A Chinese court has convicted American businesswoman Sandy Phan-Gillis for spying and ordered her deportation. Phan-Gillis was sentenced to three and a half years in prison by a court in Nanning, but it is unclear if she will have to serve the time. She was arrested in March 2015 while travelling with a business delegation from Texas through mainland China. She has already spent more than two years in detention and her family has consistently maintained her innocence. Phan-Gillis, who has Chinese origins but was born in Vietnam, was accused of espionage and stealing state secrets, according to the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention. Her lawyer, Shang Baojun, told the AFP news agency that he expected she would be “deported very soon”, which would mean she would not have to serve the sentence. The 57-year-old business consultant, who lives with her family in Houston, Texas, was in “okay” condition,…

Saudi Arabia, a country where women are not allowed to drive cars, has been elected to the United Nations women’s rights commission, sparking anger. The kingdom was elected recently by secret ballot to a four-year term on the Commission on the Status of Women and will join 45 other countries on the panel, a UN press statement said. The commission’s role has been to “promote shaping global standards on gender equality and the empowerment of women”. Algeria and Iraq were also elected to join the commission along with ten other countries. Under the kingdom’s conservative interpretation of Islamic law, women face many restrictions in work and travel. UN Watch, a monitoring group, has harshly criticized the UN for allowing Saudi Arabia onto the commission. “Electing Saudi Arabia to protect women’s rights is like making an arsonist into the town fire chief,” said Hillel Neuer, Executive director of the watchdog. “It’s…

Born at the turn of the past century, Maria Félix is old enough to remember the Mexican Revolution – but too old to get the bank card needed to collect her monthly 1,200 pesos ($63) welfare payment. Félix turns 117 in July, according to her birth certificate, which local authorities recognise as authentic. That would put her in the ranks of the world’s oldest living people. She went three months without state support for poor elderly Mexicans after she was turned away from a branch of Citibanamex in the city of Guadalajara for being too old, said Miguel Castro, Development Secretary for the state of Jalisco. Welfare beneficiaries now need individual bank accounts because of new transparency rules, Castro said. “They told me the limit was 110 years,” Félix said with a smile in the plant-filled courtyard of her small house in Guadalajara. Félix, who sells candies from a stand…

Women in the UK technology industry are paid on average 16% less than men, new research into the wage gap claims. A survey across more than 750 organisations also found that the technology sector had the largest “like-for-like” gender pay gap in the UK, with women being paid 6% less for doing the same job. Researchers pointed to a lack of women holding senior positions in technology companies as a key cause for the divide. Advisory firm Korn Ferry Hay Group, which carried out the research – coinciding with Girls in ICT Day – called on the technology sector to address how it recruited women in order to reduce the gap. Ben Frost from the group said: “The tech sector is admired for encouraging innovation at work and fostering flexible working processes, yet it must do more to institutionalise a culture where women can thrive. “Of course, this issue would…

By: Kelly Weill Five Maryland legislators could have ended a policy that forces women to share child custody with their rapists. Instead the five legislators, all men, buried the bill. Maryland is one of seven states without a law allowing women to terminate parental rights for their rapists, if their child was conceived as a result of sexual assault, according to reproductive rights organization NARAL. The state’s current policy forces survivors to negotiate child custody and adoption issues with their attacker. In a bid to update the draconian policy, Maryland Delegate Kathleen Dumais introduced legislation that would allow a woman to cut her rapist’s parental rights. But while the bill passed both Maryland’s House and Senate, the bill’s text varied between the two legislative bodies. On Monday, the last day of legislative session, a five-person negotiating group was set to decide on the bill’s final text, the Baltimore Sun reported.…

By: Joseph Wangui After venturing into male-dominated political arena in the country, women seeking elective positions in Nyeri are getting it rough due to increased physical violence and intimidation as the August General Election draws to a close. The women have complained of intimidation by their male competitors through hiring of goons and gender discrimination. Some have also suffered physical violence and destruction of their campaign materials while admitting that they are financially constrained. Ms. Ann Kanyi, who is running for Tetu parliamentary seat, is lucky to be alive following an attack by four masked men armed with metal bars and a gun at Mbaaini village. She narrated that her car was blocked from the opposite direction recently by a grey Toyota Fielder whose registration number was concealed. She said the attackers jumped out of their vehicle and smashed windows of her car before dragging her out and assaulting her.…

The Kerala government recently ordered a probe into the allegation that young women had entered the Lord Ayyappa temple at Sabarimala. The age-old practice at the temple bans entry of women aged between 10 and 50 years. Kerala Temple Affairs Minister Kadakampally Surendran said certain photographs, which purportedly showed young women at the Sabarimala hill shrine, are being circulated on the social media. “I have asked the vigilance wing of the temple affairs department to probe the incident,” Surendran said. The minister said he received complaints that a businessman from Kollam district was making gains by ensuring VIP facility for darshan at Sabarimala temple. “A complaint said the young women had gone to the temple along with that businessman. If anyone tries to make gains by facilitating VIP darshan, it is an offence. I have asked the vigilance officer to look into the veracity of the photographs,’’ he said. The…