The 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled this week in favor of a family seeking asylum in the US on the grounds that their daughter may face female genital mutilation (FGM) if they return to their home country of Indonesia.  The asylum claim was filed in 2002 by Bob Benito Benyamin and Anabella Rodriguez after their business visa expired.  Their claim rested, in part, on the fact that their eldest daughter had been forced, without their consent, to undergo FGM in Indonesia as an infant. 

NASHVILLE, Tennessee (CNN) -- The accused came from all walks of life: Retirees, dads and twentysomethings.  An engineer, a business owner and an auto worker.  A man in a wheelchair.  Men in need of Spanish or Farsi translators. 

About 40 men somberly entered a classroom on a recent Saturday morning.  About half of them wore shiny wedding bands. 

A nurse intervention program that helps sexually exploited runaway girls re-connect to family, school and health care reduces trauma and restores healthy behaviors, according to a new study led by University of British Columbia researcher Elizabeth Saewyc and Children's Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota nurse practitioner Laurel Edinburgh. 

President Karzai has approved a law that critics say condones marital rape, opening a rift in the international community as it debates how best to respond without disrupting Thursday’s presidential election. 

Iranian opposition leader Mahdi Karroubi announced Sunday that he has received reports of jailers raping prisoners during the government crackdown on protesters after June's disputed presidential election.  Karroubi, a reformist candidate defeated by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in the election, has stated that former senior officials notified him of the abuses, reports the Associated Press. 

GOMA, Congo — It was around 11 p.m. when armed men burst into Kazungu Ziwa’s hut, put a machete to his throat and yanked down his pants.  Mr. Ziwa is a tiny man, about four feet, six inches tall.  He tried to fight back, but said he was quickly beaten down. 

“Then they raped me,” he said. “ It was horrible, physically.  I was dizzy.  My thoughts just left me.” 

NEW YORK, United States, July 24 (UNHCR) – A landmark meeting in New York, co-organized by the UN refugee agency, has given important impetus to efforts to eradicate discrimination against forcibly displaced and stateless females, including rape, domestic violence and other abuses. 

The July 16-17 seminar, the first of its kind, brought together officials from UNHCR and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) with 15 independent experts from around the world who serve on the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). 

WASHINGTON — US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will visit the troubled east of the Democratic Republic of Congo on her upcoming Africa trip to push to end soaring violence against women, a top aide said Thursday. 

Clinton will travel to Goma, a city flooded with refugees since the 1994 genocide in neighboring Rwanda, as part of her seven-nation tour starting next week, said Johnnie Carson, the assistant secretary of state for Africa. 

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