The world's most dangerous countries for women

1. Afghanistan

• Beleaguered by insurgency, corruption and dire poverty, Afghanistan ranked as most dangerous to women overall and came out worst in three of the poll's key risk categories: health, non-sexual violence and economic discrimination.
   
• Women in Afghanistan have a one in 11 chance of dying in childbirth.
   
• Some 87 per cent of women are illiterate.
   
• Seventy to eighty per cent of girls and women face forced marriages.

2. Congo

• Still reeling from a 1998-2003 war and accompanying humanitarian disaster that killed 5.4 million, Democratic Republic of Congo ranked second due mainly to staggering levels of sexual violence.
   
• About 1,150 women are raped every day, or some 420,000 a year, according to a recent report in the American Journal of Public Health.
   
• The Congolese Women's Campaign Against Sexual Violence puts the number of rapes at 40 women a day.
   
• Fifty-seven per cent of pregnant women are anaemic.

3. Pakistan

• Those polled cited cultural, tribal and religious practices harmful to women, including acid attacks, child and forced marriage and punishment or retribution by stoning or other physical abuse.
   
• More than 1,000 women and girls are victims of "honour killings" every year, according to Pakistan's Human Rights Commission.
   
• Ninety per cent of women in Pakistan face domestic violence.

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4. India

• Female foeticide, child marriage and high levels of trafficking and domestic servitude make the world's largest democracy the fourth most dangerous place for women, the poll showed.
   
• One hundred million people, mostly women and girls, are involved in trafficking in one way or another, according to former Indian Home Secretay Madhukar Gupta.
   
• Up to 50 million girls are "missing" over the past century due to female infanticide and foeticide.
   
• At last 44.5 per cent of girls are married before the age of 18.

5. Somalia

• One of the poorest, most violent and lawless countries, Somalia ranked fifth due to a catalogue of dangers including high maternal mortality, rape, female genital mutilation (FGM) and child marriage.
   
• Ninety-five per cent of women face FGM, mostly between the ages of 4 and 11.
   
• Only 9 per cent of women give birth at a health facility.
   
• Only 7.5 per cent of parliament seats are held by women.

Sources: Gulf News: AlertNet (http://www.trust.org/alertnet), UN agencies, IRIN News, American Journal of Public Health, World Bank, Gender Index, Human Rights Watch, International Center for Research on Women