condemns the Shia Personal Status Law adopted in March 2009, which strongly violates the rights of Afghan women and contradicts the Afghan Constitution and international human rights standards; welcomes amendments made to the law on ‘Personal Affairs of the Followers of Shia Jurisprudence’ but remains deeply concerned about certain articles of the law, which contradict the obligations of Afghanistan under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, and the Convention on the Rights of the Child; urges the Afghan authorities to take action without delay to improve the situation of women’s rights in the country; 76. Insists that women's rights be explicitly addressed in all human rights dialogues, and in particular the combating and elimination of all forms of discrimination and violence against women and girls, including, most prominently, gender-selected abortion, all forms of harmful traditional or customary practices, for example female genital mutilation and early or forced marriage, all forms of trafficking in human beings, domestic violence and femicide, exploitation at work and economic exploitation, and likewise insists that the invocation by states of any custom, tradition, or religious consideration of any kind, in order to evade their duty to eliminate such brutality, be rejected; emphasises that efforts to eliminate all forms of female genital mutilation should be intensified both at the grass-roots level and within the policy-making process, so as to highlight the fact that such mutilation is both a gender issue and a human rights violation relating to physical integrity; underlines the situation of immigrant young women who, due to the principles of certain communities, religion, or family honour, have to face mistreatment, honour killings or genital mutilation and are being deprived of their freedom; 77. Recalls the Millennium Development Goals, and stresses that access to education and health are basic human rights; believes that health programmes, including sexual and reproductive health, promotion of gender equality, empowerment of women and rights of the child should be prominent in the EU´s development and human rights policy, in particular where gender-based violence is pervasive and women and children are put at risk of HIV/AIDS, or denied access to information, prevention and/or treatment; calls on the Commission to integrate core labour rights and the decent work agenda into its development policy, in particular in trade-related assistance programmes; 78. Welcomes the UN Human Rights Council resolution of 16 June 2009 on preventable maternal mortality and morbidity and human rights, which calls for urgent action in line with the Millennium Development Goals to prevent women from dying needlessly in pregnancy and childbirth; notes that the resolution was supported by the EU Member States, and calls on them effectively to promote the protection of the human rights of women and girls, in particular their rights to life, to be equal in dignity, to education, to be free to seek, receive and impart information, to enjoy the benefits of scientific progress, to freedom from discrimination, and to enjoy the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health, including sexual and reproductive health; 79. Calls on the Council, the Commission and the Member States to promote in particular the ratification and implementation by African Union Member States of the African Union Protocol on the Rights of Women in Africa; Torture and other cruel, inhumane or degrading treatment 80. Calls for recognition of health abuses against patients and individuals, in particular those unable to defend themselves, as cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment, while recognising the difficulty of proving certain acts and therefore calling for the highest degree of vigilance; 81. Calls for the recognition that minorities such as indigenous groups and people discriminated against