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Welcome to the archives of News Deeply’s Women & Girls Hub. While we paused regular publication of the site on January 22, 2018, and transitioned our coverage to Women’s Advancement Deeply, we are happy to serve as an ongoing public resource on the Arctic. We hope you’ll enjoy the reporting and analysis that was produced by our dedicated community of editors contributors.
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Features, analysis and in-depth reporting on women and girls’ issues – including health, education and conflict – as well as the people and groups working toward solutions.
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A hundred men in Acholi region have been trained to advocate for family planning, by spreading awareness and counselling other men on the health and financial benefits of respecting their wives’ rights to help make decisions on when and how many children they have.
Rwanda’s current penal code says the final decision over whether a woman can have an abortion lies with courts. Often women have to wait weeks or months for a ruling. Now, a new amendment would allow most abortions to go through with the consent of the woman and her doctor.
Nigeria’s tech industry may be booming, but the sector is still dominated by men. A coding program aimed at girls from a Lagos slum encourages them to pursue careers in computers and teaches that tech could help life them and their communities out of poverty.
Around Lebanon, men working as peer leaders are educating other men on the damage that child marriage does to girls and young women, in the hopes of convincing fathers to stop marrying off their daughters.
In a village outside Abidjan, young mothers are getting the chance to continue their education thanks to best friends and sisters who are splitting their days between school and childcare.
Cambodia has seen a dramatic spike in teen pregnancies since 2010, with rates tripling in some parts of the country, as an increasing number of teenage girls choose to get married ‘for love.’
In West Pokot county, which has one of the highest fertility rates in Kenya, a Catholic catechist is spreading the word about the benefits of contraceptive use, hoping to save community members from the struggles he faced as part of a large family.
As part of our series on the role of women in countering violent extremism, we collaborated with Middle East podcast Kerning Cultures on an episode about the role of mothers, told through Christianne Boudreau’s story.
With a series of health reforms and the use of new technologies, Mongolia has dramatically cut its maternal mortality rate and boosted access to maternal healthcare for one of its most vulnerable populations: nomadic women in remote communities.
NGOs say increasing numbers of young girls are being forced or coaxed into prostitution in Bolivia, turning the country into Latin America’s latest sex tourism destination.
Girls make up between 30-40 percent of child soldiers in the Democratic Republic of Congo. They face greater stigma than boys when trying to reintegrate into their communities, but demobilization programs are not taking their specific needs into account, experts say.
The world’s youngest country, South Sudan, also has one of the world’s highest maternal mortality rates. In her photo essay, Sara Hylton captures the challenges facing new mothers in Juba and the struggles of midwives trying to make it safer for women to give birth.
Each year, hundreds of people - most of them women – were killed for being suspected witches. Rights activists say raising awareness and investing in development can help stop communities from turning on their elders.
With Syria’s healthcare system crippled by conflict, women and children are dying from treatable illnesses. One doctor and his team are providing them safe, dedicated medical care by building hospitals below ground, out of the reach of airstrikes.
In the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua, mothers serving prison sentences are allowed to keep children under 4 with them as they serve their sentence. They say having the kids there helps, but some worry it’s sending the wrong message.
In northern Kenya, climate change forces pastoralist women and girls to compete with baboons, leopards and elephants for water. By installing pipes and tanks to bring water to villages, communities can keep girls in school and women out of the path of danger.
By using an indigenous wild basil to make a medicinal ointment, the Muliru self-help group of Isecheno Village has found a way to benefit the local community while preserving the threatened resources of Kakamega Forest.
At Evangel fistula center in Jos, Dr. Sunday Lengmang performs a complicated surgery, always for free, to cure cases of fistula that most surgeons can’t or won’t even try to treat.
Girls with disabilities in India are often at risk of forced hysterectomies when they begin to menstruate. One activist in Mumbai is educating both parents and children about periods to protect girls from unnecessary procedures and other types of abuse.
Women’s care homes in India are meant to offer protection for those who have nowhere else to go. But activists, authorities and former residents accuse the overcrowded, understaffed homes of trapping women in a cycle of abuse.
Menstrual hygiene is a challenge for the women across Africa who lack access to sanitary products and running water. A pilot program in a refugee camp in Uganda looks at whether reusable, long-lasting menstrual cups could be the solution.
Women & Girls speaks with Dr. Hassan Abdi of UNFPA and journalist Katie Arnold about how best to provide sexual and reproductive healthcare to Rohingya women and girls amid one of the world’s most desperate humanitarian crises.
Abortion is illegal in almost all cases in Sri Lanka, but it’s perfectly legal for women to seek help after complications from backstreet abortions. Still, the fear of stigma and discrimination prevents many from coming forward.
In rural southern Kenya, it can be difficult to reach girls at risk of experiencing genital cutting and forced marriage, but a gender officer in local government has set up a WhatsApp group to help the community intervene to protect their children.
Campus sexual assault is a widespread problem in Kenya, but universities often let perpetrators off with a warning, activists say. Meanwhile, many survivors are too scared to come forward with their stories of abuse.
As Zimbabwe adjusts to its first new president in almost four decades, News Deeply spoke to women leaders and rights campaigners about whether they think the status of women will improve under the new regime.
In the slums of Nairobi, male ‘agents of change’ are teaching men and boys how to prevent violence against women and girls in their communities. They tell News Deeply that the fight begins with challenging their own entrenched attitudes about gender.
Asylum seeker Francine Kalala is suing South Africa’s government, claiming that two hospitals turned her away while in labor – forcing her to give birth in a train station. Activists say the neglect and abuse she suffered are rife in the country’s healthcare system.
The Delhi High Court is hearing petitions on whether to criminalize marital rape in India, a country where acts of sexual violence by husbands are 40 times more common than those committed by anyone else.
Penalties handed down by Sudan’s Public Order Courts, whose role is to ‘uphold moral order,’ mean vast sums of money are going into the state treasury and judges’ pockets – and 70 percent of such cases involve women.
In Nigeria, publicly addressing anything related to sex, such as HIV/AIDS testing, can spark fear and prejudice. But as the world prepares to mark World AIDS Day, one woman is helping Nigerians stay safe without the social stigma.
Illustrator Kate Lumsden and journalist Gethin Chamberlain tell the story of Rute Fumulani, forced to marry at 14 after losing her parents to catastrophic flooding. She is one of many girls forced to marry due to the effects of climate change.
While the world focuses on sexual violence perpetrated by clashing groups in conflict zones, researchers are warning that the real danger to women is being ignored: violence from their husbands, fathers and other men they know.
Since 2009, Boko Haram insurgents have kidnapped thousands of women and girls in Nigeria, some of whom are only escaping now. One survivor who managed to escape tells of how the terrorist group denied her food and beat her for refusing to become a suicide bomber.
During the half century of armed conflict between the government and guerrilla fighters, many members of Colombia’s LGBT community were victims of violence and sexual assault. Now the government is dragging its feet on their demands for reparations.
Former Bosnian Serb commander Ratko Mladic has been convicted of crimes committed during the 1990s Bosnian conflict, including mass rapes by his troops. The survivors of sexual violence from that time still endure mental and physical health problems today.
Russia’s rapidly developing surrogate industry may now grind to a halt, as members of the parliament debate banning the practice. The issue is dividing feminists, the surrogacy industry and surrogate mothers – who are often some of Russia’s poorest women.
Their schools destroyed by the Taliban during its rule over Pakistan’s Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, many girls are attending classes in dilapidated rented buildings while others have to study out in the open, with no running water or toilets.
In the Rohingya refugee camps of southern Bangladesh, women-only support centers run by volunteers offer a safe space for those who have survived violence during Myanmar’s brutal military campaign.
Sharya refugee camp in Northern Iraq was set up to shelter people fleeing ISIS. But it’s also home to orphaned girls from unaffected parts of Iraq, sent away from their homes because they’re not allowed to live without a male guardian.
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