Wonder Woman to become UN women’s champion
Comic book heroine Wonder Woman is to be named as a new honorary ambassador for the United Nations (UN)
"The character will be used to promote messages about women's empowerment and gender-based violence", the UN said.
The UN has come under some criticism for having a lack of gender parity in senior roles. Despite campaigns there has never been a female Secretary General and one analysis found that in 2015 nine of 10 senior leadership jobs went to men.
DC Entertainment president Diane Nelson will accept the role for her company's comic book, TV and film character at a ceremony on 21 October. The DC comic's site hinted that actresses who have played Wonder Woman will also attend the event.
The campaign is being sponsored by Warner Bros and DC Entertainment who are supporting the UN and Unicef's year-long campaign for gender equality and women's empowerment.
Comics site The Mary Sue welcomed the announcement. "Wonder Woman is a great, easily-recognisable symbol of what women can become once freed from a patriarchal society", it said. But the UK Women's Equality Party said it was "fittingly comic that the UN could not think of a single human woman who could take on this role".
BBC News (13 October 2016)
(Photograph credit: Alamy)