DİHA - Dicle News Agency

MARDÎN (DİHA) –Women in Nusaybin spent the morning discussing democratic confederalism and the exploitation of nature in two simultaneous panels assembled for the first day of the World March of Women. HivaErabo, chair of the Cizîrê Canton court of justice in Rojava, explained that in Rojava, Arab, Assyrian, Syriac and Kurdish women take part in all parts of life, reorganizing life according to the model of the commune.

Congress of Free Women (KJA) activist Seve Demir moderated the panel on democratic confederalism and the Rojava revolution. KJA Coordination member Melike Karagöz spoke alongside Hiva Erabo. Hiva said that as women of Rojava, they are able to resist thanks to the work and struggles of women like Sara (nom de guerre of Sakine Cansız, the Kurdish militant women slain in Paris) and Arîn Mîrxan (the hero of the Kobanê resistance). Women had long been held back in Rojava and the rest of the world, according to Hiva, and had begun to seek ways out of the chaos and massacre to which they were exposed. Under the Syrian regime, women could have no place in the government. Democratic politics was impossible. "Because of the repression of the Syrian regime, Kurds were seeking something different."

'Women are everywhere'

She described the whirlwind process of founding local government in Rojava after the declaration of autonomy in 2011. Efforts were led by the many peoples of Rojava, whose identities had been denied and othered—and especially by women. She said the YPJ women fighting forces may be a rare model in the world, but they came out of women's history of struggle. "Our system of organization is grassroots and local. It's a communal way of life. In our communes, men and women find equality," she said. In communal life, women's organization against their own problems is fundamental. "Civil society organizations and women's organizations are actively working on this. And in politics, social life, diplomacy, economy, culture and education, women are everywhere."

'Women are strengthening Sara's struggle'

Melike Karagöz commented on the system of democratic confederalism being implemented in Rojava. "Democratic confederalism is the closest system to sociality itself. It's a system where people of every color and religion can live," she said. She said the nation-state had enslaved society in its previous state. But democratic confederalism involves every segment of society defending itself, its identity and its own way of life—something crucial for women. "Comrade Sara wanted to found women's communes," Melike said, referring to Sakine Cansız, the Kurdish militant activist woman slain in Paris. "Now, every day, women are strengthening Sara's struggle."

'We're not scared of them anymore'

In the panel on ecology, Professor Beyza Üstün moderated a panel composed of environmentalists Trude Muyrath, Ulrike Brown, and Zeynep Akıncı, of the Mesopotamia Ecology Movement. The co-mayor of Nusaybin, Sara Kaya, gave the opening speech at the panel, greeting the thousands of women who have traveled to the villages of Suruç for the upcoming March 8 rally there. Beyza Üstün framed the discussion by raising the topic of the dams that the Turkish state has built across Kurdistan, in the process destroying human and natural life across the region and displacing thousands of mostly Kurdish residents. "The capitalist system closes off our natural water sources in order to protect itself from its own crises," Üstün explained. "They do it because they're scared of us, but we're not scared of them anymore." She also mentioned the proposed shale gas prospecting in the Northern Kurdish area between Diyarbakır, Silvan and Hozat, a major threat to the people of Kurdistan.

Panelists discussed the threat of nuclear power, the destruction of nature and other threats to health, with Trude Muyrath emphasizing the need for women to come together in order for women's revolutions to take place. After the panel, women proposed forming an Ecology Committee of the World March of Women. A film screening followed the panels.

(cm/nt)