World's Most Dangerous Countries for Women

Targeted violence against females, dismal healthcare and desperate poverty make Afghanistan the world's most dangerous country in which to be born a woman, with Congo a close second due to horrific levels of rape. Pakistan, India and Somalia ranked third, fourth and fifth, respectively, in the global survey of perceptions of threats ranging from domestic abuse and economic discrimination to female foeticide (the destruction of a fetus in the uterus), genital mutilation and acid attack. A survey compiled by the Thomson Reuters Foundation to mark the launch of TrustLaw Woman*, puts Afghanistan at the top of the list of the most dangerous places in the world for women. TrustLaw asked 213 gender experts from five contents to rank countries by overall perceptions of danger as well as by six categories of risk. The risks consisted of health threats, sexual violence, non-sexual violence, cultural or religious factors, lack of access to resources and trafficking. The collection of images that follow were provided by Reuters to illustrate the dangers women face in those 5 countries. -- Paula Nelson (*TrustLaw Woman is a website aimed at providing free legal advice for women’s' groups around the world.) (17 photos total)

Women in Afghanistan have a near total lack of economic rights, rendering it a severe threat to its female inhabitants. An Afghan soldier uses a wooden stick to maintain order among women waiting for humanitarian aid at a World Food Programme WFP distribution point in the city of Kabul, December 14, 2001. The U.N. (WFP) started its biggest ever food distribution in the Afghan capital, handing out sacks of wheat to more than three-quarters of the war-ravaged city's population. (Damir Sagolj/Reuters)

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Continuing conflict, NATO airstrikes and cultural practices combine to make Afghanistan a very dangerous place to be a woman," says Antonella Notari, head of Women Change Makers, a group that supports women social entrepreneurs around the world. A woman walks past riot police outside a gathering in Kabul's stadium, February 23, 2007. (Ahmad Masood/Reuters) #

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A victim is taken away from the site of a bomb blast in Kabul, December 15, 2009. At least four civilians were killed by the suicide car bomb outside a hotel used by foreigners in Kabul's main diplomatic area and across the street from the home of a former vice president. (Ahmad Masood/Reuters) #

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An Afghan woman checks on her daughter in a hospital in Charikar city, May 11, 2009. Nearly 50 Afghan teenagers were in the hospital after a mystery gas attack on a girls' school in the northern town of Charikar, the second mass poisoning of female students in a month. Attacks on girls schools have increased, particularly in the east and south of the country. A year prior, a group of schoolgirls in Kandahar had acid thrown in their faces by men who objected to them attending school. (Omar Sobhani/Reuters) #

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The near total lack of economic rights render Afghanistan a threat to its female inhabitants. Women beg on a road as snow falls in Kabul, January 13, 2009. (Ahmad Masood/Reuters) #

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"In Afghanistan, women have a one in 11 chance of dying in childbirth." Afghan mothers visit a health clinic in Eshkashem district of Badakhshan province, northeast of Kabul, April 23, 2008. (Ahmad Masood/Reuters) #

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Shamsia, 17, a victim of an acid attack by the Taliban, lies in a hospital in Kabul, November 15, 2008. (Omar Sobhani/Reuters) #

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The relative of an Afghan prisoner cries outside Pul-i-Charkhi prison on the eastern outskirts of Kabul, Afghanistan, February 28, 2006. A siege at Pul-i-Charkhi, Afghanistan's biggest prison, entered a fourth day but the government expressed hope for a peaceful resolution to a bloody revolt by hundreds of inmates. (Ahmad Masood/Reuters) #

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Women who venture into non-traditional roles, they are often threatened or killed. A damaged campaign poster for a female Afghan candidate for Parliament on a wall in Herat, western Afghanistan, September 8, 2010. (Raheb Homavandi/Reuters) #

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An Afghan woman wearing a traditional Burqa walks on the side of a road as a Northern Alliance APC, (Armoured Personnel Carrier) carrying fighters and the Afghan flag, drives to a new position in the outskirts of Jabal us Seraj, some 60kms north of the Afghan capital Kabul, November 4, 2001. The Northern Alliance, a mix of mostly ethnic Uzbek and Tajik fighters in the north, is viewed with suspicion and enmity by ethnic Pashtuns, who operate in other areas. (Yannis Behrakis/Reuters) #

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Afghan women wait for their turn at a World Food Program (WFP) distribution centre in Kabul, February 10, 2011. (Ahmad Masood/Reuters) #

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An Afghan girl touches her mother's artificial leg at the ICRC Ali Abad Orthopaedic centre in Kabul, November 12, 2009. The centre, which is run mostly by disabled people, aims to educate and rehabilitate landmine victims and people with any kind of deformities, to help them integrate effectively into society. They also provide the patients with a 18-months interest free $600 micro credit loan. (Jerry Lampen/Reuters) #

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An Afghan mother holds her child as she visits a health clinic in Eshkashem district of Badakhshan province, northeast of Kabul, April 23, 2008. Women die in childbirth every day in Afghanistan, a country with one of the world's highest maternal mortality rates. (Ahmad Masood/Reuters) #

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A veiled Afghan woman waits with her son, whose legs have been amputated, for alms on a street in Kabul, August 4, 2008. (Adnan Abidi/Reuters) #

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Women who do attempt to speak out or take on public roles that challenge the ingrained gender stereotypes of what is acceptable for women to do or not, such as working as a policewoman or news broadcaster, are often intimidated or killed. A woman attends an event to discuss the presidential candidates in Kabul, August 11, 2009. (Lucy Nicholson/Reuters) #

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The staggering levels of sexual violence in the lawless east of the DRC account for its ranking as the second most dangerous place for women. One recent US study claimed that more than 400,000 women are raped there each year. The UN has called the Congo the rape capital of the world. A woman who has recently undergone surgery rests at the general hospital at Dungu in northeastern Congo, February 17, 2009. (Finbarr O'Reilly/Reuters) #

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"Rights activists say militia groups and soldiers target all ages, including girls as young as three and elderly women", according to the survey. "They are gang-raped, raped with bayonets and some have guns shot into their vaginas," the report continues. People flee after renewed fighting erupting around Kibati village, November 7, 2008. Fighting between rebels and government troops flared in east Congo, and African leaders called for an immediate ceasefire to end a conflict the U.N. said could engulf the country's Great Lakes region. (Stringer/Reuters) #