As you deliberate upon the health care reform bill, we write to urge you to reject provisions that would effectively obstruct access to insurance coverage for abortion and interfere with the ability of women in the United States to make decisions about their own health care.

I gave birth in the developing world, in South Africa, to be precise. South Africa was in the spotlight recently when a government-commissioned report showed a 20 per cent increase in the number of deaths from pregnancy-related causes between 2005 and 2007 over the previous three-year period. The report said that nearly 40 per cent of these deaths were avoidable.

Plans to reform immigration detention management and oversight, announced today by the US government, should quickly be translated into actual policy change and accountability. The plans focus on centralizing control of facilities used to hold detained immigrants.

As U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Christopher Hill testifies before Congress today, Iraqi's security is far from assured. Militias now targetting the socially marginalized could soon take their killing spree mainstream.

After almost a decade of dismay at U.S. policy, it was wonderful for those of us in Europe who work on women's rights to witness the U.S. Secretary of State stand up in Congress and say, "We happen to think that family planning is an important part of women's health," and, "Keeping women and men in ignorance and denied access to services actually increases the rate of abortion."

As a feminist and as an American working on immigration policy, I have a clear line in the sand when it comes to the treatment of women who immigrate to this country: “defending our borders” should not be at the expense of defending our values. But when I interviewed women in immigration detention facilities all over the country last year and heard their stories of neglect and abuse, it became clear to me that this line has been crossed.

A year ago I interviewed the mother of a young woman from Wisconsin who had been raped by a man she met at while visiting her cousin in Los Angeles. It had been eight months since the rape, and the rape kit - the physical evidence -- in her daughter's case still had not been sent to a crime laboratory. The mother had two simple questions for me: "Why is her kit still unopened?" and, "When will they test her kit?" I didn't have good answers for her then. It's been over a year and I still don't have good answers for her.

The European Parliament's new members will soon be in place, some of them without a clear idea of what they can actually achieve there. They need an agenda, one that is pan-European. They should look at the problems that continue to harm and restrict women in Europe.