Demonstrating women attacked in Afghanistan

Afghanistan News.Net
Thursday 16th April, 2009

About 300 women in Afghanistan have been attacked for demanding equality with men.

Angry men in Kabul threw stones and knocked women to the ground at a rally on Wednesday, where women were protesting a law they said would greatly restrict their freedoms.

To the sound of men screaming threats, women held banners proclaiming: "Islam means equality!"

The demonstrators belong to a women's movement that has emerged with unusual boldness in recent weeks to fight the new law which states that women should receive a husband's permission before leaving the house and gives men the right to have sex with their wives on demand.

It is the first time in many years that women have demonstrated in public in Afghanistan to oppose laws that were passed by both houses of parliament and signed late last month by President Hamid Karzai.

An outpouring of international criticism has urged President Karzai to shelve the bill.

But many women in Afghanistan support the new law, viewing the controversy surrounding it as a Western attempt to undermine their culture.

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