NOMINATIONS FOR WOMEN OF COURAGE

UNCLAS KABUL 000424

SIPDIS

SENSITIVE
SIPDIS

DEPARTMENT FOR SA/FO, SA/A, SCA/PAB, G/IWI SLOPEZ
STATE PASS TO USAID FOR AID/ANE
NSC FOR HARRIMAN

E.O. 12958: N/A
TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM KWMN KPAO AF
SUBJECT: NOMINATIONS FOR WOMEN OF COURAGE

REF: SECSTATE 12871


1. In response to reftel, Embassy Kabul submits the
following two candidates for the Women of Courage Award. Per
email instructions from G/IWI, both women speak English.


2. (SBU) Mary Akrami is Director of a non-governmental
organization called the Afghan Women Skills Development
Center. Under the rubric of this NGO, she runs one of
Kabul's two women's shelters. Most women have come to
the shelter to escape domestic violence or forced marriages.
The shelter never turns anyone away, so it often exceeds its
capacity for 25 people at the shelter. The women are allowed
to stay at the shelter as long as they need to while they
recover from the violence they have suffered, often at the
hands of a male relative. There are several women at the
shelter with high-profile legal cases pending in the Afghan
court system; several women at the shelter have made the bold
and virtually unprecedented move of stepping forward and
denouncing their abusers publicly and filing court cases
against them. Thanks to legal intervention provided by the
shelter, one woman was recently awarded a divorce from her
abusive husband. Akrami has previously moved the shelter's
location to avoid detection by angry family members who are
actively looking for women housed there. The Ministry of
Women's Affairs has referred women to her shelter, and Mary
takes them all in. Many women have brought their children to
the shelter, and the rooms are filled with children's
laughter. Several women have arrived at the shelter
pregnant, and they have had their children while living at
the shelter. Many women arrive with nothing but the clothes
on their back, and Akrami undertakes to provide them with the
basics such as clothes, toiletries, medicine, bedding, and
food. Akrami has a dedicated staff who are provide legal
advice, literacy classes, psychological counseling, and
basic skills training. Akrami and her staff often receive
phone calls in the middle of the night from women in crisis,
and they always respond to the calls. Mary Akrami is
dedicated to her work, and is on call for women who need her
assistance 24 hours a day. She and her staff have received
threats against them for the work they are doing to help
women, and harassing phone calls are a regular occurrence.
Akrami refuses to be intimidated by such threats. The
women's shelter is often the last hope for women desperate to
escape their life-threatening circumstances and regain
control over their lives. There are only two shelters in all
of Kabul, and only Akrami's shelter provides comprehensive
assistance (legal, psychological, and educational) and
permits women to stay longer than a few nights.


3. (SBU) Non-governmental organization Action Aid Women's
Rights Coordinator Aziza Siddiqui is an women's rights
activist in the field who travels frequently into the far
reaches of the countryside in Afghanistan to conduct
first-hand research on the situation of women living there.
Siddiqui previously worked as a gender researcher for think
tank "Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit." There she
focused on reporting on women's access to land and livestock,
the quality of girls' education in public schools, and labor
migration. Siddiqui also previously worked for the Ministry
of Research and Rural Development as the special advisor to
the Deputy Minister for Programs. Her responsibilities
included monitoring the progress of the National Solidarity
Program, which focused on empowering rural communities to
make decisions on local governance issues. Her current work
at Action Aid includes educating rural women living in the
Northern Provinces on their rights. To do this, she
organizes meetings with women in which she facilitates
training on how women can make decisions for themselves. She
has conducted these meetings in 50 villages, with 20-22 women
participants in each meeting, and an additional 30 meetings
are scheduled. The program was so successful in the North
that it has been expanded to central Ghazni Province.
Siddiqui is also conducting research on violence against
girls in public high schools and how that may impede their
access to education, and she is slated to begin research on
violence against women in prison in the near future. Despite
personal threats against her for her groundbreaking research
on gender, Siddiqui continues to forge ahead with her
investigation into the lives of women around the country and
uses that information as a platform to draw attention to the
needs that women have.


4. (SBU) Post would also like to nominate the deceased
Director of Women's Affairs for Kandahar Province Safia
Amajan for an honorary posthumous award. Mrs. Amajan was
murdered on September 25, 2006 for her efforts to help women.
Mrs. Amajan was shot down by a gunman who opened fire on her
as she was leaving her home for work in a public taxi. Mrs.
Amajan, a well-known activist for women's rights, secretly
teaching classes for women and girls in her home, even during
the Taliban period, served as the Director of the Women's
Affairs Department in Kandahar once the Taliban were toppled
in 2001. She was a fierce critic of the Taliban's oppression
of women. Following specific threats made against their
lives, Mrs. Amajan's son and disabled husband approached the
Embassy for assistance. They were referred to UNHCR and are
now in Islamabad, where they are registered as refugees.
Post believes honoring Safia Amajan with this posthumous
aware would send a strong message that her murder does not
erase her influence.
NEUMANN