Thailand
India: Sons Preferred by Couples, Served by Bangkok Clinics
NEW DELHI: Aamita from Delhi has a dark secret. Last year, without telling family or friends, she boarded a plane to Thailand to undergo IVF treatment. A mother of two girls by then, Aamita was perfectly fertile and would have had no problem conceiving again. But she wanted a boy.
Gender selection is illegal in India, but a growing number of women like Aamita are finding a way round the ban by going to Thailand where there are no laws against it.
Interview: Muslim women in southern Thailand face discrimination by civil and religious law
BANGKOK (TrustLaw) – Muslim women in Thailand’s insurgency-plagued southern region face problems of discrimination under state and religious law, as well as cultural norms, that are exceedingly difficult to address, a prominent human rights activist told TrustLaw.
Thailand: Insurgency Turns Malay-Muslim Women into Leaders
SONGKHLA, Thailand, Sep 23, 2010 (IPS) - When her husband was arrested for links to an insurgency raging in this southern region, Pattama Heemmima joined the ranks of Malay-Muslim women forced into the unfamiliar routine of visiting police stations, military camps and courts to secure the freedom of their imprisoned kin.
At the same time, there was no local organisation she could turn to for help regarding her husband, Nawawee Daohumso, who was taken in by the Thai police in March 2008 for his alleged role in a killing a civilian.
But by the time a court acquitted Nawawee in March 2010 -- enabling him and 34-year-old Pattama to rebuild a marriage that was only two months old when police made the wrongful arrest -- Pattama had found an answer to her search for a local helping hand.
Roles and Challenges for Muslim Women in the Restive Southern Border Provinces of Thailand
The report “Rules and Challenges for Malay Muslim Women in the Restive Southern Border Provinces of Thailand” was first presented at the Conference on Religious Activism & Women’s Development in Southeast Asia: Highlighting Impediments, Exploring Opportunities, organized by Centre for Research on Islamic and Malay Affairs (RIMA), Singapore National University, on 20 November 2009. This report focuses on the roles of Malay Muslim women in the Southern Border Provinces of Thailand who have to face life amidst problems, obstacles and difficulties in bringing up their families in a time when violence forces them to stand forward as leaders.
Angkhana Neelapaijit has written this report with the objective to draw a picture of the problems of women in various dimensions, including women affected by violence from governmental officials or by unidentified armed groups, women in families that have experienced enforced disappearance, and
women who are in groups who use violence.