Girls' Education Plea
Village girls want to continue their studies at high school, but are disadvantaged by their parents’ traditional way of thinking.
Desperate Women Set Themselves Alight
Self-immolation is the last resort for women trapped in unbearable lives, and it seems to be on the increase.
Patients Told to Buy Their Own Drugs
Hospitals woefully short of funds needed to restore them to pre-Saddam standards.
Northern Economic Upturn a Mixed Blessing
Kurdistan experiences rise in living standards, but companies are going bust.
Suffering for Their Art
Women artists, marginalised under the previous regime, get boost with opening of new gallery dedicated to exhibiting their work.
Al-Ja'afari Premier Credentials Questioned
Growing Shia calls for their prime ministerial nominee to be replaced by a more moderate candidate.
Schools Hit by Intimidation Campaign
Extremists threaten teachers and students who take Saturday off.
Mass Brawl Reflects “Culture of Violence”
Baghdad street brawl over seemingly inoffensive remarks about the Pope highlights growing tendency among residents to resort to violence to settle disputes.
Barbaric Images for Sale
Video material showing images of torture and death still on sale in most of Iraq, as Kurdistan bans “snuff” CDs.
Latest
Global Voices: Middle East & North Africa
![The sister of Aurelio Cruz López holds a sign used in the search for the young man, who disappeared along the U.S.-Mexico border. © Andrea Godínez](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/mexico-migrants4-01-Andrea%20Godinez.jpg?h=89eaa8bb)
![Araceli cries while talking about her brother who disappeared along the border and whose remains were repatriated. © Andrea Godínez](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/mexico-migrants4-04-Andrea%20Godinez.jpg?h=06ac0d8c)
![Cecilia Delgado Grijalva is a buscadora (name adopted by mothers and relatives of missing persons who are devoted to finding the remains of their loves ones) and founder of Buscadoras por la Paz (Searchers for Peace), in Hermosillo, Sonora, Mexico. © Andrea Godínez](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/mexico-migrants3-01-Andrea%20Godinez.jpg?h=93e53cd6)
![A search for family members gone missing in Sonora, Mexico. © Andrea Godínez](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/mexico-migrants3-04-Andrea%20Godinez.jpg?h=06ac0d8c)
![The portion of Evergreen Cemetery in Tucson, Arizona where deceased migrants whose remains are not claimed by their families are buried. © © Andrea Godínez](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/mexico-migrants2-01-Andrea%20Godinez.jpg?h=877dbd4e)
![Gene Hernández, forensic examiner at the Pima County morgue, inside the trailer that holds the remains of migrants who perished along the border. © Andrea Godínez](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/mexico-migrants2-02-Andrea%20Godinez.jpg?h=06ac0d8c)
![Gene Hernández, a forensic medical investigator in Pima County, holds the skull of a deceased migrant. © Andrea Godínez](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/mexico-migrants1-02-Andrea%20Godinez.jpg?h=06ac0d8c)
![Román Coc holds photos of his daughter Laura, who disappeared in the Arizona desert 13 years ago. © Andrea Godínez](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/mexico-migrants1-04-Andrea%20Godinez.jpg?h=06ac0d8c)
![A photograph shows Laura Coc (far right), a young woman from Guatemala, posing during a beauty pageant. © Andrea Godínez](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/mexico-migrants1-01-Andrea%20Godinez.jpg?h=e6835829)
![There are no statistics on cases of femicide - the killing of women on the grounds of hatred of women, with the acquiescence of the state - in Uzbekistan.](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/light-flasher-police-car.jpg?h=65f9a063)
![© Mariam Alimi](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/afghanistan-midwives-zan-times-mariam-alimi.jpg?h=a979cd41)
![Artwork by Mays Al-Saray.](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/iraq-Artwork-1-Mays-Al-Saray.jpg?h=e5565190)
!['Hope of Mother', an organization led by Lisbeth Surita, has registered 48 cases of Venezuelans missing in the border regions.](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/venezuela-48-missing.jpg?h=4362216e)
IWPR Women’s Prize for Journalism
IWPR’s inaugural award for outstanding journalism recognises the work of our network of women reporters worldwide. Working in often challenging environments, these journalists face additional threats such as harassment, gender-based violence and systemic misogyny.
World Press Freedom Day 2024
On World Press Freedom Day we focus on local journalists facing myriad challenges in the tireless pursuit of truth and their enduring efforts to bring meaningful change.
![Journalists rush for cover inside a hospital in Jenin in the occupied West Bank on June 19, 2023 amid an Israeli army raid. Israeli forces in the occupied West Bank killed three Palestinians, in a raid that saw seven Israeli security personnel wounded and rare helicopter fire as the army said it pursued "wanted suspects".](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/GettyImages-1258811702.jpg?h=41f55a5b)
![Journalists visit the site of a destroyed Russian munitions depot in Biskvitne, Ukraine to the east of Kharkiv.](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/GettyImages-1397532113.jpg?h=93c822dd)
![A TV journalist prepares to do a piece to camera in front of an armoured personnel carrier on the frontline between Ukrainian forces and pro Russian separatists near the eastern Ukrainian city of Debaltseve, in the Donetsk region on 24, 2014.](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/GettyImages-460852192.jpg?h=6ed6b043)
![An Israeli soldier takes aim from behind a wall as journalists cover their patrol in the Jenin refugee camp, in the occupied West Bank on November 29, 2023, during an ongoing military operation in the camp.](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/GettyImages-1809556133.jpg?h=e295ff8c)
![Samson Wire, a photographer and Boniface Okendo, a videographer at Standard Group, a leading multi-media house in Kenya. Kenyan journalists are warning of escalating tensions and violence amid rising threats to press freedom © Francis Odee](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/kenya-samson-wire-boniface-okendo-standard-group-journos_0.jpg?h=41f55a5b)
![A man carries items on a bicycle while walking next to a woman as people remove possessions and inspect their homes following Israeli airstrikes on April 13, 2024 in Khan Yunis, Gaza.](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/GettyImages-2148520542.jpg?h=41f55a5b)
![Former female radio presenter Marya Sultani during an interview with AFP at radio station Urooj in Farah province on October 10, 2021. Radio station Urooj once teamed with journalists producing news bulletins, but since the Taliban came to town, Ebrahim Parhar sits alone, broadcasting hours of religious sermons. © AFP via Getty Images](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/GettyImages-1235907637.jpg?h=41f55a5b)
![A Guatemalan journalist protests against the arrest of Jose Ruben Zamora, president of the newspaper El Periodico, outside the Justice Palace in Guatemala City, on July 30, 2022. © JOHAN ORDONEZ/AFP via Getty Images](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/GettyImages-1242203781.jpg?h=012f5aa1)
![In this picture taken on September 8, 2021, Afghan newspaper Etilaat Roz journalists Nematullah Naqdi (R) and Taqi Daryabi sit in their office after being released from Taliban custody in Kabul. - Two Afghan journalists have shown off ugly welts and bruises after being beaten and detained for hours by Taliban fighters for covering a protest in the Afghan capital. © WAKIL KOHSAR/AFP via Getty Images](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/GettyImages-1235137200.jpg?h=4cb2014a)
![A news anchor waits for a broadcast as another 13 Israeli hostages are released from Gaza and brought back to Israel, during the third day of the temporary truce, outside The Museum of Modern Art known as the 'The Hostages and Missing Square' on November 25, 2023 in Tel Aviv, Israel.](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/GettyImages-1815405409.jpg?h=1987d397)
![Moldova blocked access to more than 20 Russian media websites in October of last year, including Russia Today, saying they had been used as part of an information war against the country. © Misha Friedman/Getty Images](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/GettyImages-1187916857.jpg?h=37f38098)
![Graffiti on Haaret's office, Tel Aviv, March 27, 2024. From left to right: "The law and Torah study or the death penalty for all of us," "The shills of Amalek (the existential Biblical enemy of the Jewish people), "Israel's al-Jazeera".](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/israel-graffiti-haaretz.jpg?h=41f55a5b)
![Journalists of Radio Liberty (Azattyk Ynalgysy) work in the bureau in Bishkek on April 28, 2023. - A court in Russia-allied Kyrgyzstan on April 27, 2023 ordered the closure of the local branch of US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, which criticised the "outrageous" ruling. Award-winning Radio Azattyk is a prominent outlet in the Central Asian country that regularly reports on opposition groups and investigates alleged corruption. © VYACHESLAV OSELEDKO/AFP via Getty Images](https://cdn.shortpixel.ai/spai/q_glossy+ret_img/https://iwpr.net/sites/default/files/styles/focus_main_image_932_x_580_/public/images/story/GettyImages-1252254069.jpg?h=7205b073)
IN THIS ISSUE
Editor's Picks
Ukraine Justice: “Reporting the Story is Just the Start”
Journalists need training and support to properly cover war crimes trials.
Ugandan Women Pay the Price of Exploitation
Activists warn that vulnerable domestic workers risk abuse, often returning with serious health conditions.
Harsh Victory at Position X
Commitment, sacrifice and luck secured a vital early win in the south-eastern campaign, but can Ukrainian forces press on?
Behind the Wheel in a Macho City
Some women face Adana's male-dominated traffic chaos for a living.
Life in the Shadows for Armenia’s Transgender Community
Recent murder highlights widespread discrimination and violence against LGBTI people.
Interview: The War on Disinformation
Open source intelligence (OSINT) can provide facts – but impatient, angry audiences often prefer opinions.