Celebrations of March 8 ongoing
NEWS CENTER (DİHA) – Ahead of March 8, women in ten separate cities of Northern Kurdistan and Turkey took to the streets to cry "on with the resistance" and to greet the women's revolution in Rojava yesterday. The activities are only the latest in the series of International Working Women's Day celebrations in the region, which will culminate today with the beginning of the World March of Women in Nusaybin.
In Diyarbakır, women from the Confederation of Revolutionary Women's Unions (DİSK) gathered in the reception room of Sümerpark under posters of Kobanê woman martyr Arîn Mîrxan, where union leader ZeynepDemir spoke. Afterward, women from the DicleFırat Culture Center led a group traditional dance.
The women of Kocaeli University, recently attacked by campus security forces for organizing March 8 celebrations, marched on the rector's building with signs celebrating the heroic resistance of women, including posters of slain university student ÖzgecanAslan and Kobanê martyr Arîn Mîrxan. They spoke outside the rector's building against the ongoing harassment and rape on campus, the sexist discourse used by professors and the administration's open encouragement of hatred of women.
The municipality of Gürpınar and Van organized a trip of 150 women to Axtamar Island, the ancient Armenian island in Lake Van named from the legendary Armenian princess Tamar.
In Erzurum, the Women's Studies Club at Atatürk University held a conference on gender roles, gender and sexuality. In Xırvata, a town in Hakkâri province near Yüksekova, women held a panel with the attendance of Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) and Democratic Regions Party (DBP) representatives. Local civil society organizations also attended to discuss the women's movement across the world, from Clara Zetkin and Rosa Luxemburg to the three Kurdish militant women murdered in Paris, SakineCansız, FidanDoğan and LeylaŞaylemez.
In Bitlis, the women's assembly of the Confederation of Public Workers' Unions (KESK) held a press conference to discuss women's centuries-long struggle against capitalism. In Birecik, in Urfa province, women held a film screening. Hilvan, in the same province, held a celebration of March 8, with music and dancing while the women of Siverek held a panel on women's role in the Rojava revolution. Academic Handan Çağlayan and Hazro co-mayor GülerÖzavcı spoke on the panel.
In Gölmarmara, in Manisa, local musicians performed for women, who danced traditional dances and wore their regional clothes.
(nt)
