LONDON: A Kenyan man’s acquittal for having sex with a 13-year-old because she seemed willing was named on Wednesday as the world’s worst court decision for women’s rights in the past year.
It beat off tough competition from Europe — where an Italian woman did not scream loud enough to prove her rape — and an Asian ruling that restricted birth control to Philippine women.
The Gender Justice Uncovered Awards recognize court decisions that affect the rights of women and girls around the world, in both good and bad ways.
The Kenyan judge in the most egregious case ruled that if only the age of victims was taken into account, “young girls would freely engage in sex and then opt to report to the police whenever they disagree with their boyfriends.”
According to court documents summing up the April 2016 judgment, age is immaterial if a girl acts beyond her years.
“Where the child behaves like an adult and willingly sneaks into men’s houses for purposes of having sex, the court ought to treat such a child as a grown up who knows what she is doing.”
The awards cover all aspects of gender equality, including those related to sexual and reproductive rights, violence, and discrimination. Cases under consideration came from as far afield as Uruguay and Chad, with all continents represented.
“In every country, political systems, traditions, and religious beliefs inform the decisions of judges, who have the power to affect women and girls’ rights, for better or for worse,” Blakeley Decktor — a lawyer at women’s rights organization Women’s Link, which gives out the awards — told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.
“The public has sent a clear message that they will not tolerate courts all over the world discriminating against women and girls and failing to protect their rights,” she said.
A Spanish court which ruled that the law should treat men and women differently — citing domestic violence, pension and divorce cases — was praised as the best decision.
Many of the rulings, which were nominated by members of the public, related to sexual assault cases.
In March, a survey of laws in 73 countries found rapists could avoid punishment if they married their victim in at least nine jurisdictions, including Bahrain, Iraq, Philippines, Tajikistan and Tunisia.
United Nations data suggests a third of women worldwide have suffered sexual or physical violence, and one in 10 girls have been raped or sexually assaulted.
Kenya rape trial named as world’s worst case for women’s rights
Kenya rape trial named as world’s worst case for women’s rights
EU parliament approves 90-bn-euro loan for Ukraine amid US cuts
- awmakers voted by 458 to 140 in favor of the loan, intended to cover two-thirds of Ukraine’s financial needs for 2026 and 2027
The EU parliament on Wednesday approved a 90-billion-euro loan for Ukraine, providing a financial lifeline to cash-strapped Kyiv four years into Russia’s invasion.
Lawmakers voted by 458 to 140 in favor of the loan, intended to cover two-thirds of Ukraine’s financial needs for 2026 and 2027 and backed by the EU’s common budget — after plans to tap frozen Russian central bank assets fell by the wayside.
Military aid to Ukraine hit its lowest level in 2025 as the US pulled funding, leaving Europe almost alone in footing the bill and averting a complete collapse, the Kiel Institute said Wednesday.
Kyiv's allies allocated 36 billion euros ($42.9 billion) in military aid in 2025, down 14 percent from 41.1 billion euros the previous year, according to Kiel, which tracks military, financial and humanitarian assistance pledged and delivered to Ukraine since Russia's full-scale invasion.
Military aid in 2025 was even lower than in 2022, despite the invasion not taking place until February 24 that year.
US aid came to a complete halt with President Donald Trump's return to the White House in early 2025.
Washington provided roughly half of all military assistance between 2022 and 2024.
European countries have thus made a significant effort to plug the gap, increasing their collective allocation by 67 percent in 2025 compared with the 2022-2024 average.
Without that effort, the US cuts could have been even more damaging, the institute argued.
However, the think tank points to "growing disparities" among European contributors, with Northern and Western European countries accounting for around 95 percent of military aid.
The institute calculated that Northern European countries (Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, and Sweden) provided 33 percent of European military aid in 2025, despite accounting for only eight percent of the combined GDP of European donor countries.
Southern Europe, which accounts for 19 percent of the combined GDP of European donors, contributed just three percent.
To help fill the gap left by the United States, NATO launched the PURL programme, under which European donors purchased US weapons for Ukraine, worth 3.7 billion euros in 2025.
Kiel called the initiative a "notable development", which had enabled the acquisition of Patriot air-defense batteries and HIMARS multiple-launch rocket systems.
European allies are also increasingly placing orders with Ukraine's own defence industry, following a trend started by Denmark in 2024.
War-torn Ukraine's defence production capacity has "grown by a factor of 35" since 2022, according to Kiel, but Kyiv lacks the funds to procure enough weapons to keep its factories working at full capacity.
Orders from 11 European donor countries helped bridge that gap last year.
In the second half of 2025, 22 percent of weapons purchases for Ukraine were procured domestically, a record high.
