Maria Bashir
The U.S. government welcomed Bashir as a sign of Westernization after the Taliban.  The US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice flew Bashir to Washington for talks. However, Bashir said many negative things about the new constitution.  The new constitution gave equal rights to women, but many judges still used the old Islamic Sharia Law. Bashir said the new law did not give women freedom to choose their husbands.  She also said that men were not sent to trial for adultery, but women were stoned to death for the same thing.  In divorce, the husband always got the children; women thought suicide was better. On the subject of corruption, Bashir wanted to stop appointments based on ethnic groups. She also wanted more money for officials.  She said the corruption would not stop if the officials had to find more money somewhere.