 [Dawn] Pakistan has told a UN committee that it had adopted a 'zero-tolerance' approach to violence against women, and that harassment at work places has been made a punishable offence.
| Harassment being defined as throwing acid at a woman on whom you have no legitimate claim, or raping one with powerful relatives. |
Speaking in the General Assembly Third Committee -- which deals with social, humanitarian and cultural issues -- Amjad Hussain Sial said that ambitious goals of gender equality, women empowerment and ending violence against women across the world could only be achieved through international cooperation and global partnership. 'Unless financial resources are mobilized, through both domestic and international channels, across all social sectors, progress towards gender will remain limited,' he said in a debate on advancement of women on Tuesday.
Ambassador Sial said that Pakistan's Constitution guaranteed the equality of all its citizens, and women had today shed all barriers of tradition and custom.
| "Hardly any live in purdah anymore," he added. |
Participating in every walk of life, they were performing to the maximum in teaching, care-giving, engineering, law and the military, among other areas.
Pakistan, he said, had elected Shaheed Benazir Bhutto as the first woman prime minister in the Muslim world and, in addition to having 17 women senators and 76 women parliamentarians, it had South Asia's first woman speaker of a national assembly.
| How many of those women did not have powerful relatives, pray tell? |
The Pakistani representative said the government was also taking administrative and legal steps, including, among others, the adoption of the Protection of Women Act in 2006, which had been hailed as a milestone.
| No doubt it's a lovely document, honoured entirely in the breach. |
Other measures included the Benazir Bhutto Income Support Programme, which sought the social and financial uplift of women; a comprehensive Gender Reform Action Plan and the Benazir Bhutto Youth Development Programme and zero-tolerance policies for violence against women. 'Taking forward the women agenda government is not alone in its efforts,' Sial said. 'Side by side standing is the private sector and media on forefront to promote awareness of women's rights and fight violence against women.'
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