Their News [Archives:2008/1134/Local News]
OMV plans 40 new oil wells in Yemen
OMV, Austria announced its plan to dig 40 new oil wells by 2010 in Block S2 (Al Uqlah) in the Shabwa province of Yemen. This plan comes under the company's desire to grow its oil production to more than 30 thousand barrel daily.
OMV – Yemen general manager Elmar Colins said the plan includes increasing the oil production of the company through digging new wells and creating a new production unit that will be linked with the oil refinery in Safer through n exporting line about 120 kilometers long.
Colins said that this ambition is based on strong indicators encouraging investment in the sector S2 which currently produces 6 thousand and 200 barrels daily from seven oil wells. He also noted that the company is planning to invest in other oil sectors in Shabwa and Al-Mahara provinces.
The company has started implementing the Ministry of Oil and Minerals policy regarding Yemenizing employment. Colins predicted that in the coming two years around 90 percent of the workers will be Yemenis.
OMV has been active in Yemen since the early 1990s. The company has an office in Sana'a, Yemen, with 10 employees, including 3 expatriates.
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon Launches Campaign to End Violence against Women
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon launched last Monday a multi-year campaign to intensify action to end violence against women and girls.
At least one out of every three women in the world is likely to be beaten, coerced into sex or otherwise abused in her lifetime, according to UN estimates, and one in five women will become a victim of rape or attempted rape. Trafficking, sexual harassment, female genital mutilation, dowry murder, honour killings and female infanticide are other widespread aspects of the problem.
“Violence against women and girls makes its hideous imprint on every continent, country and culture,” said the Secretary-General. “It is time to focus on the concrete actions that all of us can and must take to prevent and eliminate this scourge – Member States, the United Nations family, civil society and individuals – women and men. It is time to break through the walls of silence, and make legal norms a reality in women's lives.”
The campaign will aim to mobilize public opinion to ensure that policy makers at the highest level work to prevent and eradicate violence against women. A key target will be to secure political will and increased resources from governments, international institutions, United Nations entities, the private sector and other donors for policies and programmes to tackle the problem. The Secretary-General is calling on world leaders, men and women, to lead national campaigns to end violence against women.
The growing commitment of men to prevent and combat violence against women will be leveraged, and the campaign will welcome and encourage the active involvement of men and boys, recognizing the critical role they must play.
Running from 2008 to 2015 – to coincide with the target date of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) – the campaign will focus on three key areas: global advocacy; United Nations leadership by example; and strengthened efforts and partnerships at the national, regional and international levels. The link to the MDGs reflects the fact that violence against women constrains the active involvement of women in development and is seen as a serious obstacle to the achievement of all internationally agreed development goals, including the MDGs.
Building on Momentum. The campaign will harness the existing strong momentum in the General Assembly and the Security Council to take action against all forms of violence against women, including rape in conflict and post-conflict situations. In recent years, Governments have made significant advances at international, regional and national levels by establishing legal and policy frameworks, covering many different forms of violence and seeking to end impunity. At the 2005 World Summit, world leaders pledged to redouble efforts to eliminate all forms of violence against women and, following the release of an in-depth study by the Secretary-General, further impetus was generated by two General Assembly resolutions (61/143 and 62/133) on intensification of efforts to eliminate all forms of violence against women, adopted in December 2006 and 2007 respectively, and a resolution on rape and sexual violence (62/134) adopted in December 2007. However, much more needs to be done.
The campaign will build upon the decades of work by women activists, women's groups and other civil society organizations who, as agents of change, continue to lead the struggle to expose and counter violence. Their determination and hard work has placed the issue on the global agenda and deepened understanding of the nature and scope of violence against women and girls and its impact on the survivors, their families, communities and countries.
Strengthening the role of the United Nations in ending violence and creating an organizational culture within the UN System that rejects violence against women and girls and takes action to prevent and address it are also important aims of the campaign. The ongoing reform of the UN, aimed at enhanced coherence, has created an enabling environment for the UN System to work together on this issue. UN Action against Sexual Violence in Conflict – a collaborative initiative of 12 UN entities – and other efforts, such as UNIFEM's “Say NO to violence against women” on-line signature campaign, demonstrate this new approach.
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