Participants in a march for gender equality on International Women’s Day, in Tokyo, March 8, 2018 (AP photo by Shizuo Kambayashi).

Since beginning his current term in office eight years ago, Japanese Prime Minister Abe Shinzo has repeatedly pledged that by 2020, 30 percent of leadership positions in the country would be held by women. But according to the World Economic Forum’s latest annual Global Gender Gap Report, women currently occupy only 15 percent of leadership posts in the country. To the surprise of no one, meeting Abe’s objective this year is “impossible, realistically speaking,” as one Japanese official acknowledged to the Mainichi newspaper in June. The government will instead push to hit its target “as early as possible by 2030.” […]

A protest against female genital mutilation.

When Sudan announced in April that it would officially criminalize female genital mutilation, or FGM, the news was met with a burst of support and celebration from international observers and activists. UNICEF said the ban signaled a “new era” for girls’ rights, calling it a “landmark move” in a country where around 88 percent of women and girls aged 15 to 49 have undergone genital mutilation. The measure, which amended the criminal code to make performing FGM punishable by up to three years in prison, was immediately hailed as a sign of hope for the country’s fragile transitional government, formed […]