In the words of Husan Al Hubaishi, author of Legal system and basic law in Yemen, modern Yemen means new responsibilities. 'Yemen is endeavouring to preserve its unity, to promote its newly gained democracy and to achieve prosperity for its people. However, those aspirations and responsibilities need to be guarded and the most effective guard is justice which drives us to action whenever an instance of injustice affronts our sight; justice with a judiciary adaptable to changing national needs'.

Two recent incidents suggest that Yemen's judicial system has not adapted to changing needs when dealing with women. In some cases the victim is treated as a criminal. Last month, a woman in her 20s who was repeatedly raped by her father and made pregnant by him was jailed for five years. The father received a prison sentence of 20 years.

Miriam, an Azerbaijani woman who had lived in Yemen for 25 years and had been granted Yemeni citizenship, was stabbed to death by her ex husband in a Sana'a court room. She died on arrival in hospital. The couple divorced five years ago and a legal dispute between them was going in Miriam's favour. Witnesses and court staff were shocked by the incident. Weapons are not allowed in Yemeni courtrooms but this law was not enforced with tragic consequences.

Another assault on women's rights came with the closure of the Empirical Research and Women's Studies Center at Sana'a University. Mansour Al-Zindani, a political science professor at the university who pushed for the closure, said the Dutch-funded center provoked conservative Yemeni society by repeatedly using the word 'gender' in its publications. On tapes available in Sanaa's shops, a Muslim cleric describes an evil conspiracy. 'It's the gender conspiracy. Gender is total decadence, meaning families of men married to men or women married to women. It also means that a woman can offer herself to any man she fancies'. Raoufa Hassan, the center's director is now in the Netherlands and the university is revising the curriculum for the women's studies programme and looking for new staff. Many professors and students believe the controversy was deliberately ignited by the conservatives who are against institutions which spread liberal ideas like equality between men and women.

Yemeni unification in 1990 marked the coming together of two contrasting sets of legislation and constitutional positions vis-a-vis women - primarily Shari'a based and traditional in the former Yemen Arab Republic (YAR) and socialist and secular in the former People's Democratic Republic of Yemen (PDYR).

As Maxine Molyneux pointed out in an article: Women's Rights and Political Contingency: The Case of Yemen 1990-94, the post-unity constitution of 1991 attempted to bridge these contrasting positions. While it omitted many of the commitments to state intervention on behalf of women contained in the former PDYR constitution, the 1991 constitution broadened the constitutional rights enjoyed by women from the former YAR. Article 19 assured 'to all of its citizens, equal political, economic, social and cultural opportunities', Article 21 stated the right to work was inalienable, as was the choice of profession; and Article 27 restated the commitment to equality before the law and proscribed discrimination.

A constitutional amendment following the 1993 elections and 1994 civil war omitted previous reference to gender, colour and social status. A new article was added stating 'Women are the sisters of men. They have rights and duties, which are guaranteed and assigned by Shari'a and stipulated by law'.

The government re-established a special parliamentary Shari'a Legislation Committee following the 1993 elections, to which major women's issues are referred for adjudication on the basis of Shari'a.

In 1997 this committee presented proposals to the president for tightening the family code by abolishing the minimum marriage age requirement for women; abolishing the requirement for a man to notify his first wife of his intention to marry a second; abolish the possibility of having one male and two female witnesses to a marriage and impose the requirement that there be two male witnesses and abolish the requirement that two wives be provided with separate housing.

Effective opposition from women's groups and human rights activists, including an official objection drafted by the Empirical Research and Women's Study Centre of Sana'a University, helped prevent the proposals from being passed into law.

Traditional tribal law, known as ahkam al-aslaf (rules of ancestors) also continues to have a direct impact on women's standing in Yemen. As a major study on women and children in Yemen conducted in 1998 points out, tribal law generally reflects the strongly patriarchal nature of rural society; it considers women as belonging to men in their paternal lineage prior to marriage and to their husband's family following marriage.Women are typically prevented from conducting their own marriage contract. In Mareb, Al Jawf and Saddah tribal law permits women the same right of divorce as men, though this right is normally only granted to women of high social status, such as those from the families of sheikhs. Tribal law typically denies a woman any inheritance of tribal lands if she marries outside her tribe to prevent lands passing from one tribe to another through intermarriage.

The study on women and children also noted that women arrested for violating the penal code are subjected to frequent rights violations. They are often detained for long periods before formal charging, they are generally completely unaware of their rights and most have no legal representation.

The Yemen Human Rights Guard (HRG) has drawn attention to the plight of female prisoners. Under the chaos, negligence and corruption that pervades the penal system, women are routinely subject to the worst forms of degradation and abuse at the hands of the exclusively male officers and staff. One inmate 'Shadia' described her experiences: 'They put me in detention, where four soldiers beat me in order to get me to admit who assaulted me sexually. Two days later, the officer summoned me. It was night. He promised that he would release me if I told him everything. So I told him what happened in my sister's house. He promised he'd release me from Criminal Investigations the next day if...' Five months later, Shadia was still in prison without charge.

The HRG and other human rights groups also note that many female inmates bring their children and infants with them to prison. Like their mothers, the children are deprived of food, clothing and health care and kept in unhygenic conditions. It is also the practice that when female inmates complete their sentence they will only be released to one of their parents or relatives. If that relative refuses to receive them they remain in prison. This is but one of the graver forms in which women suffer the deprivation of their dignity and humanity due to the inequality between the sexes in Yemen, the HRG concludes.

In its latest report on human rights in Yemen, the American State Department refers to a 1995 Interior Ministry regulation that a Yemeni woman wishing to marry a foreigner must present proof of her parents' approval to the Interior Ministry. A foreign woman who wishes to marry a Yemeni man must prove to the Ministry that she is 'of good conduct and behaviour', and is 'free from contagious disease'. There is no corresponding requirement for men to demonstrate parental approval, good conduct or freedom from contagious diseases.

According to a 1997 demographic survey conducted by the government nearly 23 percent of women who have married were subjected to female genital mutilation (FGM). But even though some government health workers and officials actively and publicly discouraged the practice, the government has not passed legislation to outlaw the practise and local women's groups have not made its eradication a priority.

The legal age for marriage is 15 but marriages of girls as young as 12 occur and child marriages are common in rural areas. There is a legal provision for compulsory free education for nine years but many children, especially girls, do not attend primary school.

The government often speaks about the promotion of womens' rights but its rhetoric is either not backed up with appropriate legislation or little effort is made to enforce existing legislation. Yemeni women are still second class citizens in a male-dominated society where the shari'a and tribal law places them in a subordinate position and attempts are being made to amend the constitution to deny them rights they started to take for granted.

* This article is in part based on Children and Women in Yemen: A situational analysis summary 1998 published by the Government of Yemen in partnership with UNICEF, the World Bank and Radda Barnen and draws largely on information in the US State Department's Human Rights Report on Yemen for 1999.

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