QUETTA: The Aurat Foundation, a non-governmental organisation working for women’s rights in Pakistan, has said that the new coronavirus has severely affected women in the country.

“Incidents of violence against women have risen,” Yasmeen Mughal, project officer of Jazba programme, said while speaking at the closing ceremony of a two-day training workshop on women’s participation in the political process and local government system in Quetta.

The workshop was jointly organised by the Aurat Foundation and the South Asia Partnership.

She said coronavirus had severely affected women involved in economic activities in the country and significant steps were needed to be taken to facilitate them at the governmental and non-governmental levels.

NGO says women engaged in economic activities have been affected by Covid-19

She said that if practical steps were not taken, millions of middle-class families in the country would be forced to live below poverty line and the monster of poverty would further increase in the country.

She said that Aurat Foundation and the South Asia Partnership would take joint steps for effective participation of women in economic and political processes at the district level under the Jazba project and attention would be paid for making laws for women’s individual and constitutional rights.

Speaking on the occasion, Allauddin Khilji, regional director of Aurat Foundation, Quetta, said that a society free from violence was the only guarantee of sustainable development.

Published in Dawn, July 6th, 2020