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A million women rise!
Andrea D'Cruz
In the month of the 97 International Women's Day, PN celebrates another year of women
around the world rising up and
resisting all forms of oppression
and injustice:
Palestinian women have been
protesting the devastatingly debilitating Israeli siege on Gaza. On 25
February, in a peaceful action
called by the Popular Committee
Against the Siege, thousands of
Gazan women and children joined
hands to form a human chain,
risking a violent response from the
world's fourth strongest army.
Jamila al-Shanti, a Hamas MP
and chair of the women's committee of the Palestinian Legislative
Council said: "we are here to send
out a clear message to the world
that we still exist, that we are
steadfast until the siege comes to
an end."
In August, around 400 women
from Nepal's marginalised Badi
community won concessions. They
had stripped off to their undergarments to expose the injustice of
the system that leaves their people
impoverished thus forcing the
women into prostitution.
"We have been stripped by
society everyday so why should I
be ashamed to press for our
demands," Rukmini Badi, one of
the protestors, declared.
Under ongoing US-UK attacks
on their country and a repressive
fundamentalist social climate, the
Revolutionary Association of the
Women of Afghanistan bravely
continued their vital range of
activities. Their projects include
providing free mobile health services and running the Malalai hospital in a refugee camp in Pakistan.
There is a desperate need for
these provisions. One in nine
women in Afghanistan die during
pregnancy or shortly after childbirth. Unicef attributes the figure
to the effects of the conflict and
conservative cultural sensitivities.
Since its establishment in 1977
RAWA has waged a struggle for
social, economic and political
rights and has opposed the US
crusade to "liberate" the women
of Afghanistan by waging war.
PN eagerly anticipates another
year of reporting on global struggles for women's liberation and
against the waging of all wars.
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