21st Century Suffragettes

GUSTAVO FERRARI / AP

V FOR VOTES: Kuwaiti women celebrate their new rights

At the Kuwaiti parliament last week, a crowd gathered quickly, noisily, in one of those convulsions of public feeling that impel strangers to converge on a single spot. They were not there to protest. Dancing, singing and launching fireworks, some 300 men and women came to celebrate a breakthrough political victory. After a nine-hour parliamentary debate, and six long years of delay, a bill granting women the right to vote and to run for public office finally passed. "Our hearts are overflowing with joy and happiness," exulted Fayza al-Awadhi, a member of the Kuwaiti Women's Cultural & Social...

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