has long thought it could buy its way into Europe. It is time to close any loopholes, end the dangerous phenomenon of so-called golden passports that provide a backdoor to European citizenship and ensure that Russian cash does not become the next Russian gas.”

In a resolution adopted on 1 March, MEPs demanded that EU countries with such schemes review all beneficiaries and revoke those attributed to rich Russians, especially the ones linked to sanctioned people and companies.

MEPs will debate the report today Monday and vote on it tomorrow Tuesday 8 March 2022.