Tajik Parliament Approves Law Against Domestic Violence

DUSHANBE — Tajikistan’s parliament has passed the country’s first law specifically targeting domestic violence.

Lawmakers on December 19 approved the law, which aims to give greater protections to women’s rights.

It sets up administrative measures to deal with domestic violence, including up to 15 days’ imprisonment and fines for offenders.

The law includes a statement that the elderly should play an active role in preventing domestic violence among young families.

The advice of elders carries significant weight in traditional Tajik society.

According to official statistics, more than 200 women took their own lives in 2010 and a majority of the cases were related to domestic violence.

via Tajik Parliament Approves Law Against Domestic Violence.

Tajikistan: Female Boxer Fights Odds, Wins Olympic Bronze · Global Voices

Mavzuna Chorieva, a 19-year-old athlete from Tajikistan, won a bronze medal in the women’s lightweight boxing at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London.

The fighter who was Tajikistan’s flag-bearer at the opening ceremony eliminated the highly ranked Chinese boxer Cheng Dong in a quarterfinal match on August 6, before losing her semi-final against veteran Irish fighter Katie Taylor two days later. The 26-year-old Irish who had previously won four world championships and five European titles consequently took gold.

….

via Tajikistan: Female Boxer Fights Odds, Wins Olympic Bronze · Global Voices.

World Report 2012: Tajikistan | Human Rights Watch

World Report 2012: Tajikistan | Human Rights Watch.

Better services opening new doors for women in Tajikistan | UN Women

Makhfirat Dadaboeva, a young mother, cradles the youngest of her three children as she waits in front of the Municipal office in Hissar District in central Tajikistan. Forced to drop out of university when her first child was born a few years back, she is now determined to change her future by finishing her education and getting a job. Bolstering her confidence is the local District Task Force, a legal aid centre supported by UN Women, which provides much needed services to underserved community members, many of them women.

via Better services opening new doors for women in Tajikistan | UN Women.

TAJIKISTAN: Divorce Spurs Female Labour Migration – IPS ipsnews.net

Tajikistan’s dependence on remittances from labour migrants abroad is well-documented. Last year, Tajiks working in Russia sent home 2.96 billion dollars, the equivalent of 45 percent of the country’s GDP, according to the National Bank. That makes Tajikistan the world’s most remittance-dependent country.

The International Monetary Fund is projecting a 13-percent increase in remittance flows into Tajikistan this year. Over one million Tajiks, or roughly one out of every eight Tajik citizens, are estimated to work abroad as migrant labourers.

The share of Central Asian women going abroad to work is quickly growing. An analyst at the State Migration Service in Dushanbe estimates around 15 percent of Tajik labour migrants are now women. In 2003, his office said females comprised six percent of the migrant workforce.

“A mixture of poverty and increasing divorce rates in Tajikistan, which leave many women destitute, have contributed to this rise,” Natalia Bogdanova, Moscow-based rights activist and head of Migrant’s Rights, a non-governmental organisation, told EurasiaNet.org.

Like the men, many female Tajiks work abroad illegally. In December, Konstantin Romodanovsky, director of Russia’s Federal Migration Service, estimated that only 14 percent of the roughly 9.1 million foreign nationals working in the country had work permits, Russian media reported.

Without proper legal protections, Tajik migrants in Russia face threats arising from xenophobia, dangerous working conditions and hostile police. In 2011, Tajikistan received at least 818 boxes of “Cargo 200″ – Soviet-era slang for coffins – from Russia, the Interior Ministry said in late December. Eighty-nine of the deaths were attributed to hate crimes.

Women face additional risks. “Most of the women work in domestic jobs, as cooks and cleaners. Many of them work here illegally,” Bogdanova said. “Many of them have very basic knowledge of Russian, leaving them open to exploitation, unsafe working conditions and blackmail.”

“We see cases in which women are promised jobs here and then forced to work for free, sometimes as prostitutes. …Crimes go unreported,” Bogdanova added, “because most women are not officially registered.”

via TAJIKISTAN: Divorce Spurs Female Labour Migration – IPS ipsnews.net.

TAJIKISTAN: Divorce Spurs Female Labour Migration – IPS ipsnews.net

DUSHANBE, May 23, 2012 (IPS/EurasiaNet) – Four years ago, Farida Hajimova’s husband left Tajikistan to work in Russia. After a time, he stopped calling. Ultimately, he never returned. She was left at home in Dushanbe with two daughters and not a lot of options.

Now she says she has no choice but to follow in her ex-husband’s footsteps – not to find him, but to find work herself.

Hajimova is one of an increasing number of Tajik women journeying abroad, mostly to Russia, as labour migrants. Until relatively recently, the overwhelming majority of migrant workers leaving Tajikistan were men.

But desperation and poverty are forcing tens of thousands of women to hit the road. Experts voice concern that many female migrants are at risk of being abused and trafficked for sex.

“I have only been able to find part-time work here in Dushanbe,” said 28-year-old Hajimova, who plans to follow two friends who work as cleaning ladies in Moscow. “My oldest daughter will go to school in September and I need to be able to afford to buy her the necessary supplies. The children will stay with their aunt and I will go to Moscow.”

Tajikistan’s dependence on remittances from labour migrants abroad is well-documented. Last year, Tajiks working in Russia sent home 2.96 billion dollars, the equivalent of 45 percent of the country’s GDP, according to the National Bank. That makes Tajikistan the world’s most remittance-dependent country.

(Read More) via TAJIKISTAN: Divorce Spurs Female Labour Migration – IPS ipsnews.net.

Christy Turlington Burns Talks Women’s Empowerment with Feed the Future – YouTube

Feed the Future caught up with maternal health advocate and model Christy Turlington Burns at the recent launch of the Women’s Empowerment in Agriculture Index at the UN Commission on the Status of Women in New York. Christy is founder of Every Mother Counts. She attended the Commission as part of the U.S. delegation. We asked for her thoughts on the importance of advancing opportunities for women and girls worldwide. A transcript is available at feedthefuture.gov/media-gallery.

via Christy Turlington Burns Talks Women’s Empowerment with Feed the Future – YouTube.

Advancing Legal Protection for Women in Tajikistan | IREX – Civil Society, Education and Media Development

Mufara Hamidova provides legal assistance to women in Tajikistan on issues ranging from domestic violence to early marriage. As a manager at the League of Women Lawyers of Tajikistan, she addresses domestic issues through litigation and mediation and also uses media and trainings to inform community groups about the legal status of young girls getting married and the legal and psychological consequences of early marriage. For more on early marriage in Tajikistan, click here.

As a 2011 LEAD fellow, she is studying at the University of Missouri-Kansas City this year and is accompanied by her husband and three-year-old son. Recently Mufara answered IREX’s questions about her legal work assisting women in Tajikistan and how she juggles a demanding legal career, family responsibilities, and coursework for a graduate degree in the US.

Conflict in Tajikistan – not really about radical Islam | openDemocracy

For almost a month, an armed conflict has been raging in the mountains of the Kamarob gorge between the forces of the Government of Tajikistan and local ‘mujohids’. This is the most serious political violence in Tajikistan for ten years. Here, in the first of a two-part article, Sophie Roche and John Heathershaw draw on ethnographic research and contacts with residents of the region to explain the legacy of the civil war and the social and political contexts of this largely unreported conflict.

via Conflict in Tajikistan – not really about radical Islam | openDemocracy.

Pastures for the future in Kyrgyzstan – YouTube

Sustainable land management systems are becoming vital to the preservation of the Pamir-Alai mountain ecosystems upon which local people rely for their livelihoods.

via Pastures for the future in Kyrgyzstan – YouTube.

Pamiri women and the melting glaciers of Tajikistan – YouTube

The glaciers of the Pamir mountains, which provide over 50% of Central Asia’s water resources, are rapidly melting at a rate similar to Greenland’s continental glacier. Three generations of of Pamiri women share the impacts of the melt and decreasing water levels.

via Pamiri women and the melting glaciers of Tajikistan – YouTube.

Tajikistan: Poverty Encourages Early Marriages | EurasiaNet.org

Tajikistan’s widespread poverty is a major cause of early marriage in the country, according to a recent report by the Eurasia Foundation. In rural families, boys become the main breadwinners and girls are often considered financial burdens.

“Some parents feel that their daughters can be better supported by the husband’s family, and marrying them off [early] is a way to conserve their own limited resources,” Azita Ranjbar, the author of the report, told EurasiaNet.org.

via Tajikistan: Poverty Encourages Early Marriages | EurasiaNet.org.