Russian NGO honours Afghan woman MP

By OUR SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT

London

Oct. 7: Afghanistan woman member of Parliament, 30-year-old Malalai Joya, has been conferred the prestigious Anna Politkovskaya Award for her work in defending human rights.

The award, set up in memory of Russian investigative journalist, Anna Poli-tkovskaya, who was killed in Moscow on October 7, 2006, is given every year to a woman human rights defender from a conflict zone in the world.

Ms Joya was presented the award at a ceremony on Monday night by journalist Jon Snow and Natalia Estemirova, a human rights defender from Chechnya and the first recipient of the Anna Politkovskaya Award in 2007.

Ms Joya has been described as the bravest woman in Afghanistan for publicly denouncing warlords, war criminals, standing up for women’s rights and campaigning on behalf of rape victims. The award has been instituted by RAW in WAR a NGO.

Iranian composer, singer and performance artist Sussan Deyhim and Irish singer-songwriter Lorraine Jordan performed at the ceremony. The award has been instituted by RAW in WAR (Reach All Women in WAR), an international human rights NGO, which was founded by journalist and human rights activist Mariana Katzarova. It supports women human rights defenders working in countries of war and conflict and helps end abuse and persecution against them.

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Afghan refugees quit battle zone

Islamabad, Oct. 7: Afghan refugees were flowing over the border from a Pakistani battle zone on Tuesday after officials accused them of links with Taliban militants and ordered them out, the police said.

Pakistani authorities have told Afghans living in the Bajur tribal region to go back to their homeland and quit an area where troops have been fighting a bloody war with insurgents. The order risked adding to the humanitarian crisis resulting from the two-month old military offensive in a long-neglected region that had become a base for militants fighting on both sides of the frontier. The US officials concerned about the escalating insurgency in Afghanistan have praised the operation, which the Pakistani military claims has killed more than 1,000 insurgents. It has given no figure for civilian casualties. Bacha Khan, a police official in Bajur, told on Tuesday that refugees had been crossing steadily into Afghanistan. —AP