Iranian delegation present at a key intergovernmental conference held on May 22-23 in Turkey refused to sign its final declaration.
The conference dubbed “Empowering Women’s Role in Society“ was organized by Turkey under the Greater Middle East Initiative (GME) and was attended by 21 countries.
Group of Eight countries launched the Greater Middle East Initiative in 2004 to foresee supporting multidimensional reforms in the fields of politics, society, economics and security.
Talking to IRNA, head of Iranian delegation stated that the country believes those who make decisions for women across the world should represent various segments of the female population.
Sheida Nikouravin added, “Organizers of the confab, who do not even come from the region (Middle East), are seeking their own expansionist policies. We are of the opinion that they lack the competency for making decisions.“
The official, who is also an advisor to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, underscored that Iran has friendly and close relations with regional states.
“The Islamic Republic favors an improvement in women’s conditions. But the reforms should not be dictated by non-regional states,“ she observed.
About the reasons behind Iran’s participation in the conference, Nikouravin elaborated, “The Ahmadinejad administration insists on active presence in all conferences and summits so our representatives can analyze and criticize.“
The Iranian delegation managed to attract the participants’ attention to the fact that regional women, whether Muslim or non-Muslim, should have the final say about issues pertaining to them.
Meanwhile, another member of Iranian delegation, Fariba Alasvand Lahberi, stated that the message of oriental women to the world differs from that of their western peers.
“Eastern women underline the balance of women’s multiple roles in family and society,“ Lahberi observed.
The researcher mentioned that the world is now completely prepared to hear the voices of different cultures. “Free human beings are against hegemonic powers trying to impose their own ideas on all nations.“
Meanwhile, the New Anatolian reported that the conference on women fell short of a final declaration and contented itself with a “presidential declaration.“ Iranian delegation’s refusal to sign the declaration was named as the reason for this.
According to the paper, the Iranian delegation accused Turkey of being biased.
Turkey’s only independent English language daily quoted Nikouravin as saying that Turkey’s “unfair“ restrictions on the headscarf had caused the recent shooting at the Council of State.
A judge was killed and four others wounded on May 17 when a gunman shouting “I am a soldier of Allah“ stormed into Turkey’s highest administrative court and sprayed bullets. Members of the council linked the attack to its rulings confirming a ban on Islamic headscarves in public institutions and universities.

Eight billion rials were allocated for women and family affairs in the current year.

The Interior Ministry announced the northeastern Khorasan Razavi province is second only to southeastern Sistan-Baluchestan province in terms of the number of women heading households.
Fereshteh Sassani, director general of the ministry’s Office for Women’s Affairs called for devising plans and allocating budgets for Khorasan Razavi which is home to an approximate 140,000 female breadwinners, ISNA reported.
“Budget is one of the most important concerns of provincial organizations. However, the government has helped materialize women’s funds by centralizing budget management in the Center for Women and Family Affairs,“ she noted.
She expressed regret that of the total 14 billion rials worth of credits earmarked for women’s working groups, only three billion rials had been expended on women-related affairs last year.
Sassani said eight billion rials were set aside for women and family affairs in the current year, indicating a 43-percent increase in provincial funds.
The population increase and rapid urban development further highlight the significance of NGOs, she said, adding, “Our policy is to reinforce and help stabilize non-governmental organizations as long as they help achieve state goals.“

Mary Henrietta Kingsley, English traveler, ethnologist and author, daughter of George Henry Kingsley, was born in London in 1862. Her father was a man of versatile abilities, with a passion for traveling which he managed to indulge--in combination with his practice as a doctor. He wrote one popular book of travel, South Sea Bubbles, by the Earl and the Doctor (1872). Mary Kingsley’s reading in history, poetry and philosophy was wide if desultory, but she was most attracted to natural history. Her family moved to Cambridge in 1886, where she studied sociology.
The loss of both parents in 1892 left her free to pursue her own course, and she resolved to study native religion and law in West Africa. She started for the West Coast in August 1893; and at Kabinda, at Old Calabar, Fernando Po and on the Lower Congo she pursued her investigations, returning to England in June 1894. She gained sufficient knowledge of the native customs to contribute an introduction to R. E. Dennetts Notes on the Folklore of the Fjort (1898).
Kingsley made careful preparations for a second visit to the same coast; and ,in December 1894, provided by the British Museum authorities with a collectors equipment, she proceeded via Old Calabar to French Congo, and ascended the Ogow River. From this point her journey, in part across country hitherto untrodden by Europeans, was a long series of adventures and hairbreadth escapes, at one time from the dangers of land and water, at another from the cannibal Fang. Returning to the coast, Kingsley went to Corisco and to the German colony of Cameroon, where she made the ascent of the Great Cameroon from a direction until then unattempted. She returned to England in October 1895.
The story of her adventures is vividly told in her Travels in West Africa (1897). The book aroused wide interest, and she lectured to scientific gatherings on the fauna, flora and folklore of West Africa, and to commercial audiences on the trade of that region and its possible developments. But her chief concern was for the development of the negro on African, not European, lines and for the government of the British possessions on the West Coast by methods which left the native a free unsmashed man not a whitewashed slave or an enemy.
In 1899, Kingsley set out for South Africa to collect more plants and fresh water fish. She was in Cape Town during the Anglo-Boer war and decided to become a nurse. There was an outbreak of typhoid and dysentery while Kingsley was taking care of soldiers and she caught the enteric fever and died in 1900 at 37.
Surprisingly, Kingsley conquered all of her extraordinary adventures in her traditional Victorian clothes that consisted of long skirts, high collars, and fur caps.

A view of Iranian women gliders

Paragliding competitions will be held in Tehran for women in all age categories during summer, vice-chairwoman of the provincial Aerial Sports Association told IRNA.
Azar Mazraei Farhani noted that participants will have to bring their own equipment and accessories, adding the competition schedules would be tied to favorable climatic conditions.
She explained, “The competitions are held only in Tehran. No female paraglider has ever been sent to international competitions.“
Referring to fields presently promoted by Aerial Sports Association, she said, “So far, paragliding is the sole field offered for women and has been divided into elementary and advanced levels.“
Farhani concluded, “Those interested can register in the elementary level at any time. However, the advanced level requires more preparation.“

A local woman making potteries in Rahimabad, Gilan province

About 287 pregnant women lost their lives due to bleeding, pre-eclampsia, infection and heart diseases last year (ended March 20), director general of Health Ministry’s Office for Family Health and Population said, ISNA wrote.
Mohammad-Esmail Motlaq noted that from the total figure, about 20 percent died either at home or on the way to hospital, while 17 percent lost their lives because they gave birth with the help of untrained attendants.
He explained that training courses would be offered for local midwives in villages and small cities.
Stressing that sexual health education is effective in preventing infections and venereal diseases in pregnant women, he said 400 pre-marriage consultation centers had already been set up across the country.
According to him, these centers familiarize couples with new contraceptive methods, helping reduce unwanted births by 300,000 annually. He continued the couples would undergo training by internists, gynecologists, psychologists, psychiatrists and health experts.
Motlaq insisted that pregnancy cares should be expanded, adding pregnant women should refer to medical centers at least six times.
He described the main programs of the Office for Family Health and Population as decreasing maternal morbidity due to pre-eclampsia, eclampsia and bleeding, reducing anemia, as well as helping lower stress and fear associated with childbirth.

Center for Management of Women’s Theology Schools runs 240 schools across the country where over 30,000 female students are attending religious courses.
The center was founded in 1997 upon an endorsement by Qom Theology School’s High Council.
A great number of women have already graduated from schools supervised by the center, Fars new agency quoted head of Public Relations Office of Qom Theology School as saying.
Seyyed Mohsen Qodsipour said the center has educational and cultural, training, research, administrative and financial as well as logistics departments.
Each year, the school admits women interested in theological studies, he added.
Referring to the background of theology education for women, Qodsipour recalled that activities related to religious studies of women were limited in Qom during the pre-revolution era.
The 1979 Islamic Revolution paved the ground for education of women keen on raising their knowledge of the religion, the official added.
According to Qodsipour, the center was established in 1997 to meet the demand of enthusiastic women.

Only about 15 percent of women develop long-term loss of their menstrual cycle (amenorrhea) after receiving follow-up chemotherapy for breast cancer, according to a report in the medical journal Cancer, Reuters reported.
Rates of chemotherapy-induced menopause differ with different agents, the authors explain, and the incidence of long-term amenorrhea after anthracycline therapy, such as daunorubicin and doxorubicin, and taxane-containing therapy, such as paclitaxel and docetaxel, has not been established.
Monica N. Fornier and colleagues from Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York investigated the incidence of long-term amenorrhea in 235 premenopausal women ages 40 years or younger whose breast cancer was treated with anthracycline and taxane-containing chemotherapy, with or without the subsequent use of tamoxifen.
Of the 166 women included in the analysis, 141 (85 percent) maintained or resumed regular menses after the completion of treatment, the authors report. The overall incidence of chemotherapy induced, long-term amenorrhea was 15 percent.
The incidence of amenorrhea among women who also received hormonal therapy with tamoxifen was 17 percent, the report indicates.
Women who developed long-term amenorrhea were significantly older than women who did not, the researchers note.
“Based on our data,“ the investigators conclude, “the sequential addition of taxane to a standard...anthracycline-based chemotherapy regimen does not appear to produce a high rate of chemotherapy-related amenorrhea compared with historic reports.“
“We did not have information regarding estradiol, follicle-stimulating hormone, or luteinizing hormone secretion,“ the authors explain. “These data should be obtained in prospective studies because they may be relevant and important in clinical practice and in the decision-making process among younger women affected by breast carcinoma, who are concerned with the potential long-term risks of chemotherapy.“