Tuesday, January 20, 2004

Iraqi women recently got shafted -- something your newspaper didn't tell you. Here's the lead of a story from last night's All Things considered:

Despite Saddam Hussein's tyranny, women in Iraq enjoyed some of the broadest legal protections in the Muslim world. But the U.S.-backed Governing Council has voted to eliminate those protections. The decision came in an unpublicized meeting last month, when the council ordered that the "personal status" law, as it's known, be canceled. Family issues would be placed under the Islamic legal doctrine known as sharia.

To listen to the story, scroll down to "Iraqi Women Protest Loss of Rights" here; you can read Juan Cole's article on this here.

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