Women's rights could be rolled back 200 years in Egypt under a proposed law that would stop them signing their own marriage certificates, registering their child's birth or travelling abroad without a man's consent, rights activists say.
Egypt will start registering millions of gig workers in order to offer them health insurance and emergency state aid during the coronavirus pandemic, which has taken a particularly heavy toll on the nation's ad-hoc employees, officials said.
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CAIRO (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Egypt arrested a father and a retired nurse on Tuesday for carrying out female genital mutilation (FGM) on a 15-year-old girl, after announcing plans to toughen the penalty to 20 years.
Police made the arrests a day after the crime was reported to the public prosecution by a doctor in a hospital about 35 km northeast of the capital, Cairo, said Sabry Osman, head of a child helpline that supports children subjected to violence.
“The surgery was done at home and when the girl had severe bleeding, the father transported her to a nearby hospital,” Osman, who works for the state-run National Council for Childhood and Motherhood, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
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CAIRO (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - When 83-year-old Farida El Choubachy ran for parliament in Egypt last year, she did not expect to win, let alone become the first woman in 42 years to preside over its opening session.
Her speech to parliament on Tuesday made history in Egypt for a second reason - more than a quarter of its 596 members were women, after a record number of female lawmakers were elected in last year’s parliamentary polls.
“It was a historical moment. I never expected it, but it shows how the role of women in political and parliamentary life is being transformed,” El Choubachy, a well-known journalist and political writer, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
Egypt Arrests Father & Nurse for Performing FGM on Girl, 15, in Hopeful Sign for Crackdown
The country is in a bid to stamp out the practice, with nearly 90% of women and girls affected.
By Menna A. Farouk
CAIRO, Feb 2 (Thomson Reuters Foundation) Egypt arrested a father and a retired nurse on Tuesday for carrying out female genital mutilation (FGM) on a 15-year-old girl, after announcing plans to toughen the penalty to 20 years.
Police made the arrests a day after the crime was reported to the public prosecution by a doctor in a hospital about 35 km northeast of the capital, Cairo, said Sabry Osman, head of a child helpline that supports children subjected to violence.