After genocide, before peace
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Genocide in Rwanda had been under way for 48 hours when 36-year-old Monique was told by a friend she would be killed. Monique fled, but her 12-year-old niece, Geraldine, was raped that night, and took years to die. "Aids is the second genocide," says Monique, who lost 27 members of her close family in 1994. That doesn't include her grandfather, who was murdered in 1963; her aunt, raped and murdered in 1973; and her father, attacked and interrogated in 1990, who later died from a heart attack. Monique's family provides a gruesome snapshot of 30 years of cyclical bloodshed that paved the way for genocide.
Book review: Women in Parliament - the new suffragettes
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Have you ever wondered what Westminster is really like? What it feels like and tastes like from the inside? If so, regardless of your gender or politics, this is a book you have to read. Boni Sones succeeds in bringing Westminster to life, as well as shining a light on the traditionally male world of parliament, fashioned by 500 years of men-only shortlists.
Women in Parliament deconstructs the ‘Blair’s babes’ phenomena to give readers a real taste of what happened when the 1997 election doubled the number of women in parliament overnight. But, even after this huge increase in women, 82% of MPs were still men. It is no wonder that women, a small minority of parliamentarians, weren’t able to transform the Commons overnight. Yet they remained burdened with vast expectations.
The first time I was thrown out for being black
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Do you remember Hurricane Katrina? It not only destroyed New Orleans, but also laid bare the ugly truth about America's racial divide. I reported on the disaster for the Guardian, and set out on a personal journey through the southern states to see what had changed since my African-American dad was forced to flee the US on racially-motivated charges. The last time I visited New Orleans I was a student travelling around America. It was the first time in my life that I was physically thrown out of somewhere for being black. "We don't have niggers like you here!" yelled the manager of a scummy youth hostel before throwing my belongings out of a first-floor window, scattering them over the street.
