Afghanistan women and children are rotten away in prison for moral crimes like leaving abusive husbands. An estimated 860 women are currently behind bars in the country, along with 620 girls between the ages of 12 and 17, and 280 children according to the U>S> State Department. Ninety-five percent of these women are convicted of moral crimes.
In Afghanistan the most common practiced form of judicial is due process. Simply requires two men to accuse a woman of a crime. There is no burden of roof or defense. A group of respected male elders pass down the sentence. For women these moral crimes are punishable by prison or death include refusing to marry a rapist, having an affair (or being accused of having an affair), murder by proxy, where a male family member kills someone and assigns the prison sentence to a female. Males are also notorious for trading and enslaving their wives and daughters to settle debts or property disputes.
These women and children live in horrible conditions. Mothers do not have enough milk for their children, they survive and frigid temperatures and the children incessant coughing echo throughout the concrete cell. The CSSP and a few nonprofit groups such as Afghan Women’s Education Center, or AWEC, are working to improve the conditions of these women and children. Mike Runnells, CSSP director in Kabul, plans to be in every district by the end of 2011.
What can you do? Buy a “Not Guilty” T-shirt ($25). The Afghan women’s Justice Project will send the proceeds to the nonprofits helping Afghan women and kids in prison. One shirt purchase buys a child’s milk for a month or school supplies for 10 prisoners.
http://www.marieclaire.com/world-reports/news/latest/afghan-women-in-prison
1 comment:
It is astonishing to read that women are subjected to carry out prison sentences when their husbands are guilty of a crime. It truly makes me, as an American female, appreciate my own freedoms and rights.
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