feminism

• Advocating for women’s sexual and reproductive rights in Peru, a risky fight against powerful enemies

  Spanish

  CIVICUS speaks to María Ysabel Cedano, Director of DEMUS –Study for the Defense of Women’s Rights, a Peruvian feminist organisation that since 1987 defends human rights, and particularly women’s sexual and reproductive rights, by promoting their free exercise and questioning the hegemonic cultural paradigm on women and their sexuality. DEMUS carries out public opinion campaigns and advocacy work with the three branches of government; it conducts strategic litigation and promotes mobilisation on issues related to the promotion of equality and non-discrimination, a life free from gender-based violence, access to justice, and sexual and reproductive rights.

  1. How would you describe the context for the exercise of feminist activism in Peru?
  Generally speaking, conditions for activism greatly depend on the ideology, programme and nature of the organisation and movement in question - on its stance regarding the state and the incumbent government, and on its relationship with political forces and the powers that be.

  Due to our agenda, we feminists are antagonists of Fujimorism, the political movement founded by Alberto Fujimori, who ruled Peru between 1990 and 2000. Our organisation has criticised and opposed them since the 1990s, as we have fought for justice and reparations for the thousands of victims of the Fujimori administration’s policy of systematic forced sterilisation. Its victims were mostly peasant, indigenous and poor women who underwent irreversible surgical contraception without being able to give their free and informed consent, in a context of widespread violence.

  On this issue, in 2003 we reached a Friendly Settlement Agreement (FSA) in the Mamérita Mestanza case. As a result, the Peruvian state acknowledged its responsibility for human rights violations in the context of the forced sterilisation policy and committed to providing justice and reparation to victims. We also obtained favourable statements by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights that have boosted our work to defend the right to access justice and to promote a policy of integral reparations. That made us a target of Fujimorist attacks, in the form of defamation in the national media as well as in social media. We have in fact sued former congressman Alejandro Aguinaga, under investigation in the preliminary examination of forced sterilisations as a crime against humanity and other serious violations of human rights, which the Public Ministry opened in 2004 in compliance with the already mentioned FSA. The case still remains in its preliminary stages due to political interference, which we have publically denounced. For more than fourteen years, the Public Ministry has failed to accuse former President Fujimori and his former Health Ministers, including Aguinaga, and no prosecution has taken place. In the meantime, Fujimorism has not undergone any renovation whatsoever: it still does not believe in human rights and cannot fathom the right of women to decide on their own. In fact they all remain very convinced that it is the state that has to decide for them.

  The other antagonists we have as a result of our feminist agenda are the Catholic and Evangelical ecclesial hierarchies, as well as other conservative and fundamentalist religious groups such as Opus Dei, Sodalitium and Bethel. These are the leaders of an anti- sexual and reproductive rights agenda and seek to legislate and implement public policies to strengthen the institutions that guarantee their political, economic, social and cultural dominance, thereby ignoring the secular character of the state that the authorities in turn fail to enforce. For decades they have run a strong campaign against what they call “gender ideology”, not just in Peru but throughout Latin America and the Caribbean, and beyond. These are multimillion-dollar campaigns that maintain that “gender ideology” attacks life, marriage and family. The funding they poured into the fear campaign against the peace accords in Colombia is a good example of this. They have also promoted a campaign called "Don't mess with my children" in several countries in the region.

  While these actors have questioned the scientific and legal validity of the gender perspective, the concept of gender has been adopted in the Beijing Platform for Action (1995) and in standards such as CEDAW, the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court and the Convention of Belém do Pará. In Peru it was included into several laws, public policies and institutions, as a result of which conservative sectors are currently trying, for instance, to eliminate the gender perspective from the school curriculum, including all allusions to sexual orientation and gender identity. They have done so by means of both street actions and lawsuits. These however have not yielded the desired results: the overwhelming response from the Ministry of Justice’s Attorney General even covered them in ridicule. As a result, they had no alternative left other than using their power in Congress, where there are currently two bills that have been submitted by Fujimorism towards that aim.

  Lastly, in addition to harassing us through their press, as they have always done, these sectors now also attack us for our funding sources. They say we are the instruments of great powers seeking to impose Western models of family and sexuality in our country.

  Thanks to a journalistic investigation that then became a criminal investigation, we currently know of child sexual abuse perpetrated by members of the Sodalitium, one of the most conservative and powerful groups within the Catholic Church. The scandal contributed to weakening the attacks coming from the ecclesial hierarchy. We are also beginning to know about the unholy business the Church does with education, health and even cemeteries within the framework of the Concordat between the Peruvian state and the Vatican. The very same priests who have spent years fighting us on the decriminalisation of abortion for rape cases, and who have said the worst things about us because they consider themselves to be the “defenders of life”, have allegedly covered for rapists of children and adolescents in their congregations and communities. This has helped people overcome their fear of denouncing the Catholic Church’s hypocrisy and double standards, and has limited the church’s ability to demand the government implement specific policies. For instance, the government has recently obeyed a court order to resume the distribution of emergency oral contraception despite pressures from Cardinal Cipriani.

  Given that our struggles for transitional justice have led us to seek justice and integral reparations for the victims of sexual violence during the internal armed conflict (1980-2000), we face not only Fujimorism but also APRA, a traditional party that ruled during a part of this period. They both seek to divide Peruvians between terrorists and non-terrorists and associate the left and human rights with terrorism. They never get tired of asserting that those who attack the military are terrorists - or ungrateful to say the least, for persecuting those who freed us from terrorism. If we strive for the legalisation of abortion we are abortionists, and if we defend human rights we are terrorists.

  2. How does DEMUS work to overcome these obstacles?
  We combine organisational and mobilisation strategies to strengthen the feminist and women’s diversity movement, public and political advocacy for legislation, public policies and access to justice measures, and strategic litigation. Among the latter were for instance the Manta y Vilca trial on rape during the internal armed conflict, which established that this was a crime against humanity; the case of forced sterilisations during the Fujimori administration; and other cases that have allowed us to move forward in terms of the recognition and guarantee of the human right to therapeutic abortion, among other sexual and reproductive rights.

  Ours is not just a lawyers’ struggle: we work in multidisciplinary teams and in alliances and within networks including other feminist, women’s, LGBTIQ and human rights NGOs, groups and platforms. Experience has taught us that it is not enough to obtain jurisprudence, standards, laws and public policies if there are no social movements and citizens defending them, that is, if there is no social base accompanying and empathising with the victims. Strategic litigation, legal defence and psycho-legal and therapeutic help are therefore always to be accompanied with mobilisation and campaigning.

  3. Is the Peruvian women’s movement integrated into regional or global networks, so as to face an adversary that is?
  There are indeed very important global and regional networks. In Latin America, the level of articulation reached by indigenous, peasant and environmental women human rights defenders is astonishing in contrast with the weakening of some feminist networks. New technologies have revolutionised communications, and we now have various alternative means to organise ourselves in networks.

  We must think about how to strengthen our thematic networks, for instance in the field of sexual and reproductive rights, in order to resist together. This is facilitated by a number of conceptual convergences, but complicated by the scarcity of resources reaching Latin America, competition around which affects alliances and articulations. Neoliberalism has also had an impact on inter-subjective relations: conflicts and rivalries arise due to scarce funding. It is impossible to understand the degree of difficulties we face without analysing the changes in and the new rules of international cooperation and funding mechanisms.
  On the other hand, we must not forget that Peru’s is a post-conflict society, with open wounds and an abundance of distrust, which has not yet learned to resolve differences without violence. We need to be aware of these limitations, so as not to reproduce what we criticise. But we are certainly still very strong: with much greater organisation and resources than we have, Catholics and evangelicals have not yet managed to create enough pressure in the streets and on public opinion to remove sex education from the school curriculum. Their only hope is now placed on authoritarian conservative forces in Congress.

  4. What progress or setbacks do you perceive in the struggle for women’s rights in Peru?
  Taking stock of the forty years of contemporary feminism in Peru, there has been net progress in terms of the legal-institutional framework. Advances have been the result of constant struggle and permanent dispute, and are neither ideal nor stable: they need to be continuously defended and perfected.

  For instance, in late 2015 a substantial amendment to Law No. 26260 (1993) on domestic violence was finally passed. The new legislation, Law No. 30394, is a law against gender-based violence. Shortly after, in July 2016, the Third National Plan against Gender Violence (2016-2021) was passed. In both cases there was a dispute over the diversity of the women to be protected. There was much resistance against the possibility that legislation would also protect lesbian, bisexual and transgender women. In fact, recognition of the variety of forms that gender violence can take was not as resisted as the extension and recognition of the objects of protection. The women’s movement succeeded in getting some previously unacknowledged forms of gender violence recognised as such, including gender-based violence in the context of social conflicts. We wanted the new law to protect women human rights defenders of land, the environment, and natural resources, that is, indigenous and peasant women who are currently criminalised and on whom conflicts have a differential impact on the basis of gender. This we achieved. We had also proposed that the violation of sexual and reproductive rights be recognised as gender violence. And while we achieved recognition of forced sterilisation, rape in the context of internal armed conflict, violence due to sexual orientation, and obstetric violence as forms of gender-based violence, such recognition was not expressed in the language of sexual and reproductive rights. In additional, sexual orientation-based violence was recognised but gender identity-based violence was not.

  Fifteen years after the First National Plan was launched, and more than twenty after the first law against then-called “domestic” or “intra-family” violence was passed, tension between women’s rights and family protection persists. Although Law No. 30364 has in many respects aligned legislation with the Belém do Pará Convention, violence based on gender identity discrimination has not yet been recognised. Public debate continues to focus on nature as a determinant of sexuality, reproduction and family.

  Why is it that feminists and LGBT people perceive “family protection” as contrary to our rights? First, because not all families are protected. Family rights of the LGBT population are not recognised. Secondly, because why protect the existing family – a traditional, hierarchical, violent family based on sexual division of labour and the exclusive recognition of heterosexual sexuality? A family organisation free of discrimination and gender-based violence should be promoted instead. In other words, measures should be taken to dismantle the patriarchal family, which functions as the very first place of normalisation and control, particularly for women and LGBT persons. The family has become a space in which physical, psychological and sexual violence remain unpunished: in fact, Peru has the second highest rate of denunciation of sexual offences against girls and adolescents in the region, and these are in many cases perpetrated by family members. Finally, a person’s (and in this case a woman’s) rights can never be subordinated, conditioned or reduced to a by-product of family welfare, in the same way as the rights of an actual person cannot be subordinated to the rights of being yet to be born.

  In sum, in historical perspective there has been progress in the recognition and guarantee of rights, but these have been the product of constant struggle. We face strong resistance, and if we had not permanently defended our conquests, we would certainly have seen them retreat long ago.

  5. In this context, how has DEMUS’ agenda changed since its beginnings in 1987?
  DEMUS is an organisation well known for its work for the right to a life free of gender-based violence. We specialise in prevention, care, denunciation, therapeutic and psycho-legal accompaniment, litigation, advocacy with legislative, policymaking and justice administration bodies, and campaigning and mobilisation on gender-based violence. For instance, we developed the “Not one more death” campaign, which placed femicide on the public agenda, and the “A man doesn't rape” campaign, which contributed to call attention on the problem of sexual violence, impunity and the culture of rape.
  
  In the beginning we had to dispute about the very concept of what was then called “intra-family violence”, which we designated as “violence against women” and today we call “gender-based violence”. We saw violence against women as a problem of power inequality, sexual discrimination and impunity, so we advocated for equality and access to justice. However, as years passed and the first laws and policies on the issue were passed, we realised that we were not obtaining the results we expected.

  The fight against violence against women had gained consensus as part of the state agenda and had occupied a space in the institutional structure of the state (commissions, ministries, etc.), and even ultraconservatives had begun to accept equal opportunities between men and women (which was enshrined in Law No. 28983 of 2007) all the while resisting the recognition of other sexual orientations and gender identities. So we began a conceptual revision and concluded that if we wanted to combat gender-based violence, our central strategic battle had to revolve around women’s autonomy and self-determination in the field of sexuality and reproduction, the recognition of and the provision of guarantees for sexual and reproductive rights understood as fundamental human rights, and access to justice in cases where these were violated. The perspective of sexual and reproductive rights came to enrich the equality and non-discrimination approach in addressing the problems of gender-based violence and impunity.

  Thus, although the defence of LGBT rights and the legalisation of abortion were already in DEMUS’ agenda, they have since become more central to it. And our strategies became richer in the process, because besides strategic litigation and therapeutic and psycho-legal accompaniment we started to focus as well on organisation and mobilisation, public advocacy and communication. We have used the whole toolbox in our search for justice and reparations for the victims of forced sterilisations, and also in our campaigns for emergency oral contraception and the legalisation of abortion (first of all for reasons of rape, foetal malformations incompatible with extra-uterine life, and unconsented artificial insemination and egg transfers, and eventually on the basis of women’s dignity and right to decide).

  Most recently, in our work to defend victims of sexual violence and impunity, we have learned from the indigenous and peasant women defenders of land and water that women human rights defenders are being differently affected by the extractivist economy due to their gender, and are being specifically criminalised by corporations such as the Yanacocha mining company and by the state itself. In their struggle to defend lakes and resist mining projects such as Conga, women are having a hard time, since gender-based violence is being used against them. In the actions of the police and the Armed Forces we are currently seeing a criminalisation of social protest, threats and violations of women’s rights echoing those that took place during armed conflict. In order to avoid the repetition of serious violations of human rights and crimes against humanity, we are using the new legislation, which now enables it, to denounce Yanacocha and make it clear that there is gender-based violence behind situations of harassment like that suffered by women human rights defenders such as Máxima Acuña.
  
  The other agenda that we increasingly adopted as central is the defence against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, in order to achieve recognition of and guarantees for the right to gender identity and lesbians’ right to maternity. We choose the issues we fight for on the basis of several criteria. One of them is that of revolutionising whatever the system resists the most, so that if we win, we will not only have obtained a law, public policy or jurisprudence, but we will also have conquered people’s common sense. And what the system most resists today is transgender identity and the right of LGBT persons to love and family. The system condemns us to civil death, poverty, marginalisation, murder, harassment and rape.

  6. In Peru, there have recently been major mobilisations with the motto #NiUnaMenos. How was the issue placed on the public agenda in such a way that mobilisation turned out to be so massive? What roles did regional networks play in the process?

  The marches in Argentina, Mexico and other countries inspired many of us: we wanted to do something similarly massive in our own country. But mobilisation did not occur in Peru as a response to a regional call, or as a result of prior coordination within a regional network.

  A year prior to this mobilisation there was a high profile case in Peru, in which a woman was savagely attacked in a hotel in Ayacucho, dragged by the hair and almost raped and murdered. The episode had been recorded on video, and everyone followed the case in the media and expected the attacker to be convicted. The ruling came out a few months before the demonstration, and it acquitted the accused. It denied that an attempted rape and femicide had taken place, and it even ruled that the injuries on the victim had been minor. This generated a social phenomenon of indignation that spread throughout the national territory and in social media. Women who were in the ideological and social antipodes from one another agreed that something had to be done, and feminists started talking about a mobilisation meant to make it clear that “if they touch one of us, they are touching us all”. The #NiUnaMenos (#NotOneLess) slogan was adopted out of the belief that the time had finally come and that this would be a mobilisation of a magnitude similar to those that had taken place in other countries.
  
  In Peru, the idea persists that if you do not obtain justice it is because you cannot prove what has happened to you. You only have your word and that is not enough for justice administrators. Now, if even in a case where there is a video like that, the aggressor is eventually absolved, what kind of security and justice is left for the rest of us? This created an unprecedented feeling of helplessness. Fear quickly turned into indignation, and this in turn into mobilisation. I was invited to join a Facebook chat a few hours after the video was made public. There were ten of us to start with, and a little while later we were over sixty, and the next day we were meeting at a comrade’s place. Within a few hours, the closed group formed in Facebook went from a few women testifying to the various forms of violence in their daily lives to 20 thousand, 40 thousand women reporting on their own stories of violence: at home, in the streets, at work, in school. Terrible stories, and everybody was telling them and keeping each other company.

  Thus, in Peru citizens went out into the streets to reject impunity and defend the right to justice. People began to wonder why violence against women persists despite all the laws and policies to combat it. The media started talking about patriarchy and machismo as its causes. There was some recognition of the importance of the feminist struggle, at least in that particular context. Much of the leadership and organisational work towards mobilisation was done by various organised and unorganised female citizens, leaders of feminist groups in neighbourhoods, universities, trade unions, NGOs. Women of a wide diversity of movements, colours, desires, education, professions and talents, in alliance and dialogue with the survivors whose emblematic cases united diverse sectors of society. Conservative sectors have still not managed to obtain similar success in defence of their agenda.

  7. Did the mobilisation have any positive effect in terms of public policy?
  The mobilisation resulted in some concrete measures, although these were too narrowly focused and involved little public investment. A Circle of Protection program was created, thereby extending attention to 24/7 in five out of over 200 Emergency Women’s Centres (EWC). Coverage of the emergency line Línea 600 was extended to all days of the week. This contributed to an increase in addressed complaints. Also, cases of femicide and rape were subsequently included into the rewards programme to stop offenders.

  Additionally, there were announcements regarding the expansion of temporary shelters, the provision of gender training to justice operators, and in particular to the National Police, and the creation of at least 50 new EWCs in various police stations across the country. The Public Ministry adapted its guidelines to Law No. 30364 and announced the creation of prosecution offices specialised in femicide. The Judiciary established a National Gender Commission.
  
  Nonetheless, femicidal violence persists as a savage daily occurrence; there is in fact a patriarchal and male chauvinist counteroffensive underway. They continue to kill us and rape us, and the femicide and rape culture keeps blaming us for it. And the measures adopted by the state in defence of the gender approach and gender equality fall short: they are basically reactions and responses to public pressure. We women do the reporting and monitoring job that the state should be doing. The state and the government always give in when it comes to the sexual and reproductive rights of women and LGBTIQ people. Which makes it clear that unless it becomes feminist, public policy will yield no results. If public policy priorities do not change, women will continue to die.
  
  The most important changes have occurred in the realms of common sense. #NiUnaMenos has shown that there is widespread rejection of violence against women, and that women have become empowered to talk about sexual violence in the same way that we first learned to talk about partner and domestic violence. There is no longer shame in having been a victim: it is clear that the other party is the one at fault. Women now know that there are things that are not right, and that if they happen to them it is not their fault, or God’s will, or the work of nature: it is a violation of rights and a matter of justice, and those responsible have to be punished.

  Civic space in Peru is rated as ‘obstructed’ in the CIVICUS Monitor.
  Get in touch with DEMUS through their website, visit their Facebook page, or follow ‪@DEMUS_f‬ and ‪@MYCfeminista‬ on Twitter.‬‬‬‬

  Image ©Peru21

• ARGENTINA: ‘Change is inevitable. It is just a matter of time’

   

  

  In 2018, after years of civil society efforts, Argentina’s congress discussed an initiative to legalise abortion for the first time. While the ban on abortion in most cases remains, those campaigning for reform believe the debate has progressed. CIVICUS speaks about the campaign to Edurne Cárdenas, a lawyer with the international team of the Centre for Legal and Social Studies (CELS),an Argentine human rights organisation. CELS was founded in 1979, during Argentina’s military dictatorship, to promote human rights, justice and social inclusion. In its early years, CELS fought for truth and justice for the crimes committed under state terrorism, before expanding its agenda to include human rights violations committed under democracy, their structural causes and their relationship to social inequality. CELS advances its agenda through research, campaigning, alliances with others in civil society, public policy advocacy and strategic litigation in both national and international forums.

  When did CELS, a classic human rights organisation, start working on sexual and reproductive rights, and why?

  CELS has had great capacity to work in tune with the times and therefore to enrich its agenda progressively, always in alliance with social movements and other organisations. The idea of women’s rights as human rights was explicitly articulated at the 1993 Vienna Conference on Human Rights. In the mid-1990s, and more precisely in 1996 I believe, the CELS annual report included contributions by women’s rights activists on reproductive rights. Over the following years, often in partnership with other organisations, CELS took part in submissions to human rights bodies: for instance, in 2004 we contributed to a shadow report submitted to the United Nations’ Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). The National Campaign for the Right to Legal, Safe and Free Abortion was formed in 2005 and CELS joined in 2012. Shortly after those first articles were published in our annual report, our concerns about human rights violations gradually widened to encompass access to non-punishable abortions, as they are referred to in the Criminal Code - abortions that can be performed legally when the woman’s life or health are in danger or if the pregnancy in question is the product of rape. The issue was also incorporated as a result of the sustained work of feminist activists within our organisation.

  In sum, CELS works on this issue because we understand that the criminalisation of abortion has a negative impact on the enjoyment of human rights by women. CELS’ key contribution was to place the abortion debate within the human rights sphere and to put into circulation human rights arguments to feed debate around the issue. CELS does not specialise in health issues, but we work in partnership with other organisations that examine the problem from that angle. From our point of view, this is an issue in which freedom and equality are at stake, and that is cross-cut by another theme - institutional violence - that was historically central to our work.

  In 2018 the debate over legal abortion progressed in Argentina more than ever before, but not far enough for legal change to happen. What lessons do you draw from this experience?

  In 2018, for the first time ever, an initiative to legalise abortion was debated in Congress. It was the seventh time that an initiative of this nature was introduced, and it was drafted and promoted by the National Campaign for the Right to Legal, Safe and Free Abortion. This is a network bringing together more than 500 organisations that form the women’s movement; it is well coordinated, horizontal and has 13 years of experience in this struggle. Before 2018, initiatives had not progressed, even within the congressional committees that had to issue an opinion to allow for debate to proceed to the full house. Argentina has a tradition of highly mobilised feminism and, since 2015, the campaign has had a lot of street presence and has made a clear demand for legal abortion. 2018 began with a novelty: in his opening speech of that year’s legislative session, the president raised the issue, which alongside feminist pressure enabled parliamentary debate. This was absolutely unprecedented. Regrettably, after being passed by the House of Representatives - the lower house - in June 2018, the initiative to legalise abortion was rejected by the Senate in August.

  The whole process was led by the women's movement. All other movements and organisations aligned behind their leadership. In the House, the initiative succeeded because the strategy was multi-partisan and diverse, there was strong social movement participation and street pressure made itself heard. In the Senate, a more conservative chamber, additional work was required. Our alliances failed us, as we couldn’t make them as cross-cutting as they were in the House. A question that remains on the table, then, is how to reach out to the most conservative chamber of Congress with a demand that must necessarily be processed through it.

  In addition, the defeat in the Senate made it clear that we need to work more to understand and counter the ‘post-truth’ discourse of our opponents. We are seeing conservative advances that put institutional quality, and ultimately democratic institutions, at risk. What was interesting in the process was that all citizens were able to find out and take note of what their representatives think and how they vote.

  The results of this particular struggle could be called bittersweet. How much of a defeat, and how much of a victory were they, and why?

  The pictures of disappointment on 9 August 2018, when the Senate rejected the initiative, do not tell the whole story. When we take stock, the list of what we won is much longer than the list of what we lost. Losses of course include a missed opportunity - but we only missed one opportunity, that of 2018, because I really believe that change is inevitable, and it is just a matter of time. I do not know if it will happen in 2019, but it will eventually. But one thing does need to happen in 2019: with elections due, all the issues that were put on the table during this process have to be part of the presidential campaign agenda.

  We undoubtedly gained in terms of mass participation and public presence - both in the streets and in public opinion. In 2018 abortion was discussed like never before, so silences and taboos broke. But the process also had a negative side effect: because the issue that was placed on the agenda was so divisive, and mobilisation became so massive and acquired such centrality on the political scene, a strong reaction from the most conservative sectors ensued. These sectors gained a level of organisation and visibility that they did not have in the past.

  As these conservative voices emerged, the debate on abortion rights also brought back into the discussion some things that we thought were long settled and part of a basic, untouchable consensus. These sectors began to say out loud certain things that they wouldn’t have dared say only a few years ago. Such was the case with the campaign ‘Do not mess with my children’ (Con mis hijos no te metas), against the implementation of the law mandating comprehensive sex education, which called into question the role of the state in education.

  What role did CELS play in the legalisation campaign?

  Throughout the process, the women’s movement’s leadership, and that of the National Campaign for the Right to Legal, Safe and Free Abortion, was undisputable. As a member of the Campaign, and alongside other human rights organisations, CELS made an important contribution in terms of organisation, coordination and argumentation.

  Our history and experience give CELS much legitimacy. The fact that CELS speaks about abortion can make a difference when it comes to reaching broader audiences. Starting in 2014, when it seemed likely that the legalisation initiative would eventually be discussed in congressional committees, CELS began putting together input for the legislative debate, by revising jurisprudence and current standards and providing a justification as to why the debate on abortion had to be carried out from a human rights perspective.

  At the same time, CELS participated as amicus curiae - friend of the court - in various court cases. Although we think that our ultimate goal, and the only one compatible with the recognition of women’s autonomy as full subjects of rights, is the legalisation of abortion, we have deemed it necessary to ensure in the meantime that the abortions that are already legal can be performed effectively, along the lines established for non-punishable abortions. In 2012, in its ruling in the F.A.L. case, the Supreme Court made very clear the conditions under which legal abortions can be performed and the obligations that this confers on the state. This ruling reflected the great work done by women’s rights and human rights movements on the streets, in hospitals, in academia and in the courts. But nonetheless, access remains very uneven, and even in more ‘advanced’ provinces barriers to legal abortions still exist. To a large extent, this reflects the structural limitations of a system that establishes a restrictive set of grounds allowing abortions, which inevitably fails because it depends on someone certifying the presence of those grounds. In addition, the current system ignores the most important among all possible grounds for abortion: the pregnant person’s will. This is precisely what the bill that was passed by the House put in the spotlight.

  During the 2018 debate, CELS made several presentations in support of the initiative at public hearings in both houses of Congress. Our executive director and I presented at the House of Representatives - significantly, both at the opening and the closing of the debate - and our litigation director spoke at the Senate. At the beginning of the debate, we issued a publication that was endorsed by a large part of the women’s movement, feminists and organisations alike, with arguments, legislation and jurisprudence, to bring clear information to legislators.

  We were also present on the streets, not only sharing the vigils that were held during the voting sessions, but also in organising, providing support and coordinating with the women's movement, with the other organisations within the Campaign for Legal Abortion and with high school students, health professionals and other mobilised groups. This coordination and the sustained presence of the movement on the streets were what made the difference during 2018. Finally, we defended the freedom of expression and the right to peaceful assembly, since throughout this process the groups mobilised against legal abortion perpetrated various acts of violence against legalisation activists.

  You have repeatedly mentioned the existence of anti-rights groups. Do you think these groups are on the rise? If so, what can progressive civil society do to protect the rights already conquered and keep moving forward?

  Anti-rights groups have indeed grown and are organised under a common umbrella, against what they call ‘gender ideology’. They saw this debate as an opportunity to organise like never before. Now they are more numerous: there used to be groups linked to the Catholic Church, but now there are also numerous groups with links to evangelical churches, well-organised and well-funded, alongside other groups that are not necessarily faith-based. Their presence demands our attention because their goals run against the rights of a large part of the population, as they seek to limit access to rights by children, women, lesbians, gays, transvestites and trans people. They are appearing throughout Latin America and their existence also raises questions about their alliances and goals: how and when did they arrive in Argentina? What are their demands? How far are they willing to go? We have seen that behind their ‘no to abortion’ they bring along a broader agenda that is linked to their rejection of so-called ‘gender ideology’, sexual education in schools, even vaccination, and who knows what else.

  The progressive movement needs to think of a strategy to face them. The strength of the human rights movement is our use of creativity and the strategy of reason. On the other hand, what anti-rights movements do is mirror the strategies of the human rights movement. Now, although creativity and innovation give us an advantage, the anti-rights movement is making us waste our time discussing things we thought were long settled. To top it all, what we get into is not even an honest discussion, since the statements they make and even the data they use do not withstand the slightest fact check. The result is not actual debate - that is, a genuine exchange of arguments and reasons. Still, we have no alternative but to respond. So, when we engage in such ‘debate’, we do not really discuss with them or try to convince them, but we share our reasoning before an audience, in order to try and convince that audience. We take advantage of that simulation of a debate to make our point before public opinion. For this task, social media are key, although they have clearly been a double-edged sword. In fact, it was during this debate that we were able to see first-hand the way so-called ‘fake news’ operates, particularly when they find an echo in influential voices outside social media, who disseminate them elsewhere. It so happened, for instance, that totally fake data found on social media were quoted by legislators during the congressional debate. In that area, there is a lot of work for us to do.

  Leading the debate agenda is one of the challenges that our movements face. To do this, we need to always be a step ahead in the discussion. We should not ‘debate’ with the anti-rights groups but speak to larger audiences and engage in discussion with elected representatives, whose obligation it is to pass laws for our common good and to ensure the state’s compliance with its obligation to enforce human rights. The debate over the legalisation of abortion was a spearhead to think about other issues. The system of limited grounds for legal abortion, similar to the one that has just been adopted in Chile, has been in place in Argentina since 1921. The transition from a system of grounds to a system of deadlines requires a simple legislative decision to amend the Criminal Code. Why such big fuss then? Because this debate puts other discussions on the table, including what we think the role of women is, what the role of the state should be, to what extent and regarding what issues the state should get involved - and this is where conservative sectors exhibit their contradictions: they want the state to get inside your bed to criminalise your behaviour, but when it comes to education or vaccination, they want it not to interfere.

  We cannot stay on the defensive. We need to go on the offensive and place secularism and the role of the state on the agenda. And we are forced to do so in a very regressive sub-regional context. Brazil, our biggest neighbour and partner, has just elected a president who is committed to advancing the agenda of its powerful evangelical caucus and who has just appointed to lead the Ministry of Human Rights an evangelic minister who says that women are born to be mothers.

  Civic space in Argentina is rated as ‘narrowed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.

  Get in touch with CELS through theirwebsite andFacebook page, or follow@CELS_Argentina and@EdurneC on Twitter.

• ARGENTINA: ‘The state is abandoning its role as guarantor of access to rights’

  CIVICUS discusses the deterioration of civic space and human rights under Argentina’s current government with Vanina Escales and Manuel Tufró of the Centre for Legal and Social Studies (CELS). Founded under dictatorship in 1979, CELS promotes the protection and effective exercise of human rights, justice and social inclusion, nationally and internationally.

  Since its inauguration in December 2023, thegovernment of Javier Milei, a self-proclaimed ‘anarcho-capitalist’ who allied with culturally conservative groups, has promoted policies of economic deregulation, the reduction of the state and social spending cuts, resulting in increased unemployment and poverty. It has adopted a restrictive and repressive approach towards protests against these policies, denigrating journalism and anyone who expresses critical opinions. In the face of these restrictions on civic space and human rights, civil society is seeking international visibility and solidarity and pursuing strategic litigation.

  How would you describe Milei´s government?

  This is the first libertarian -- or anarcho-capitalist, as Milei describes it – government we’ve had in Argentina. Its rise is part of an international trend towards the erosion of democracies as a result of policies of market extremism and the advance of the far right. Like other expressions of the far right in Europe or the USA, it is characterised by brutalism and a recourse to authoritarianism to deal with social conflict. At times it also shows features such as historical denialism and regressive values about gender roles and the rights of sexual, gender and racial minorities. But it also has some peculiar aspects: unlike its counterparts in the global north, its xenophobic nationalism hasn’t targeted immigrants but Indigenous peoples instead.

  In the economic sphere, the libertarian agenda has manifested itself in the liberalisation of prices, leading to high levels of inflation and thus to a brutal transfer of income from the middle and poorer classes to the richest.

  As far as social policy is concerned, the government has tended to leave in place only policies of direct income transfers to individuals, meagre subsidies or social aid such as the Universal Child Allowance, which alone cannot mitigate the effects of the recession or counteract the impacts of the withdrawal of the state. This withdrawal can be seen in the lack of food and medical supplies and the closure of and disinvestment from community spaces and social policies. The state has withdrawn from its role as guarantor of access to basic services.

  The stated aim is to weaken controls on businesses, particularly foreign ones, in order to attract investment. Deregulation has a direct impact on the environment, as it ignores the rights of Indigenous peoples and peasant communities over the territories where companies want to set up. Companies receive privileges while the country is deprived of its natural resources.

  Some reforms were imposed by decree and others by an omnibus bill called the Basic Law, which was passed by Congress after much debate and amendment.

  How is the government reconciling libertarianism with cultural conservatism?

  There is a tension within the government between neo-liberalists who promote market deregulation, economic liberalisation and changes in labour policies, and the equally authoritarian but conservative voices that defend the last military dictatorship, state terrorism and state violence, and attack emancipatory movements such as feminism and its egalitarian gains.

  On this terrain, the government is fighting a cultural as well as a material battle. Verbal attacks go hand in hand with the dismantling of gender policies. For example, the government dissolved the Ministry of Women, Gender and Diversity and then dismantled all policies against gender violence. Officials have also spoken out strongly against abortion and sexual and reproductive rights in general.

  As part of the dismantling of state structures, programmes aimed at preventing teenage pregnancy and care, health and early childhood policies are being dismantled. Our monitoring of care policies has shown that only seven out of 43 are still in force. The state is abandoning its role as mediator and guarantor of access to rights.

  In addition, at the international level, the government is challenging commitments made by the state through international treaties, which in Argentina have constitutional priority, enshrined in legislation. At the recent General Assembly of the Organisation of American States (OAS), for example, the government demanded that any mention of climate change, gender and LGBTQI+ people be removed from the final documents. We believe that the OAS, the United Nations and their human rights mechanisms should closely monitor the Argentine government’s actions.

  How have these processes affected civic space?

  The quality of civic space has been severely compromised. Protests are now treated as crimes. These basic practices in any democracy are presented as, at best, obstacles to traffic and, at worst, seditious activities aimed at overthrowing the government.

  This is reflected in blatantly unconstitutional norms such as Resolution 943/2023 of the Ministry of Security, known as the ‘anti-picketing protocol’, which states that any assembly that disrupts traffic in cities or on roads is a flagrant crime and authorises direct police intervention, without the need for a court order, to disperse it and investigate protesters.

  This resolution authorises the deployment of large numbers of security forces at every protest, often using abusive and indiscriminate ‘less lethal’ weapons such as rubber bullets and teargas, as well as physical violence and arbitrary arrests. We have documented at least 80 such arrests in recent months. Protesters have been released because the government has no evidence to prosecute them. But as a result of these tactics, many demonstrations are broken up or do not take place at all.

  In the past six months, at least 47 journalists have been injured in protests. Many more have been harassed on social media and criminally prosecuted for anti-government statements.

  The government has dismantled the public media to the point where we have no way of knowing what is happening in different parts of the country, unless something comes to the attention of private media and international correspondents and they decide to cover it. In Argentina today, the right to generate information and be informed by a plurality of voices is being violated.

  How is civil society organising to resist these restrictions?

  Civil society organisations have filed several precautionary measures ahead of protests to protect the right to peaceful assembly. But the judiciary has not accepted them, arguing that there is no a priori risk, but rather that it is necessary to assess how a demonstration unfolds. The judiciary also has a very weak role in controlling arbitrary arrests and assessing excessive police violence.

  Since the judicial route is not bearing fruit, it’s time to resort to international mechanisms for the protection of human rights, something CELS has done many times throughout its history, since it was born under the dictatorship. We are working to provide information on the human rights violations taking place in Argentina.

  On 11 July we took part in a hearing before the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights. The state was present, but only reaffirmed its position in favour of the criminalisation of social protest, justifying it as a mechanism to deal with sedition and attempts at destabilisation. The government was evasive and did not answer questions such as what protocols were in place to control the use of less lethal weapons, or why a regulation to control police action in public demonstrations had been repealed.

  We are also compiling a register of physical and digital attacks from non-state sources, particularly from parts of the radicalised right. Thanks to our work with the political research team at Crisis magazine, we have already registered around 280 cases of offline harassment on the Radar portal, and we are beginning to register online attacks, including the leaking of personal data that could lead to physical attacks.

  Today, more than ever, it is necessary to organise in national and international networks to carry out information and denunciation campaigns with a collective voice. If we wait for the total destruction of rights to raise our voices, it will be too late.

  Civic space in Argentina is rated as ‘narrowed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.

  Get in touch with CELS through itswebsite or itsFacebook andInstagram pages, and follow@CELS_Argentina and@vaninaescales on Twitter.

• AUSTRIA: ‘Unfortunately, times of crisis have rarely proven to be a catalyst for gender equality’

  CIVICUS speaks about International Women’s Day and civil society’s role in combatting gender-based violence (GBV) in Austria with Hannah Steiner and Sophie Hansal of the Network of Austrian Counselling Centres for Women and Girls.

  The Network of Austrian Counselling Centres for Women and Girls is a civil society organisation (CSO) aimed at improving women’s and girls’ lives through the development of training programmes, the provision of free counselling and campaigning and advocating for women’s concerns to be addressed by public policies.

  

  How did the work of the Network change under the pandemic?

  The Network of Austrian Counselling Centres for Women and Girls is an umbrella organisation encompassing 59 counselling centres all over Austria. We build our internal network by organising training activities, exchange and communication among counselling centres. We represent the concerns of our member organisations externally and are therefore in constant contact with funding bodies, politicians, the media and the public. We advocate for a society in which all human beings, and particularly women and girls, can lead a free and safe life.

  The Network and all its counselling centres have no affiliation with any political party or religion. Our member organisations provide various forms of support, from career guidance, training and reintegration to work after parental leave, guidance regarding employment laws and residence status, to partnership and support on child-rearing issues, divorce and custody, physical and mental health issues, all the way to violence in all of its forms.

  The pandemic had a major effect on our work, particularly at the beginning, when uncertainty was highest and the availability and accessibility of counselling was very limited. Many women and girls were unsure where to seek advice. Counselling centres tried to react to this as quickly as possible, for example by offering counselling online, but also by actively contacting women and girls who had registered with them earlier to ask how they were doing and whether they needed anything.

  As in many other areas, counselling embraced new technologies during the pandemic. However, some women and girls didn’t have – and still don’t have – the equipment or skills to access these opportunities. At the same time, some organisations have told us that there are women and girls who find it easier to ask for advice or help in an online setting. And women who live in rural areas, far from the next counselling centre, found access to counselling easier via phone or email. The ways the pandemic impacted on our work cannot be summarised so easily, because its effects were multifaceted.

  How has the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated GBV in Austria, and how has civil society reacted to this?

  Studies have shown that all types of violence against women and girls intensified during the pandemic. Political measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19 affected women and girls in specific ways: financial worries, movement restrictions, often cramped living conditions and – in cases of domestic violence – isolation in close quarters with abusers all made the situation especially dire for many women and girls.

  It is important to note that the pandemic has also affected many people’s psychological health. Only the future will show the pandemic’s long-term effects on a social level. Unfortunately, times of crisis have rarely proven to be a catalyst for gender equality.

  What is key for achieving equality and social justice is an active civil society. Civil society gives a public voice to those who are often not heard. During the pandemic, CSOs have pointed out how the crisis affected the most vulnerable groups in society. They have continued to offer advice and support to those who need it and have developed new offers to address pandemic-induced economic and psychological stress.

  Counselling centres for women and girls play a special role in protection from GBV. We can recognise violence early on and in cases where it is hidden behind other problems. Even – and especially – in times of crisis such as this, counselling centres are crucial contact points for women and girls.

  CSOs have always been key figures in advocating for gender and social equality in Austria, and will certainly continue to do it in the aftermath of the pandemic.

  What should the Austrian government do to curb GBV?

  Austria ratified the Istanbul Convention – the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence – in 2013. Since then, its implementation has been evaluated by the Council of Europe’s Group of Experts on Action against Violence against Women and Domestic Violence (GREVIO). In its evaluation report, GREVIO has included many CSO demands. Full implementation of the Istanbul Convention would be a milestone in the elimination of GBV.

  One of the most important political steps would be an increase in funding for CSOs working in the field. Due to the ongoing crisis and the increased need for advice, women’s and girls’ counselling centres need more support. There is often no long-term funding that can ensure CSO sustainability, only project-based funding. This does not allow for long-term actions and makes planning difficult.

  Furthermore, the knowhow and wide experience of women’s CSOs should be considered and included to a higher degree when it comes to policy-making at the national and regional levels. The government should make use of and rely on the expertise of women’s organisations and the long-existing services they built when planning new measures or setting up new institutions.

  Further research on the specific situation of young women and girls should be conducted so that their needs are taken into consideration when new measures are designed.

  The International Women’s Day theme for 2022 is #BreakTheBias. How have you organised around it in the communities you work with?

  The Network of Austrian Counselling Centres for Women and Girls works 365 days a year to create a world free of bias, stereotypes and discrimination, by offering counselling for women and girls in difficult situations; by making sexism, gender stereotypes and GBV a political issue; by advocating for women’s and girls’ rights on a daily basis; by developing training programmes, quality standards and working documents; by connecting feminist CSOs and by positioning ourselves as experts for the issue of gender equality. Our aim is to improve the living conditions of all women and girls living in Austria.

  Due to the pandemic, we have not organised an event on 8 March, but some of our member organisations have planned events and we are joining the International Women’s Day protest in Vienna.

  Civic space in Austria is rated ‘open’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
  Get in touch with the Network of Austrian Counselling Centres for Women and Girls through itswebsite ofFacebook page, and follow it onInstagram. 

• BULGARIA: ‘Women’s rights organisations are working together towards the goal of a feminist Europe’

  CIVICUS speaks about the upcoming International Women’s Day and Bulgarian civil society’s role in eliminating gender-based violence (GBV) with Iliana Balabanova, founder and president of the Bulgarian Platform of the European Women’s Lobby (BPEWL). 

  BPEWL was founded in 2005 by a group of civil society organisations (CSOs) working for gender equality and social justice, and against violence towards women. Since its inception it has organised at the community level to raise gender issues and push them up the agenda, promoted petitions, organised workshops, implemented projects and collaborated with civil society in other European countries on joint advocacy initiatives against gender inequality.

  How has the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated GBV in Bulgaria?

  As reported by civil society, since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic there has been a significant increase in violence against women and children. One of the main challenges in preventing violence has been the lack of a coordinating body bringing together both government and civil society. There is need for much better coordination among all institutions to review cases of violence and identify the best ways to deal with them.

  According to the office of the World Health Organization in Bulgaria, at least seven women lost their lives at the hands of a partner or family member since pandemic-related confinement measures were put in place. The national helpline for children received 80 reports of a parent abusing another parent in March 2020 alone. This indicated that violence against women and children doubled compared to the months before the pandemic.

  The pandemic impacted very negatively on the work of the centres that provide assistance to GBV victims. The impact was dramatic on victims of domestic violence and rape in need of emergency support. Assistance had to be provided exclusively through the phone, while phone calls for consultations increased by 30 per cent.

  In addition, the interaction with public institutions – judicial, health and municipal bodies – was difficult. And the pandemic had a negative effect on the justice system, as it delayed court decisions. During lockdown periods, applications for protection orders in domestic violence cases were submitted by mail to the regional or district courts, and most other applications could not be sent due to the huge backlog.

  What role has Bulgarian civil society historically played, and continues to play, to tackle GBV?

  Bulgarian women’s organisations have worked against GBV and domestic violence for decades. At the very beginning, in the late 1990s and early 2000s, we started to work on domestic violence by counselling victims and we opened the first shelters for victims of domestic violence in Bulgaria.

  At that time there was no legislation to prevent domestic violence or protect victims, and Bulgarian women’s CSOs – joined later by other human rights CSOs – drafted the first such bill. The lobbying campaign and the advocacy work to get the bill passed lasted almost five years. 

  Thanks to this work, in 2005 the Bulgarian parliament passed the Law for Protection against Domestic Violence, which defined domestic violence quite widely, encompassing all forms of violence – physical, sexual, psychological, emotional and economic – committed by family members or partners in a formal or de facto relationship or cohabitation. The process was hurried by the fact that Bulgaria had started harmonising its legislation with European Union (EU) regulations, and women’s CSOs took advantage of the momentum to exert pressure for a new legislative framework to protect women from domestic violence.

  By then the Bulgarian women’s movement had gained enough experience, knowledge and expertise, and we started to work to change societal attitudes and create an understanding of domestic violence as an expression of unequal power relations at the personal, community and societal levels. We tried to shine a light on the link between social domination, economic control, power inequalities, stereotypes and GBV. The BPEWL and its member organisations have worked on disrupting the continuum of violence against women and girls ever since.

  After 2011, one of our main goals was to get the Bulgarian state to ratify the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence – the Istanbul Convention. Unfortunately, mostly because of the rise of populist, nationalist and transphobic politics, Bulgaria rejected the Istanbul Convention. Moreover, in 2018 the Bulgarian Constitutional Court ruled that the concepts of gender and gender identity were irrelevant for the Bulgarian constitutional and legal system. They said they have no clear and precise legal content and would have dangerous legal consequences.

  As a result of this decision, Bulgaria does not keep official statistics on domestic violence and other forms of GBV. The number of complaints registered by the police and cases submitted to the courts are not counted in publicly available statistics. Murder, the most serious form of intrusion against a person, is also not captured through a gender-specific lens – that is, as femicide. So it fell on civil society to do this work, and so far information on GBV has been gathered by CSOs and some social agencies.

  According to this data, one in three women in Bulgaria are subjected to GBV and approximately one million women experience domestic violence. According to the Bulgarian Helsinki Committee, every two weeks a woman is killed in Bulgaria, a third of whom have been subjected to systematic violence by their murderer, and a tenth of whom have sought police protection against their murderer. Civil society reported that between 2014 and 2017, over 5,500 women sought protection from women’s CSOs providing victim services and over 700 women and their children were placed in crisis centres.

  As I mentioned, during the pandemic domestic violence increased. Worryingly, however, the number and capacity of shelters remained very limited, and no progress was achieved in systematically collecting and analysing statistical data on GBV, including registering femicides. So women’s CSOs continue to lobby for the government to increase the number and capacity of state-funded crisis centres and other services, provide adequate support for CSOs offering shelter and care to victims, collect administrative data on all forms of GBV and ratify the Istanbul Convention.

  How is the European Women’s Lobby (EWL) working at the regional level?

  The EWL is the largest European women’s rights network, involving more than 2,000 organisations throughout Europe. It brings together the European women’s movement to influence the public and European institutions to support women’s human rights and gender equality. The Bulgarian Platform became a member of the EWL in 2005 and ever since we have worked together with member organisations at both national and EU levels. Our vision is that of a society in which women’s contributions are recognised, rewarded and celebrated, and in which all women have self-confidence, freedom of choice and freedom from violence and exploitation.

  The EWL works towards the goal of a feminist Europe. In a policy brief published in April 2020, ‘Women Must Not Pay the Price for COVID-19!’, we called on governments to put gender equality at the heart of their response. We call for a universal social care system with infrastructure to provide social and quality care services that are accessible and affordable for all women and girls.

  The 2022-2026 EWL strategy was developed during the pandemic, as all aspects of our work and our mission were being impacted on significantly. Over the course of this period, the EWL adapted to the restrictions brought about by the pandemic, sharpened its actions in a radically changed world and enabled online spaces for the women’s movement to come together, analyse and strategise about the significant and long-term impacts of this crisis, which will surely be shouldered disproportionately by women and girls.

  What are your plans for International Women’s Day? 

  This year’s International Women’s Day in Bulgaria will be focused on peace. We are working on providing support to women and girl refugees coming from conflict areas in Ukraine.

  Civic space in Bulgaria is rated ‘narrowed’ by the CIVICUS Monitor.
  Get in touch with the Bulgarian platform of the European Women’s Lobby through itswebsite or itsFacebook page.

• CHILE: ‘Domestic and care work still falls overwhelmingly on women’

  CIVICUS speaks about International Women’s Day and civil society’s role in combatting gender inequalities in Chile with Cecilia Ananías Soto, founder of Amaranta, an independent civil society organisation (CSO) based in the Chilean city of Concepción, in the Biobío region.

  Amaranta is a feminist space made up of women from the social sciences, humanities and social activism aimed at promoting gender equality and human rights in the spheres of education, health, culture, technology and media. It was founded in early 2018 to give visibility and response to the everyday problems of women, and specifically lesbian, bisexual, transgender, working, migrant, displaced, poor and Indigenous women. Taking a critical, local and decolonial perspective, it carries out training, dialogue, research and advocacy work.

  What impacts has the COVID-19 pandemic had on Chilean women and girls, and how has civil society responded to it?

  The pandemic affected women and girls differentially and disproportionately. In the case of Chile, in the first year of the pandemic there was an explosive increase in requests for help for gender-based violence (GBV). This happened because, in the midst of mandatory quarantines, women and girls were locked in their homes together with their aggressors.

  In addition, because there was no school for a long time and even kindergartens were closed, women were on their own to care for children and sick family members, often having to abandon their work and studies to support their households. Just before the pandemic, female participation in the labour market had reached an all-time high of 53.3 per cent, while after the pandemic it fell back to 41 per cent. It will take a long time to recover women’s participation in the labour force. 

  Faced with this scenario, women and women’s groups built support networks. At the neighbourhood level, women’s groups organised community kitchens and sales or exchange fairs, among other initiatives. Many women’s groups set up helplines because the official ones were not sufficient or did not always respond. Amaranta received hundreds of requests for help with GBV in digital spaces and, despite having a small team, contributed by providing initial support and communicating basic self-care strategies.

  The pandemic forced us to move much of our work into the digital sphere. On the one hand, this allowed us to continue working, to do so safely and to reach much further. But on the other hand, not all people have access to the internet or digital literacy, so we had to find other strategies as well. Now we work by mixing face-to-face and distance gender education with educational and activist materials that we hand out in the streets, such as fanzines and stickers.

  What are the main unresolved women’s rights issues in Chile?

  A big problem is that domestic and care work still falls overwhelmingly on women. This has profound effects on women’s quality of life, because it results in them either abandoning their studies or leaving their jobs to do this unpaid work at home, or trying to become ‘superwomen’ who must be able to do everything, even if they can no longer take it because they so tired.

  This was made clear in a report published in the magazine Revista Ya in late 2020, ‘An x-ray of the zero man‘, so titled because according to the study on which the article was based, 38 per cent of men spend zero hours a week doing housework. Similarly, 71 per cent spend zero hours helping their children with schoolwork and 57 per cent spend zero hours taking care of children. In contrast, the women surveyed spend 14 hours a week more than men caring for children under the age of 14.

  Another major pending issue is that of sexual and reproductive rights. Our right to decide over our own bodies is still not recognised. Abortion is only permitted on three grounds: danger to the life of the pregnant woman, foetal malformations incompatible with life and when the pregnancy is the result of rape. At the same time, there are no comprehensive sex education programmes to prevent unwanted pregnancies, sexually transmitted diseases and sexual violence. During the pandemic, many instances of failure of oral hormonal contraceptives were documented. Many of these had been provided free of charge in public health facilities; as a result, many vulnerable women ended up pregnant, without being able to choose to have an abortion and without receiving any kind of monetary compensation.

  What should be done to reduce gender inequality in Chile?

  At Amaranta, we believe that we must start with non-sexist education, including comprehensive sex education. This is the only way to stop repeating stereotypes that perpetuate inequality from an early age. This is an important element in preventing GBV.

  Laws and public policies that pave the way for a more equitable and inclusive society are also important. Since 2019, Chile has gone through multiple social protests, which have included the feminist movement in a very prominent role. As a result of these protests, we now find ourselves drafting a new constitution which, if approved, we already know will include gender-sensitive justice systems. This is a tremendous step forward for our country, and even a first at the continental level.

  The International Women’s Day theme for 2022 is #BreakTheBias. How have you organised around it?

  Our ongoing campaign as an organisation is about breaking down biases and overcoming prejudices and stereotypes. We do this through education, which can take many forms: from a relatively formal talk or workshop, to recommending a book or handing out a feminist fanzine, to disseminating content through a TikTok video.

  In terms of mobilisation, we remain attentive to all calls from feminist organisations in the area and we will participate in women’s meetings, marches, bike rallies and ‘pañuelazos’ – that is, large gatherings of women wearing green scarves – that are being organised.

  Civic space in Chile is rated ‘obstructed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
  Get in touch with Amaranta through itswebsite and follow@AmarantaOng on Twitter.

   

• CHILE: ‘The drafting of the new constitution is a historic opportunity for women’

  CIVICUS speaks with Mariela Infante Erazo, director of Corporación Humanas, about the impacts of the pandemic on women and girls in Chile, and about her hopes for advances coming from the inauguration of a new government and the process to develop a new constitution.

  Founded in 2004, Humanas is a civil society organisation (CSO) dedicated to advocating for the deepening of democracy and the inclusion of women.

  

  What has been the impact of the pandemic on women and girls in Chile?

  The pandemic has had a very serious impact on the human rights of girls and women. Women regressed more than a decade in terms of their labour market participation. When schools closed, they had to take on most of the domestic and care work, both for their children and for sick or older relatives, so many had to stop working. Those who continued to work – including by working from home – were overburdened, which had an impact on both their physical and mental health.

  Gender-based violence also increased shockingly, as confinement and restrictions of movement were quite strict in Chile. According to official statistics, domestic violence calls from adult women tripled. But the situation also affected girls facing family abuse.

  The most feminised fields of work, such as education and health, were the most in demand during the pandemic. Women are in the majority in the professions that fought the pandemic – nurses, health workers, service workers, educators – but were not given much recognition. Female educators had to undertake virtual teaching and this undermined learning, at least among economically and culturally disadvantaged people. In Chile, there is no universal access to a basic internet service, and this has been detrimental for access to education.

  A full recovery is a long way off: unemployment remains high and women’s employment rates are not recovering at the same speed as men’s. A gendered approach is needed to ensure that women can return to the labour market and regain economic autonomy, which is key to exercising our rights.

  How has civil society in general, and Humanas in particular, responded?

  In the first months of the pandemic, and especially during lockdown, there were high levels of activity among feminist organisations: many seminars, meetings and discussions took place. There was a lot of reflection and an eagerness to share. But virtual interactions are very challenging and these spaces eventually ran out of steam: the first year’s participation was reasonably high, but then it began to decline. The format is now a bit worn out; I think we need to think of new forms of participation.

  During these two years, we at Humanas have all been working from home, with the difficulties this sometimes entails for communication among co-workers. Opportunities for informal communication were lost and work slowed down. Regarding our outward work, we had to rethink workshops, seminars and training events, because it is very difficult to do interactive and motivating training sessions via computer. Of course we had to cancel all trips, which was limiting for our regional networking strategy.

  But we learned a lot about how virtual interactions can replace face-to-face ones, and we adapted.

  What are the main women’s rights issues in Chile?

  As in the rest of Latin America, there are multiple challenges. In the field of employment, a major problem is precarious work: women have more precarious, informal and lower-paid jobs, as well as higher unemployment rates.

  Women also bear the bulk of the burden of family care. This limits our free time, harms our health, limits our job prospects and hinders our political participation. That is why the feminist movement, of which we are part, prioritises the establishment of a national care system in Chile.

  In terms of sexual and reproductive rights, abortion – which used to be prohibited in all circumstances – has been legal since 2017 under three grounds: when the life of the pregnant person is in danger, when the foetus suffers from malformations incompatible with life and when the pregnancy is the result of rape.

  But during the pandemic, limitations on the exercise of sexual and reproductive rights increased: contraceptive distribution decreased, defective contraceptives were distributed through the public system and the number of preventative gynaecological examinations decreased. Many people stopped making medical consultations because health centres were overwhelmed by the number of COVID-19 cases, which left many pathologies undiagnosed and untreated.

  Chile does not have a comprehensive law to prevent violence against women in various spheres and manifestations. There is a draft law on the subject that has not made any progress for many years. The number of femicides – and attempted femicides – is very high. Violence levels are very worrying, and they increased even further under lockdown during the pandemic.

  In addition, Chile has become one of the main host countries for Venezuelan migrants and has adopted a restrictive policy towards migrants, refugees and asylum seekers, particularly women. As applying for a visa has become virtually impossible, people are entering Chile irregularly. This has led to an increase in human trafficking and smuggling, the main victims of which are women and girls.

  Irregular migration has also had an impact on labour exploitation. Without documentation, many migrant women do not even dare to go to health centres for fear of being expelled from the country. According to the principles of the Cartagena Declaration, which establishes a broad definition of asylum, Venezuelan women should be considered subjects of international protection, as they are fleeing a law-and-order crisis. But they are not recognised as such and are denied labour and health rights, among many other rights.

  Moreover, racism has increased along with xenophobia. Migrants of African descent, mainly from Colombia and Haiti, have experienced racism and xenophobia. The same is true for the Indigenous population. In the context of the territorial conflict with the Mapuche people in southern Chile, institutional and police violence have differentially affected Indigenous women, for instance during violent raids in their communities.

  How is civil society working to bring these issues into the public agenda?

  At the moment, the Constitutional Convention is the space through which we are channelling the feminist agenda. We have high expectations and are working so that the Convention will produce a general normative framework for the recognition of women’s rights, which will then have to be implemented through laws and public policies.

  I believe the current Constitutional Convention is the first of its kind in the world, with gender parity and reserved seats. The Convention does not reflect the composition of the Chilean elite – white heterosexual men – but the real Chile: it includes Indigenous people, women and people of all educational levels and professions, rather than purely lawyers as is the case with parliament. This diversity of perspectives makes it incredibly rich.

  The process of drafting a new constitution for Chile is a historic opportunity that we are trying to take advantage of to channel women’s rights issues. This process was the product of a massive social mobilisation demanding rights, justice and dignity. It embodies an institutional solution to the discontent and fragmentation of Chile’s social fabric.

  After 40 years, today we have the possibility of reshaping a constitution made during the dictatorship, which does not guarantee social rights. We are only a few months away from having a draft that will be put up to a plebiscite, which is why this current process is for us a great political moment that entails the prospect of progress on women’s rights. 

  How could gender gaps and inequalities be reduced in Chile?

  The pandemic exposed a care crisis that is structural. The private and domestic realm continues to be women’s responsibility, on top of which comes paid work. We want a paradigm shift establishing that this is a shared social responsibility, which should not fall exclusively on women. The creation of a national care system in which the state, the private sector and families – but whole families, not just women – take on family care could bring about a real transformation of the sexual division of labour.

  Attention to the issue of care is a first step in advancing a structural issue such as the sexual division of labour: taking women out of a single role, valuing their roles and even generating new sources of work for women. We need a cross-cutting care paradigm that fosters bonds of respect and solidarity. This is of enormous importance: none of us would be here now if someone had not taken care of us.

  The issue of care is also very relevant in relation to nature, water and the commons, if they are to serve to improve the quality of life for all people, rather than generate wealth for a few. What is important is that the focus be on the common good and not on extraction and accumulation. The current extractivist development model reproduces inequalities and is at the root of violence against women defenders of land and territory.

  Feminism is currently taking a much more holistic perspective and is making alliances with other social movements. We are feminists, but we are connected with other worlds – those of environmentalism, Indigenous women, women defenders of land and territory – which makes us understand that inequalities and exclusions come from the intersection of various systems of domination: those of capitalism, colonialism and patriarchy. In order to generate a profound transformation, we must take a holistic view.

  What are the expectations of Chilean feminists as a new government is inaugurated?

  Our expectations are high but realistic, not excessive. We know that four years is a short time for so many challenges and we will not be able to transform everything in such a short time, but we believe that there is political will to move forward with laws on care, equality and non-discrimination, social rights, sexual and reproductive rights, and gender violence.

  President Gabriel Boric, who took office on 11 March, self-identifies as a feminist. He has already given a positive signal by placing the Ministry of Women’s Affairs within his political cabinet, indicating that he does not understand gender as a sectoral issue; we hope that this will translate into real mainstreaming of the gender approach to permeate all policies.

  The new government’s cabinet is more than gender-balanced: it includes more female than male ministers. Several of the ministers – those of women, justice and national assets – are feminists. This is more important than the fact that there are more women, because it will allow us to make important progress on our agenda. 

  We know that, as in the rest of Latin America, there are very difficult times ahead, with a looming economic crisis and very high inflation. We will have to face a process of life becoming more precarious, in a pandemic context that continues to be somewhat uncertain. We do not know how much of a ‘normal life’ we will be able to recover, nor what it will be like.

  The new government will have to protect the work of the Convention, which is being heavily attacked and criticised by mainstream media, which rejects any redistribution of power. The new government will have to give the Convention budgetary and institutional support to continue its work. It will then receive the draft of the new constitution – which will apparently be quite transformative and will hopefully be ratified through a plebiscite – and will have to undertake the enormous task of gradually implementing parity norms in various spheres.

  Civic space in Chile is rated ‘obstructed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
  Get in touch with Corporación Humanas through itswebsite or itsFacebook page, and follow @corphumanas on Twitter. 

• CHINA: ‘Feminism remains resilient because it addresses issues central to everyday life’

  CIVICUS discusses women’s rights and a crackdown on feminist activists in China with Jing Guo, founder of the Legal Aid Hotline for Women’s Right to Work, which provides legal and psychological support to women facing gender-based discrimination and violence.

  The Chinese government, which sees any form of independent activism as a threat to its power, is targeting the women’s rights movement. It recently sentenced two women’s rights activists, Sophia Huang Xueqin and Wang Jianbing, to five and three and a half years in prison respectively for ‘inciting subversion of state power’. Huang is a prominent #MeToo activist, while Wang advocates for labour rights and support for women who report workplace sexual harassment. Arrested in 2021, they had already spent three years in prison when they were sentenced.

  What’s the status of women’s rights in China?

  Women in China face several pressing issues that have a significant impact on their daily lives. Gender discrimination is pervasive, affecting women in education, the workplace and within their families. Women often face higher barriers to education, stricter admission standards, job discrimination, lower wages and unfair treatment, especially during pregnancy. The lack of adequate public childcare services also places a heavy burden on women, often forcing them to sacrifice career opportunities to care for their families.

  Violence against women is alarmingly widespread, occurring in homes, schools and workplaces, but legal protection is limited and poorly enforced. Many officials lack awareness of gender issues and the profound impacts of domestic violence and sexual harassment.

  In addition, social norms continue to favour sons over daughters, perpetuating gender inequality. Women are often pressured to conform to traditional roles and relationships, but increasing awareness is leading many to resist these expectations.

  Gender inequality is prevalent, but the government is reluctant to mobilise efforts to improve women’s status and civil society organisations have limited resources. For instance, there is a lack of comprehensive and reliable national statistics on women’s status. Surveys conducted by governmental organisations such as the Women’s Federation are not convincing, and civil society doesn’t have the capacity to conduct widespread surveys.

  What happens to activists who publicly raise these issues?

  Prominent feminist activists face severe repression. For example, Sophia Huang Xueqin, a feminist journalist and #MeToo activist, was arrested in 2021 while on her way to the UK to study. Last month she was sentenced to five years in prison for ‘subversion of state power’. Huang has been a prominent voice in China’s #MeToo movement, reporting on victims of sexual abuse and speaking out against misogyny and sexism in Chinese newsrooms.

  According to the verdict, the authorities considered her regular meetings and forums to discuss social issues to be subversion. Huang’s activism began in 2018, when she supported the first #MeToo case in China by helping survivors share their experiences. After personally experiencing sexual harassment, she began investigating in journalism circles and covered protests in Hong Kong in 2019. The government accused her of promoting non-violent protest strategies, demonstrating the absurdity of the charges against her. Her story and others like it reveal what women face when they campaign for their rights in China.

  Why is the Chinese government targeting feminist activists?

  The Chinese government targets not only feminist activists, but any form of dissent, resulting in widespread harassment and repression. There was also a significant setback in 2015, when five feminists were arrested while planning an anti-sexual harassment campaign.

  The deteriorating political environment has made activism increasingly difficult, but feminism remains resilient because it addresses issues central to everyday life. The fact that feminist ideas are deeply embedded in everyday life makes it difficult for the government to completely suppress activism.

  Despite limited resources and ongoing security concerns, feminist activism continues. The movement is largely driven by volunteers who support victims and promote public education. Women continue to build connections and organise small-scale activities, both inside China and in exile. Online groups and social media serve as important platforms for expressing feminist ideas and sharing experiences.

  What has been the impact of the Chinese #MeToo movement?

  The #MeToo movement triggered a powerful shift in public awareness of sexual harassment in China, transforming what was once a taboo subject into an issue we could finally talk about. Just a decade ago, discussion of sexual harassment was virtually unheard of, and it was the persistence of activism that changed this.

  #MeToo spawned informal volunteer groups dedicated to supporting survivors and educating the public, inspiring changes in men’s attitudes. Volunteers from diverse professional backgrounds have come together in a vast advocacy network that empowers those affected by sexual harassment. This collective effort isn’t just about dealing with individual cases; it’s about fostering a cultural shift that promotes equality and respect for all.

  As a result, a 2022 law provided a clearer definition of sexual harassment, allowing some cases to reach the courts and resulting in significant victories for survivors.

  Despite ongoing challenges, the #MeToo movement continues to reshape gender dynamics, particularly in academia and civil society, where young, educated women are taking action to change the ingrained patriarchal ideas in these areas.

  How do Chinese women’s rights activists organise and mobilise, and what kind of international support do they need?

  Feminist activism in China is resilient, as activists continue to develop innovative strategies to organise and mobilise women. Activities such as hiking serve as informal gatherings where participants can network and discuss pressing issues. Outside China, activists face fewer security concerns, but are still cautious. They organise events such as stand-up shows in cities such as London, New York and Vancouver to raise awareness and build a community.

  Despite limited resources, activists are making the most of what they have and stressing the importance of creating supportive and courageous spaces to share experiences and ideas. In recent years, more feminists have created platforms for political expression, providing opportunities for open discussion of political issues. Events held abroad encourage Chinese feminists to share their stories bravely, often without photographs to protect their identities, reflecting ongoing security concerns even in exile.

  International support is crucial to sustaining feminist activism. Financial assistance, intellectual exchange and the creation of supportive networks are essential for the growth of the movement. For example, Chinese activists and organised groups have launched a transnational campaign to demand Huang’s release, but we need broader support from more people and organisations to build a stronger network to prevent these injustices happening again.

  Civic space in China is rated ‘closed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.

  Get in touch with Jing Guo through herFacebook page.

• CUBA: ‘All tactics used by activists have been turned into crimes’

  CIVICUS speaks about changes to the Cuban Penal and Family Codes and the government’s reaction to mass protests in 2021 with Marta María Ramírez, a Cuban journalist and autonomous feminist.

  

  Photo by María Lucía Expósito

  How do you assess recent changes to the Cuban Penal Code?

  The reform of the Penal Code cannot be understood without reference to last year’s protests. The argument provided to justify this reform referred to the previous constitutional reform: once the constitution was updated in 2019, a reform of the Penal Code was required. But the constitutional process itself was misleading: one would think that a constitutional update is something positive, but this is not necessarily the case in Cuba. The constitutional reform process was confusing: while the rituals of consultation were carried out, the reform was basically imposed. And in terms of substance, the new constitution contains many questionable elements, which are precisely the ones that should have been changed but were carried over intact from the old constitution.

  For instance, while the new constitution recognises the market, it continues to declare socialism as the economic system in place and highlights the ‘irrevocable’ character of socialism. The one-party system remains intact, with the Cuban Communist Party recognised as ‘the superior leading political force of society and the state’ on the basis of ‘its democratic character and permanent link with the people’.

  As a result, other freedoms that the constitution also recognises are rendered meaningless. For example, the constitution recognises ‘the rights of assembly, demonstration and association, for lawful and peaceful purposes, [...] provided that they are exercised with respect for public order and in compliance with the prescriptions established by law’ – but this is the very same law that establishes that the only legitimate political affiliation is to the Cuban Communist Party.

  The same applies to the freedoms of expression and artistic creation, which are recognised if they are exercised ‘in accordance with the humanist principles on which the cultural policy of the state and the values of socialist society are based’, that is, only if they are used to express acquiescence rather than critical thought.

  In any case, on the basis of this reform it was argued that the rest of the legal framework, including the Penal Code and the Family Code, should be updated. In the case of the Family Code, this was really necessary, because it had not been updated since 1975 and was totally out of step with the reality of today’s society. The reform of the Penal Code was also justified by the need to ‘modernise’ legislation and codify crimes that the previous code, which dated from 1987, did not recognise, such as environmental crimes, cybercrime and gender-based violence. But from my perspective, this reform can only be understood in reference to the July 2021 protests and their predecessors: those of 11 May 2019, 27 November 2020 and 27 January 2021.

  To shield the regime from dissent, all tactics used by activists have been turned into crimes of public disorder and crimes against state security, and foreign funding of civil society organisations and the media is criminalised. The aim is to stifle dissident media, because how is a media not aligned with the state to be financed in Cuba?

  Penalties for various crimes have also increased. Not only has the death penalty been retained, but the range of crimes it can be applied for has increased. The age at which a person is decreed criminally responsible is among the lowest in the world. What kind of modernisation is this? For some reason it was decided not to submit this reform to any kind of consultation.

  If we analyse the production of laws in recent years, it is clear that this has been systematically aimed at shielding the regime, which has gone beyond controlling actions to try to control thought as well. This protective shield is completed with the new Penal Code, which seeks to prevent a repetition of last year’s protests and silence all dissent.

  How can we understand the discrepancy between these highly regressive changes to the Penal Code and the apparently progressive reform of the Family Code currently underway?

  The Family Code is also being updated following the constitutional reform, although it should – and could – have been reformed much earlier. The first time I heard about equal marriage in Cuba was back in 2007. Even then there were calls for reform coming from academia, which is where activism linked to gender issues, women’s rights and sexual minorities was concentrated.

  But there was a lot of resistance and it was argued that recognition of equal marriage required a constitutional reform. This was obviously not true: marriage was regulated by the Family Code and not by the constitution, and when the constitution was reformed, this right was not included, but rather purposefully excluded and left pending for whenever the Family Code was reformed.

  The issue of equal marriage was again at the centre of the debate from the moment that, following the constitutional reform, the Family Code needed to be reformed as well, and pressures mounted for this right, not enshrined in the constitution, to be recognised by the Code – something that could have been done in 2007, 15 years ago. But this is clearly the way Cuba is ruled.

  In the draft Family Code that was submitted to consultation no special protection was included for trans children. Nothing, not a single mention, although it is known that this group experiences high rates of school dropout, expulsion from their homes and school bullying, both by students and teachers, experiencing a total impossibility to live their gender identity with guarantees. When trans people grow up, particularly trans women, they are the favoured victims of punitive provisions relating to ‘pre-delinquent behaviour’. This concept is so fascist that it is no longer called this in the current Penal Code, but it will remain in force through other regulations, in the practices of law enforcement officials and in the biases that will continue to exist.

  Why are we discussing these issues now? I have the impression that this is being used as a smokescreen, a manoeuvre to placate a demand without making profound changes to the political regime. These two seemingly contradictory strategies – a regressive reform of the Penal Code and a seemingly progressive reform of the Family Code – both point in the same direction, that of the stabilisation of the regime.

  I say ‘seemingly progressive’ because after a long process of consultations, parliament must now take the proposals received, reformulate the bill and set a date for a referendum to turn it into law. We still don’t know what will remain in the bill and what will be watered down or modified. Nor do we know how this document will translate into the daily lives of Cuban families.

  What positive elements are expected to be included in the new Family Code?

  One of the issues included in the draft Family Code is same-sex marriage and adoption by same-sex couples. Another issue that has been included is that of so-called solidarity gestation, or surrogacy, which until now has been illegal. This of great concern to feminist activists. Let’s remember we are in a context of brutal machismo and feminisation of poverty. How will solidarity gestation be regulated? Even if the law is clear on the prohibition of remuneration, how will it be possible in this context to avoid the development of an informal economy based on the exploitation of pregnant women?

  Another important issue is that of the rights of grandparents to have a relationship with their grandchildren, which has its counterpart in some provisions on parental responsibility, which would include respecting and facilitating the right of children to maintain communication with their grandparents and other close relatives.

  The issue of parental responsibility is key. It replaces the concept of parental authority, bringing a welcome shift from the idea of fathers’ and mothers’ power over children to the idea that parents are responsible for and have a responsibility towards their children. This is very interesting, and yet it has generated uproar, not only from social conservatives but also from political activists.

  This must be understood within Cuba’s political context. Activists – not necessarily conservative ones – feel that the emphasis on responsibility would allow the state to label them as irresponsible so they can take their children away from them, or threaten to do so to force them to desist from their activism. Many activists, and particularly women with maternal responsibilities, have already encountered this kind of threat, with comments such as ‘take care of your children’, ‘we know you have your daughter’ and ‘be careful, do it for your child’.

  But I think this threat is already out there, and under the new Code fathers could also be forced to exercise their responsibilities – something that does not currently happen in Cuba, with the feminisation of poverty being a consequence. As elsewhere in the region, there has been a massive increase in single-parent, female-headed households, something official statistics do not fully recognise.

  Another issue that has been at the centre of discussions is that of the children’s progressive autonomy. We know that punishment – including physical punishment – is normalised in Cuba, and parents make important decisions for their children without consulting them. The idea that parents are able to decide everything for their children until they come of age has changed over time, increasingly replaced by the concept that children progressively acquire the capacity to make their own decisions. I personally believe that as parents we should no longer talk about ‘parenting’ a child, but rather about accompanying them in their learning process.

  An important issue contained in the version of the document that went out to consultation is that of child marriage, added at the last minute as a result of strong pressure from feminist activism and independent media and allies. It is a vital issue, but legislators had not seen it.

  Many of these issues have created controversy, but I don’t think there has been real debate. In a context of high political polarisation, Cuba is not ready for debate. As activists who participated as independent observers have reported, the debates that have taken place in the consultative stages have been misguided and have not been led by people well trained to conduct them. There really is no debate in Cuba; you simply hear monologues for and against.

  What other problems do you see?

  Generally speaking, the problem is not with the contents of the Family Code. Women make up more than half of the population, and if you also count children, adolescents and LGBTQI+ people, the new code would meet the needs of a large majority.

  But we have great doubts about the reasons why it is being pushed through just now, especially because of the way in which some controversies were encouraged that served to obscure the fact that at the same time a terribly regressive reform of the Penal Code was being imposed on us, without any debate.

  In the new Penal Code, everything we do as activists and citizens is criminalised. It is a medieval code. The Family Code, on the other hand, is presented to us as ultra-modern and the result of consensus, which also creates uncertainty about its implementation. But while we have no doubts about the implementation of the Penal Code – we know that it will be implemented to the letter – if the Family Code ends up being as modern and progressive as advertised, I have huge doubts that it will actually be implemented. 

  To a large extent, those who would benefit from the new Family Code are the same people who will be repressed under the new Penal Code. Those who are protesting for the release of activists imprisoned after the 2021 protests are mostly single mothers demanding their children’s freedom. Many of those who took to the streets to protest were poor, Afro-descendants, transgender people and children raised by single mothers. This problem has existed for a long time and there have been no public policies aimed at solving it. There has not been the slightest attempt to make public policies with a gender perspective. In this context, it cannot be expected that the new Family Code will make such a big difference.

  Civic space in Cuba is rated ‘closed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
  Follow@Martamar77 on Twitter.

• ECUADOR: ‘Women’s rights have experienced an emergency situation since well before the pandemic’

  CIVICUS speaks with Virginia Gómez de la Torre, president of Fundación Desafío, about the progress made and the challenges remaining in the area of sexual and reproductive rights in Ecuador. Virginia tells us about the significance of the breakthrough that took place in April 2021, when abortion was decriminalised in cases of rape. Active since 2000, Fundación Desafío is a feminist coalition dedicated to the defence and promotion of women’s sexual and reproductive rights and the right to a life free of violence in Ecuador.

  

  What are the challenges for women’s rights in Ecuador?

  Women’s rights in Ecuador continue to be a challenge because in every area there are unresolved issues due to discrimination, exclusion and sexist violence. In terms of access to work and opportunities for economic and personal development, for example, women have suffered disproportionately from the pandemic and the slowdown in activity; the elimination of small businesses and the reduction of opportunities for informal sales hit them hardest, and it has been difficult for many to regain those spaces.

  Inequalities affect women from different social groups in different ways. Ecuador has a large Indigenous population and there is a large female peasant force, but women do not own land. There is a lot of discrimination, and Indigenous and Afro-descendant people have much more difficulty accessing opportunities. Indigenous and Black peasant and internal migrant women are more vulnerable because they suffer the violence of a system that devalues Indigenous and peasant lives.

  In Ecuador there is also a large presence of women in a situation of mobility, mostly young women of reproductive age. They arrive without papers and enter through unauthorised migratory passages, which exposes them to situations of trafficking, sexual exploitation and rape, as well as xenophobic violence. In this sense, women’s rights have experienced an emergency situation since well before the pandemic.

  All these exclusions are accompanied by violence, and Ecuador has yet to develop a strategy to confront this violence. Although psychological violence remains the most prevalent, all forms of violence have increased. For instance, obstetric violence – that is, the actions or omissions by health personnel that violate women’s rights during pregnancy or childbirth – is extremely high, affecting 42 per cent of women, and is much more prevalent in rural areas and among certain ethnic groups. The state makes little effort and does not give priority to the issue of femicide; last year we had 118 cases. This year we have already had 131, including violent deaths of women related to gang or criminal vendettas. Violence against women is a very serious problem in Ecuador, and as long as it does not deal with it, the government will be noncompliant with the rights enshrined in the constitution.

  The Ecuadorian state should issue protection and restraining orders and investigate femicides. It should also combat the violence that is present in all areas of daily life, and which manifests itself very strongly in the form of sexual violence, as well as other forms of violence such as political violence.

  This is the context for sexual and reproductive rights. Only on 28 April 2021 was abortion decriminalised in cases of rape. The fact that is something so basic and so long fought for shows the extent to which the Ecuadorian state is tied to the interests of economic power groups that are strongly linked to religious power groups. Every year, between 2,000 and 3,000 girls become pregnant in Ecuador. In 2019 there were 4,000 under the age of 14, and under the pandemic there were about 3,000; according to the Criminal Code, these pregnancies are the result of rape.

  What was the process that led to the legalisation of abortion in cases of rape?

  Until April 2021, abortion was only permitted when a woman’s life or health was in danger or if the pregnancy was the result of rape of an intellectually disabled woman. In response to several unconstitutionality lawsuits filed by women’s rights organisations, the Constitutional Court of Ecuador decriminalised abortion for all cases of rape.

  This has been a struggle of many years. Women’s rights organisations have been defending therapeutic abortion and abortion in cases of rape since 2008, when the new constitution was drafted and when anti-rights groups tried to repeal therapeutic abortion. They wanted to deprive Ecuadorian women of access to abortion under any circumstances.

  Within this framework, the proposal to legalise abortion in cases of rape was brought forward in 2012, when a new Criminal Code was drafted. In 2013, then-President Rafael Correa – the most powerful of anti-rights activists – excluded this possibility. He threatened to resign and used the typical cliché that the constitution guarantees and protects life from the moment of conception.

  In 2019, the issue of the decriminalisation of abortion in cases of rape was raised again as a result of a legislative initiative coming from the Public Defender’s Office. The National Women’s Coalition of Ecuador (CNME) and Fundación Desafío once again worked for decriminalisation in cases of rape. But at the last minute, during legislative negotiations, the issue was used as a bargaining chip, and we lost the vote. We had the 70 votes needed to pass a motion in the Assembly, but several Assembly members from parties that had pledged their support ultimately voted against it. We got 65 votes against 59 for the anti-rights side. We lost and the process took another course, that of the Constitutional Court.

  Two months before the vote, Fundación Desafío and CNME had already filed a complaint of unconstitutionality and a complaint of non-compliance with the Constitutional Court, because women of this country have no confidence that the powerful will look after our interests. In December 2019 these two lawsuits were admitted and in November 2020 other women’s organisations joined in, as well as the Ombudsman’s Office.

  Following the Constitutional Court’s ruling, the determination of time limits remains an immense challenge. We proposed that there should be no time limit, but some doctors and health professionals are already putting them into the bill, so this is something we are going to have to fight for in the Assembly.

  What roles has Fundación Desafío played in the process?

  In addition to filing the claims of unconstitutionality and non-compliance, we have played a leadership role in legislative lobbying. This work was in addition to the contribution of many other organisations that worked with the population, holding workshops, organising networks to accompany women undergoing abortions and opening up spaces that give women the possibility to decide, even if in a context of illegality.

  In the legislative processes of 2013 and 2019 we did all kinds of things. We ran communication campaigns, we produced short videos with people who have great public visibility, we worked in networks and we presented our research. We played a day-to-day role in the Assembly’s Justice Committee, which worked on the two reports that were later passed on to the plenary. We channelled the presence of Human Rights Watch, which from a comparative law perspective urged the Assembly to move forward on legalisation, and of several women who gave their testimonies, including a woman who had been raped and another woman who worked in the area of violence against children. We also campaigned for the passage of the Health Code, which included several articles on sexual and reproductive rights. Following eight years of debates, the Health Code was passed by the Assembly in August 2020, but it was fully vetoed the following month by then-President Lenín Moreno.

  Lastly, we supported the constitution of the Ecuadorian Faith Network, formed by progressive evangelical Christians. This group made public presentations and statements. The trade union movement and the Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities of Ecuador were also in favour of the process. All this documentation was submitted first to the Assembly and then to the Constitutional Court.

  What impact do you think this legal change will have?

  For those of us who have devoted our lives to this and will continue to do so, this change has a great symbolic impact, even though it is a small step. Obviously, the legalisation of abortion in cases of rape is something huge for raped girls, of whom there are many in Ecuador, and more generally for the women who can now end a pregnancy that is the result of a crime, if they choose to do so. And although no progress has been made in recognising the right of all women to decide about their own bodies in any circumstance, symbolically it is a huge step forward because it demystifies abortion and the possibility of making decisions about the course of a pregnancy in cases of rape. It is now legal to make decisions about the body of a pregnant woman who has been raped; the state has given its approval and for the first time has put the victim at the centre of the debate. So why shouldn’t women who have not been raped be able to make similar decisions about their bodies? I think these are the shifts that are implicitly taking place.

  The next step in the very short term will be to also decriminalise abortion in cases of lethal foetal malformation. The scenario of total decriminalisation needs to be raised in the Assembly, as has happened in other countries. The Assembly may say no, but that is the way forward and someone needs to do it.

  Civic space in Ecuador is rated as ‘obstructed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
  Get in touch with Fundación Desafío through itswebsite orFacebook page, and follow@DesafioDerechos on Twitter.

• EL SALVADOR: ‘Legalising abortion is all about recognising women’s status as citizens’

  CIVICUS speaks with Morena Herrera, president of Citizens’ Group for the Decriminalisation of Abortion, about the struggle for abortion rights in El Salvador, which has some of the most restrictive abortion laws in the world.

  Citizens’ Group is a Salvadoran civil society organisation that works to raise public awareness of sexual and reproductive health issues, advocates for the reform of abortion rights legislation and provides legal support to women accused of or convicted for having abortions or related crimes.

  What’s the situation of women who need to have abortions in El Salvador?

  Currently, El Salvador’s laws do not allow abortion under any circumstances, not even in the case of a pregnancy of a nine-year-old girl, a pregnancy entailing risk to the pregnant person’s life, or a case of foetal malformation incompatible with extra-uterine life. Even in ectopic pregnancies, which occur outside the uterus and cannot be carried to term, doctors are usually forced to wait until there is no foetal heartbeat before performing the termination, putting the pregnant woman at serious risk of haemorrhaging.

  This is the reality faced by women seeking to terminate a pregnancy in El Salvador. They face legal restrictions, criminal charges, prosecution and the risk of imprisonment. All they have left is clandestine abortion, which is often unsafe. Women living in poverty face much greater risks. Those with financial resources can leave the country and seek assistance somewhere where abortion is legal, while those with no resources have no options.

  This explains why suicide has become the leading indirect cause of maternal death among adolescents. In the absence of alternatives for terminating a pregnancy, some adolescents with imposed or unwanted pregnancies see suicide as the only way out.

  How are Salvadoran feminist organisations, including Citizens’ Group, working for abortion to be decriminalised?

  Feminist organisations in El Salvador – particularly Citizens’ Group and the Feminist Collective – have worked to open up a conversation about abortion from new perspectives. We approach it as an issue of public health, social justice and reproductive justice, as well as from the angle of democracy, since at the end of the day it is all about recognising women’s status as citizens.

  Citizens’ Group works along three interrelated lines. The first is litigation and the legal defence of women criminalised for abortion or obstetric emergencies. We have denounced this as a violation of human rights and have managed to get 73 women who had been convicted out of prison.

  Our second line of work is advocacy and campaigns for legal change. We have disseminated a narrative in defence of women’s rights and freedom, and we have submitted initiatives to reform the Penal Code, along with an appeal for unconstitutionality and petitions to follow up on a Supreme Court ruling that recognised the need to reform the legislation.

  In this area we have made uneven progress. There has been progress in the field of public opinion, but this has not yet reflected on the legal framework, partly because politics in El Salvador are controlled by a single party, and partly because religious and conservative parts of society have an enormous influence over the state.

  Our third area of work is litigation in international arenas such as the Inter-American and the United Nations human rights systems.

  Who is for and against legal abortion in El Salvador?

  In El Salvador, these two blocs are not homogeneous. The one that actively opposes abortion is not very numerous, but it includes people with a lot of economic power, media influence and the capacity to put pressure on institutions. They are small in number but have a lot of power. For instance, for a recent hearing at the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR), they hired expensive law firms and went very well prepared. They also have an army of social media trolls who attack and threaten those of us who argue that change is necessary.

  However, on the side of change there are numerous organisations, not only feminist and women’s rights organisations, but also human rights organisations that have gradually come to understand that the absolute criminalisation of abortion is a violation of human rights. These organisations have supported us at IACtHR hearings even though the decriminalisation of abortion is not the main focus of their work. They have done so from a social justice perspective in the face of a reality that is too unfair for women, and particularly for poor women.

  This bloc, in sum, encompasses a broad spectrum of organisations and people committed to human rights but working mostly outside institutions and with far fewer financial resources and access to influential media.

  What significance could an upcoming IACtHR ruling on the Beatriz case have?

  The Beatriz case is an emblematic case in the struggle for the legalisation of abortion in El Salvador. It’s the case of a young woman who was prevented by the Salvadoran state from having an abortion, even though her pregnancy endangered her physical integrity and her life.

  An IACtHR ruling on this case would have enormous significance. Already at the end of 2021, the IACtHR condemned the state of El Salvador in the Manuela case, the case of another young woman who was criminalised after suffering an obstetric emergency and died because she did not receive the required medical attention. This ruling established that the criminalisation of poor women facing obstetric emergencies is inseparable from the context of absolute criminalisation of abortion.

  A ruling in the Beatriz case would highlight other consequences of the absolute prohibition of abortion and could lead to legal reform that prioritises women’s rights.

  ---

  Civic space in El Salvador is rated ‘obstructed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.

  Get in touch with Citizens’ Group for the Decriminalisation of Abortion through itswebsite orFacebook page, and follow@AbortoPORlaVIDA on Twitter.

• FRANCE: ‘The inclusion of the right to abortion in the Constitution is a true feminist victory’

  CIVICUS speaks with Floriane Volt, Director of Public and Legal Affairs at the Women’s Foundation (Fondation des Femmes), about recent changes to the French Constitution to include the right to abortion.

  The Women’s Foundation is a leading French organisation working for women’s rights and freedoms and against gender-based violence.

  Where did the initiative to enshrine the right to abortion in the French Constitution come from?

  Women’s right to control their own bodies is an essential condition for women’s freedom and equality between women and men. So enshrining the right to abortion in the constitution was both a necessity and a consecration of women’s rights and equality.

  It is the role of the constitution – the founding text of our society, which protects the fundamental rights of all citizens – to safeguard the right to control one’s own body. It is an additional guarantee for all women. It will now also prove more difficult to challenge it as it will require constitutional reform, a more complex process than simply deleting it from a piece of legislation.

  Feminist organisations have long called for abortion to be enshrined in the constitution. It was one of the programmatic proposals put forward by the Women’s Foundation and other feminist organisations during the 2022 presidential election. Back in 2017, a female senator, Laurence Cohen, tabled a bill to include this right in the constitution.

  The US Supreme Court’s June 2022 ruling reversing its decision to protect abortion sent shockwaves through the French political scene, and many people called for the right to abortion to be enshrined in the constitution.

• Harassment goes virtual: Women activists and journalists speak out

  
  

   

  Women journalists, feminists, activists, and human rights defenders around the world are facing virtual harassment. In this series, global civil society alliance CIVICUS highlights the gendered nature of virtual harassment through the stories of women working to defend our democratic freedoms. These testimonies are originally published onGlobal Voices through a partnership between CIVICUS and Global Voices.
  

   

  For this Filipina journalist, every day is a battle with fear

  There has been a relentless crackdown against independent media and journalists. Threats and attacks against journalists, as well as the deployment of armies of trolls and online bots, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, have contributed to self-censorship—this has had a chilling effect within the media industry and among the wider public. In this first part of the series, Filipina journalist Inday Espina-Varona tells her story.

   

  Called a prostitute by the prime minister, a Slovenian journalist tells her story (Ler em portugues)

  Evgenija Carl is an investigative journalist from Slovenia. After she produced a television report about the opposition SDS party in 2016, a leading politician at the time, Janez Janša, called her a “prostitute” on Twitter. When Janša later became Slovenian prime minister, the online abuse intensified. Read Evgenija Carl's story here.

   

   

  Online rape threats connect Lebanese activist to ‘thousands of other women’ facing abuse (باللغة العربية)

  Since October 2019, anti-government protests known as the “October Revolution” have erupted across Lebanon. Protesters have called for the removal of the government and raised concerns about corruption, poor public services, and a lack of trust in the ruling class. Protests have been met with unprecedented violence from security forces. Feminists have been at the forefront of the revolution and have stepped up to provide assistance in the aftermath of the explosion. In the third part of this series,Maya El Ammar, a Lebanese feminist writer, activist and communications professional, tells herstory and the online abuse she continues to face. 

   

  Personal attacks follow Burundi human rights defender into exile in Uganda (Lire en français)

  Under the regime of President Évariste Ndayishimiye, journalists and rights defenders continue to face challenges. The arrest of political activists and the recent public announcement of the sentencing of 34 exiled people—including journalists and human rights defenders—to life imprisonment illustrate the obstacles to free expression in the country. Chantal Mutamuriza, a feminist, human rights defender, and founder of the Light For All NGO, tells us her story of the continuous online harassment she faces day in and day out.

   

  Intimidation, censorship, and defamation in the virtual sphere

  In Syria, hundreds of thousands of people have died since 2011. Numerous human rights violations have taken place during the Syrian crisis - arbitrary detentions, torture, assassination of journalists, and the violent repression of protests, make Syria one of the most volatile countries in the Middle East and North Africa. Originally from Syria, Weaam Youssef is Programme Manager for Women Human Rights Defenders for the Gulf Region and Neighboring Countries. This is the story of Weaam.

   

  Herself a victim of cyberbullying, Lindsey Kukunda fights online violence against women in Uganda

  More than half of Ugandan women experience physical violence, while one in five is subjected to sexual violence; many also face psychological abuse, forced and early marriage, and female genital mutilation. In 2014, Uganda introduced a law against pornography that has been used to target and prosecute women, especially women whose nude photos have been shared online without their consent. Lindsey Kukunda is a feminist, writer, and human rights defender. She is also the managing director of Her Empire, a feminist organization that runs two programmes: Not Your Body and The Mentor’s Network. Lindsey tells us her story. 

   

• INDIA: ‘Civil society organisations are at the forefront of the fight against gender-based violence’

  CIVICUS discusses the recent wave of protests against gender-based violence (GBV) in India with Dr Kavitha Ravi, a member of the Indian Medical Association (IMA).

  Protests erupted across India after a 31-year-old female medical trainee was raped and murdered in a Kolkata hospital on 9 August. The IMA called a strike, with protests held in major cities including Kolkata and Mumbai. While the official strike has ended, many doctors, particularly junior doctors, remain on strike and protests continue to demand justice, accountability and safer working conditions for women.

  What triggered the recent protests against GBV in India?

  Protests erupted after the tragic rape and murder of a young female doctor at the R G Kar Medical College in Kolkata on 9 August. This horrific incident shocked the nation and sparked widespread outrage. In response, a coalition of doctors, medical associations such as the IMA and various resident and faculty associations joined together in a nationwide strike to demand justice for the victim and better safety measures for health workers, particularly women who face significant risks in the workplace.

  Protesters are calling for major reforms, including the adoption of a Hospital Protection Act, which would designate hospitals as safe zones and introduce measures to create a safer environment for health workers. Their demands are part of a larger movement to comprehensively address GBV, prevent similar tragedies in the future and create a safer and more supportive working environment for everyone in the health sector.

  What steps have been taken so far to ensure justice and the safety of female health workers?

  The judicial system has acted swiftly by transferring the case to a higher authority to ensure a thorough investigation after concerns were raised about the police’s initial inquiry, which was not accepted by the students or the victim’s family. They were sceptical, believing the police might be favouring the college authorities and supporting the accused.

  This decision aims to ensure a detailed investigation so justice can be done. The Supreme Court of India is also overseeing the case to monitor its progress, address any issues that may arise and ensure all necessary steps are taken to uphold justice.

  In parallel, several initiatives are underway to improve the safety of female health workers. The Ministry of Health has proposed establishing a committee to review and improve safety protocols in health facilities. There are also plans to increase security in hospitals and establish a new national taskforce dedicated to improving safety through better infrastructure, advanced technology and additional security measures. However, despite these efforts, more needs to be done to combat GBV and ensure that these measures effectively protect female health workers.

  How have the authorities responded to the protests?

  The authorities have taken a mixed approach to the nationwide strike, combining concessions with new measures to address immediate concerns. The Health Ministry has drawn up a detailed plan to increase security in central government hospitals. This includes installing high-resolution CCTV cameras, monitoring access points with identification badges, deploying trained security personnel for constant patrolling and securing duty rooms for female staff. Hospitals are also encouraged to develop and regularly update emergency response plans and conduct mock drills.

  In response to these measures, the IMA suspended its strike. However, other doctors’ associations have continued to protest for more substantial reforms. Many people remain dissatisfied, particularly after recent incidents of police violence. While the Supreme Court’s intervention may have temporarily eased the tensions, protesters remain concerned about the new measures’ effectiveness and full implementation.

  Why is GBV so prevalent in India, and what’s being done about it?

  Deep-rooted cultural, social, economic and legal factors account for the high prevalence of GBV in India. This is a patriarchal country where traditional gender roles and the subjugation of women are deeply entrenched. Women tend to be economically dependent on men, which traps them in abusive relationships that make it difficult for them to seek help or escape. Intergenerational cycles of violence perpetuate the problem, as children who witness or experience abuse may come to see such behaviour as normal.

  Low literacy rates, particularly in rural areas, further limit women’s understanding of their rights and the available support. When they do seek justice, the system often fails to protect the victims or hold perpetrators accountable. Systemic failures in law enforcement and justice help perpetuate GBV.

  Many initiatives and campaigns have helped highlight and address this issue. But it has not been easy. A lack of consistent political will and weak implementation of policies have hindered substantial change. Feminist and social justice movements often face resistance from conservative parts of society, making it difficult to change these deeply entrenched cultural norms.

  To combat GBV effectively, we need a comprehensive approach that includes better education, legal reform, economic empowerment and cultural change. Civil society organisations are at the forefront of this fight, actively advocating for stronger laws, better enforcement and increased public awareness. Continued and robust efforts are essential to address this widespread problem and ensure meaningful change.

  Civic space in India is rated ‘repressed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.

  Get in touch with the Indian Medical Association through itswebsite orFacebook page, and follow@IMAIndiaOrg on Twitter.

• IRAQ: ‘We've submitted many bills, but parliament refuses to adopt a law against GBV’

  CIVICUS speaks about International Women’s Day and civil society’s role in combatting gender inequalities and the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on Iraqi women and girls with Alyaa Al Ansari, executive director of Bent Al-Rafedain Organisation (BROB).

  Founded in Iraq’s southern Babylon province in 2005, BROB is a feminist civil society organisation (CSO) that works to ensure the protection of women and children and promotes women’s integration in all spheres of society. Since its foundation, BROB has extended its activities to eight provinces across Iraq. 

  

  How has the COVID-19 pandemic impacted on women and girls in Iraq?

  The pandemic has affected many different groups of Iraqi society, but women and girls have been the most affected of all. Since before the pandemic, Iraqi women were socially compelled to have the biggest share of care responsibilities within their families: they are the main caregivers for children and older people. When a full lockdown was imposed in Iraq for four months, these responsibilities grew even more.

  Additionally, many women were financially affected as the pandemic swept away countless businesses, including hotels, restaurants and shops, because they lost their jobs in the private sector. Without a stable income, their families suffered, particularly when they were the family’s main breadwinner.

  The situation was even worse for female healthcare professionals. Some of them made the tough decision to remain separate from their families for a prolonged period to avoid spreading the virus to their family members. Further, the government did not issue any additional regulations on the working conditions of pregnant medical staff during the pandemic. They too were forced to continue working and risk their lives and those of their unborn children; several of them miscarried.

  Another dramatic effect of the full lockdown was the spike in domestic violence. For four long months, abused women had no way out. They had to continue to live under the same roof with their abusers. There were more femicides and more attempted suicides were reported as some women could not bear the pressure and the violence they were subjected to.

  How has civil society, and BROB in particular, responded to the devastating impacts of the pandemic on women?

  During the pandemic, civil society efforts focused on providing humanitarian aid to affected women and their families. For instance, charity organisations covered essential needs of poor families and helped women who lost their jobs due to the pandemic.

  As for feminist CSOs, some set up online programmes to provide psychological support. Other organisations shifted their face-to-face activities online and took to social media platforms such as Facebook to reach women who had to stay at home for unusually long periods. BROB’s phone number was posted across social media platforms, so women and families who needed urgent help were able to reach us.

  Fortunately, BROB staff were able to continue to work at full capacity during the pandemic. We had freedom of movement once the Iraqi authorities issued permits allowing us to circulate during curfew in the eight provinces where we work. They gave us permission because we were providing essential services to families under lockdown. For instance, our team was distributing food supplies twice a month. 

  We maintained our social and psychological support programme for women but we moved it fully online via mobile and communications apps such as WhatsApp. Remote work is one of the new tactics we adopted during the pandemic. Our staff was creative and developed several new tactics we had never thought of before the pandemic, which allowed us to meet the urgent needs of women and their families.

  Financially, BROB sustained its activities through donations from members as well as from the local community. Moreover, as public health institutions were struggling and the Ministry of Health was overwhelmed, we crowdfunded and sought donations to acquire additional medical equipment for the public health sector. This was a successful campaign that could have the positive side effect of strengthening the relationship between civil society and government institutions in the public health sector.

  What are the main women’s rights issues in Iraq and how is civil society working to make change happen?

  There are many relevant issues, but the one that if adequately tackled would make the most meaningful change in the lives of Iraqi women is that of gender-based violence (GBV). There is an urgent need for a law criminalising domestic violence in Iraq. CSOs have advocated for this for more than a decade. They have submitted several bills, but parliament has so far refused to discuss and adopt a law to protect women, girls and families from violence.

  Given the importance of such legislation in promoting and protecting women’s rights at the national level, we will continue to put pressure on decision-makers through advocacy and campaigns combined with media support.

  It is also key to change current laws that are unequal and unfair to provide women much-needed legal protection. Personal status laws in particular contain articles that discriminate against women in terms of the rights they recognise or don’t recognise, and the obligations and penalties they impose.

  At the very least, Iraq should have laws to guarantee equal access to education, healthcare and public services overall. Such laws will contribute to gender equality as they become an integral part of the Iraqi legislative system. A law criminalising incitement of violence against women in the media and by religious leaders is also very much needed.

  To make change happen, CSOs will continue raising awareness on gender equality, advocating with decision-makers, orchestrating public opinion campaigns, fighting legal battles and fostering leadership capabilities among women and girls. It is mostly up to us, because when it comes to official response, decision-makers do nothing besides issuing positive press releases to capitalise on CSO campaigns. 

  The International Women’s Day (IWD) theme for 2022 is #BreakTheBias. How did you organise around it?

  Most of our projects have always focused on breaking the bias to combat gender inequalities. Every year we plan events on IWD to shed light on an issue that is critical to local communities. In 2019, for instance, we celebrated disabled sportswomen in Babylon province and supported their training programmes.

  As usual, there are plenty of urgent issues this year, but we decided to focus on discrimination in the workplace, in both the private and the public sector. Women deserve safe and fair working conditions everywhere.

  Civic space in Iraq is rated ‘closed’ by the CIVICUS Monitor.
  Get in touch with Bent Al-Rafedain Organisation through its website orFacebook page. 

• JORDAN: ‘Transnational feminist solidarity is vital in the struggle against gender-based violence’

   Content warning: this interview contains references to femicide and violence.

  CIVICUS speaks with Banan Abu Zain Eddin about the widespread anger triggered by recent femicides in Jordan, and more broadly in the Middle East and North Africa, and civil society’s role in the struggle against gender-based violence (GBV).

  Banan is a feminist activist and co-founder and executive director of Takatoat, an independent feminist collective based in Jordan whose work focuses on establishing safe spaces for women and girls and building solidarity to push back against the prevalent patriarchal culture.

  What do recent femicide cases reveal about the scale of the problem of GBV in Jordan and the region?

  We have recently seen a frightening rise in femicides in the region, shockingly carried out in public spaces. In Egypt, Naira Ashraf, a student at Mansoura University, was murdered in broad daylight and in the presence of several bystanders outside the university gates. Shortly after, a Jordanian student, Iman Arsheed, was shot on her university campus in Amman. A few weeks later, another Egyptian university student, Salma Bahgat, was knifed to death by a fellow student. In what seems to be a pattern, the murderer was a man whose marriage proposal she had rejected. The string of tragedies continued in Lebanon, where a young pregnant woman was beaten and burned to death by her husband.

  We are seeing a wave of femicides in the region. We have reached a point at which people are witnessing femicides happen in public and not bothering to interfere. This is leading to femicide being normalised and even turned into a spectacle. A terrible case in this regard took place in 2020, when a woman was murdered by her father who then sat beside her body drinking a cup of tea while people made videos and took photos of the murder scene. The victim had recently been returned to her family after spending time in a women’s detention facility for complaining of her husband’s domestic abuse.

  Women and girls are constantly at risk of being killed just for being female. Women are targeted when they are viewed as challenging those exercising power over women’s bodies and choices. Men get easily offended when women violate the unwritten rule that a man cannot be rejected by a woman. A rejection of a marriage proposal represents a denial of male authority over women.

  This is very scary. Following Iman Arsheed’s murder, many women and girls received death threats. Many were afraid of going to class, and some stopped attending, effectively losing their right to access education. Such crimes reinforce the exclusion of women, taking us backward in a struggle that an older generation of feminists has carried on for decades.

  What roles are Jordanian women’s rights organisations playing in the struggle against GBV?

  We are putting forward demands for national mechanisms for monitoring GBV, reporting cases, protecting victims and holding perpetrators accountable. We emphasise that encouraging women and girls to report abuse should only come after the enactment of protection mechanisms, and that immediate accountability is the main deterrent.

  We also work to counter the normalisation of GBV by focusing on the ethics of media coverage. As much as the murderer should bear full responsibility for his crime, the media should be held accountable for its coverage. Naira Ashraf’s murder provided a blunt example of the terrible normalising effects of media coverage that is sympathetic towards perpetrators rather than victims of GBV. Her murderer’s defence lawyer was given a lot of air space that he used to justify the murder, creating a wave of public sympathy for his client. 

   

  What should the Jordanian government do to curb GBV?

  Women’s rights and safety should be a priority on the government’s agenda. Sadly, this is not the case. State inaction has normalised GBV. The recent femicides didn’t happen out of the blue: a series of events led to them that the state did nothing to stop. The state has so far failed to establish effective protection and reporting mechanisms and encourage women to report violence before it escalates.

  When a woman in Jordan reports a situation of violence, including domestic violence, she is typically blamed. Reporting mechanisms have a major flaw when it comes to abusive family members: victims are sent back home to their abusers once perpetrators sign a pledge to stop the abuse. On top of that, the concept of swift justice for GBV victims simply doesn’t exist.

  Additionally, the limited protection mechanisms that currently exist scare most GBV victims away. Women hosted in safe houses are subjected to a number of rules and regulations that result in them losing their freedom of movement, being under surveillance and losing access to communication devices.

  In short, the current wave of femicides is a direct result of collusion between the government, the media and the judiciary.

  What was the idea behind the call for a regional strike against GBV?

  The regional strike that we held on 6 July was just the start of our cross-border fight against GBV. Transnational feminist solidarity is vital in this struggle. The driving force of our call was sheer anger at the current situation: we will not accept more piecemeal, ineffective solutions for a problem that is systematic and systemic.

  Violence against women is the result of a system that places women in a subordinate position. That’s why the whole range of feminist demands for rights are inseparable. Intersectional feminism believes that protecting women from violence implies not only protecting them from femicide but also closing the gender pay gap and recognising women’s unpaid work, among many other things.

  The strike was quite successful because it proved that if the rise in femicides is a regional phenomenon, feminist organising against it is regional as well.

  Civic space in Jordan is rated ‘repressed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
  Get in touch with Takatoatthrough itswebsite or itsFacebook page, and follow@takatoat on Twitter. 

• KENYA: ‘Protests against femicides encouraged survivors to seek justice’

  CIVICUS speaks with Wangechi Wachira, Executive Director of the Centre for Rights, Education and Awareness (CREAW), about recent protests demanding justice for femicide victims and policy changes to combat gender-based violence (GBV) in Kenya.

  Founded in 1999, CREAW is a national feminist women’s rights civil society organisation (CSO) dedicated to protecting and promoting women’s and girls’ rights and addressing systemic gender inequalities, oppression, exploitation and discrimination.

  Why did protest recently erupt in Kenya?

  On 27 January, thousands of women and men took the streets to protest against femicides. The protests were triggered by 14 cases in January alone, and their primary objective was to demand accountability from state agencies, particularly law enforcement and the judiciary, in prosecuting perpetrators of femicide and ensuring justice for the victims. The case of John Matara, accused of killing Starlet Wahu, highlighted the failures of the legal and judicial systems, because he had been previously reported for GBV multiple times but had remained free.

  Femicide Count reported 48 cases in January and February 2024, compared to 152 cases during 2023, which itself was the highest number in the past five years. Data from Africa Data Hub indicates that over 500 women were killed in acts of femicide from January 2016 to December 2023. It also acknowledges the number is likely much higher, with many killings of women not properly categorised as femicide.

  The protest also aimed to raise awareness about the issue, as many people, including those in public office, do not fully understand the severity of femicide as the most extreme form of GBV. A 2021 report by the United Nations (UN) Office on Drugs and Crime revealed that 56 per cent of all female homicides globally are committed by intimate partners or family members.

  Protesters sought to educate the public on victim-blaming, which empowers perpetrators and deters survivors from reporting abuse. By addressing the victim-blaming and shaming associated with GBV, the protests challenged societal norms and encouraged survivors to seek support and justice.

  What were protesters’ demands to the government?

  We urged the president to issue a declaration recognising GBV and femicides as a national crisis requiring an emergency response. Such a declaration must be accompanied by annual reports provided during the State of the Nation address, outlining measures taken to combat the problem.

  We also urge the government to establish a national public inquiry and official review of events or actions ordered by a government body for all femicide cases to track and ensure accountability.

  Given the lack of integrated official data, we also demand the government improves data collection on femicides and GBV, aligning it with international frameworks. This data is crucial for evidence-based policymaking and effective criminal justice responses.

  Additionally, we call for increased funding for GBV prevention programmes and demand an inclusive appointment process for all public positions, ensuring representation from grassroots feminist organisations and youth groups.

  How big a problem is GBV in Kenya, and what are its root causes?

  GBV is pervasive in Kenya, mirroring global trends. It exists in several forms, including physical, sexual, verbal, emotional and economic abuse. According to the 2022 Kenya Demographic and Health Survey, over 40 per cent of women have experienced physical or sexual violence from an intimate partner at some point in their lives. GBV also manifests in harmful practices such as female genital mutilation and child marriages. Femicides are a frequent occurrence and appear to be on the rise.

  The roots of GBV are found in patriarchal underpinnings of our society, which promote harmful social and cultural practices often reinforced by religious beliefs. Power is concentrated in men’s hands and women have little to none. Such unequal dynamics cannot but foster violence.

  Economic factors such as poverty help perpetuate GBV by pushing women to stay in abusive relationships due to lack of financial independence. They also push families in famine-hit areas to marry off young girls for economic gain, and specifically to be able to acquire livestock in return.

  Conflict, crises and displacement leave women and girls especially vulnerable to violence. A recent example is the COVID-19 pandemic, which saw an 80 per cent increase in intimate partner violence in 2020.

  How does civil society work to address GBV in Kenya?

  Civil society plays key roles in addressing GBV. CREAW specifically has a workstream focused on ending violence against women and girls. Over the years, we have provided free legal aid and psychosocial support to over 20,857 GBV survivors. We are among the few CSOs that offer these services. We collaborate closely with state-sponsored legal aid programmes, such as the National Legal Aid Service, to ensure integrated, efficient and timely GBV service delivery. Our work is enhanced by strategic partnerships with various GBV working groups, Court User Committees, relevant health institutions, parts of criminal justice system and community dispute resolution mechanisms.

  CREAW actively engages with legislators and policymakers at both national and county levels to advocate for the development and implementation of regulatory frameworks on GBV. Our advocacy contributed to the passage of the 2006 Sexual Offences Act, 2013 Matrimonial Property Act, 2014 Marriage Act and the 2015 Protection Against Domestic Violence Act.

  The aim of the Sexual Offences Act is to set out what constitute sexual offences, provide ways to prevent illegal sexual acts and protect all people from them. The Matrimonial Property Act sought to provide clear rules for what belongs in a marriage’s matrimonial estate and provide a legal framework for the ownership, management and distribution of matrimonial property that would apply to all types of unions. This was a monumental achievement because it recognised rights women didn’t previously have, such as owning and buying land.

  The Marriage Act consolidated various laws on marriage, provided procedures for separation and divorce and regulated the custody and maintenance of children in the event of separation or divorce. The Protection Against Domestic Violence Act provides avenues for victims and survivors of violence to report their circumstances to relevant authorities, seek legal redress and receive justice.

  CREAW also supports the county governments of Kilifi and Meru, the Kenya Police Service and the Kenyan judiciary in strengthening their mechanisms for implementing existing GBV laws and policies.

  CREAW’s commitment to supporting survivors extends to financial inclusion. Since 2020, we have implemented a programme, the Jasiri Fund (‘bold’ in Swahili) that provides GBV survivors with quality financial services to mitigate the effects of GBV and enable economic empowerment. To date, the project has supported around 1,000 survivors with a total of US$400,000, leading to the establishment of at least 878 women-owned enterprises. The Jasiri Fund offers complementary support, including access to justice, psychosocial support, shelters, business grants and case management grants, accompanied by financial training and business development support. Its success led to its scaling up to cover more counties and support more survivors.

  We are also part of the National Gender Based Violence working group, coordinated by the National Gender and Equality Commission and the National Women’s Steering Committee, and of the National Council on the Administration of Justice Working Committee on GBV.

  CREAW served as a co-convener of the Kenya Chapter of the Africa Unite campaign against GBV. We are also members of the Solidarity for African Women’s Rights and the Sustainable Development Goals Group. We contribute to various campaigns such as Gender is My Agenda and globally contribute to the Generation Equality Forum commitments.

  ---

  Civic space in Kenya is rated ‘obstructed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.

  Get in touch with CREAW through itswebsite or itsFacebook orInstagram pages, and follow@CREAWKenya and@Wwangechi_leah on Twitter.

• MEXICO: ‘Alliances, public debate & diversification of voices are indispensable in the struggle to expand rights’

  CIVICUS speaks with Verónica Esparza and Rebeca Lorea, respectively lawyer and researcher and Public Policy Advocacy Coordinator at Information Group on Reproductive Choice (GIRE, Grupo de Información en Reproducción Elegida), about the significance of recent Supreme Court rulings on abortion rights, and sexual and reproductive rights in Mexico. GIRE is a feminist and human rights organisation that has been active for almost 30 years to ensure that women and others with the capacity to bear children can exercise their reproductive rights.

   From left to right: Verónica Esparza & Rebeca Lorea
  

  What is the situation of sexual and reproductive rights in Mexico?

  Currently, women and other people with the capacity to bear children do not find optimal conditions in Mexico to decide about their reproductive life: there are a high number of pregnant girls and adolescents, affected by a serious context of sexual violence that the state continues to fail to remedy; obstacles to access services such as emergency contraception and abortion in cases of rape; the criminalisation of women and other pregnant people who have abortions; daily obstetric violence during pregnancy, childbirth and postpartum; and women who die in childbirth from preventable causes.

  The structural failures of the health system are compounded by the fact that the majority of people in Mexico are employed in the informal sector, which limits their access to social security and therefore to benefits such as maternity leave and childcare. Women, who continue to play the biggest role in household and care work, bear the brunt of this lack of access to services, which particularly affects those who experience multiple discriminations, such as girls and adolescents, Indigenous women and people with disabilities.

  What does GIRE understand reproductive justice to mean, and how do you work to advance it?

  GIRE understands reproductive justice as the set of social, political and economic factors that give women and others who can get pregnant power and self-determination over their reproductive life. To achieve this, it is essential for the state to guarantee these people’s human rights, taking into account the discrimination and structural inequalities that affect their health, rights and control over their lives, and for it to generate optimal conditions for autonomous decision-making.

  It is no longer sufficient to understand reproductive rights in terms of legally defined individual freedoms, while ignoring the barriers that limit the effective access of certain populations to these rights. Reproductive justice is a more inclusive analytical framework because it links reproductive rights to the social, political and economic inequalities that affect people’s ability to access reproductive health services and effectively exercise their reproductive rights.

  GIRE has worked for almost 30 years to defend and promote reproductive justice in Mexico, making visible the normative and structural obstacles that women and others with the capacity to bear children face in fully exercising their human rights, and promoting change through a comprehensive strategy that includes legal support, communications, the demand for comprehensive reparation for violations of reproductive rights, including non-repetition guarantees at both the federal and local levels, and the collection of data to feed into our work.

  Our priority issues are contraception, abortion, obstetric violence, maternal death, assisted reproduction and work-life balance. While we focus on sex and gender discrimination faced by women and girls in Mexico, our quest for reproductive justice recognises that these variables intersect with other forms of discrimination, such as class, age, disability and ethnicity. In addition, we recognise that the discrimination faced by women and others with reproductive capacity affects not only them, but also their communities, and particularly their families.

  What is the significance of the two recent Supreme Court rulings on reproductive rights?

  In the struggle for legal, safe and free abortion in Mexico, the National Supreme Court of Justice (SCJN) has played a fundamental role. Since 2007 it has issued several rulings recognising access to abortion as a human rights matter.

  In April 2018, the SCJN granted amparos – constitutional protection lawsuits – to two young female rape victims in cases that GIRE had brought forward. The two women had been denied abortions by public health services in Morelos and Oaxaca despite the fact that this is a right for victims of sexual violence. The Court stated that this denial constituted a violation of the women’s human rights and that health authorities are obliged to respond immediately and efficiently to these requests, so as not to allow the consequences of the rape to continue over time. This implies that health authorities cannot implement internal mechanisms or policies that hinder or delay the realisation of this right. With these rulings, the SCJN reaffirmed the legal obligation of health service providers to guarantee access to abortion in cases of rape.

  On 15 May 2019, in another case promoted by GIRE, the SCJN granted an amparo to a woman who had been denied an abortion despite the fact that continuing her pregnancy could cause her serious health complications. With this ruling, the SCJN recognised that the right to health includes access to abortion and ruled on the particular reproductive health service needs of women, highlighting the serious consequences of denial of termination of pregnancy for health reasons.

  On 7 July 2021, the First Chamber of the SCJN ruled on another case joined by GIRE, of a young woman with cerebral palsy and severe limitations on her ability to carry out tasks essential to daily life, which were aggravated by a precarious economic environment. As a result of a seizure, her family had taken her to a hospital in Chiapas, where they were informed that she was 23 weeks pregnant. The pregnancy had been the result of rape when she was 17 years old. A request was made to terminate the pregnancy, but the hospital director rejected the request on the grounds that the 90-day gestation deadline established by the state penal code had passed. The SCJN pointed out that this time limit ignored the nature of sexual aggression and its consequences on women’s health, and reflected a total disregard for the human dignity and autonomy of a woman whose pregnancy, far from the result of a free and consensual decision, was the result of an arbitrary and violent act.

  Finally, in September 2021, the Plenary of the SCJN analysed two pieces of legislation that had a negative impact on the right to choose by women and others with the capacity to become pregnant. First, it analysed an action of unconstitutionality (148/2017) on the criminal legislation of the state of Coahuila, which the Attorney General’s Office had considered to be in violation of women’s human rights for classifying abortion as a crime.

  In a landmark ruling, on 7 September the SCJN unanimously decided that the absolute criminalisation of abortion is unconstitutional; it became the first constitutional court in the region to issue such ruling. The SCJN pointed out that, although the product of pregnancy deserves protection that increases as the pregnancy progresses, this protection cannot disregard the rights of women and other pregnant persons to reproductive freedom, enshrined in article 4 of the Constitution. In other words, it ruled the absolute criminalisation of abortion to be unconstitutional.

  This ruling had several implications. Firstly, the Congress of the state of Coahuila will have to reform its criminal legislation to decriminalise consensual abortion. Secondly, it establishes a precedent, meaning that the central arguments of the ruling must now be applied by all judges in Mexico, both federal and local. From now on, when deciding future cases, they will have to consider as unconstitutional the criminal laws of all the federal entities that criminalise abortion in an absolute manner. In addition, the congresses of the states where voluntary abortion is still restricted and punished now have a set of criteria endorsed by the SCJN to act to decriminalise it.

  In the same week, the Court also analysed actions of unconstitutionality (106 and 107/2018) on the recognition of the ‘right to life from conception’ established in the Constitution of Sinaloa. These actions had been promoted by a legislative minority and the National Human Rights Commission. Unanimously, the SCJN considered that the states do not have the competence to define the origin of human life and the concepts of personhood and right-holding status, which is the exclusive domain of the National Constitution. Furthermore, it considered that personhood cannot be granted to an embryo or foetus and then be used as the basis for the adoption of measures restricting the reproductive autonomy of women and other pregnant persons; this is unconstitutional.

  Based on precedents set by both the Supreme Court and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, the SCJN established that the main efforts of the state to protect life in gestation as a constitutionally valuable good should be directed towards effectively protecting the rights of women and other pregnant persons, guaranteeing the rights of those continuing pregnancies they desire, providing the necessary conditions for dignified births, without obstetric violence, and eradicating the causes that provoke maternal deaths.

  What are the prospects for achieving legal, safe and free abortion in all of Mexico in the near future?

  In Mexico as in the region, there have been several successes over the past decade in the struggle for access to legal, safe and free abortion, although many barriers and challenges persist.

  In our country strong stigma still prevails around abortion, based on the idea of motherhood as women’s inevitable fate. This idea continues to permeate all state institutions and laws, and forms the basis for not only the social but also the legal criminalisation of abortion, which particularly affects women and other pregnant persons living in situations of violence, economic marginalisation and lack of access to reproductive information. It also sends the strong message that the state plays a role in reproductive decisions that should belong to the private sphere.

  In most of Mexico, as in Latin America, voluntary abortion is still considered a crime. For decades, feminist activists, collectives and organisations have pushed for the repeal of these laws, pointing out that consensual abortion is part of the reproductive life of women and others with the capacity to bear children, and that criminalisation does not inhibit its practice but rather means that in certain contexts it will be carried out in an unsafe manner.

  From the 1970s onwards, Mexican feminists have raised the issue of access to abortion as a matter of social justice and public health and as a democratic aspiration. Despite the forcefulness of their arguments, it took 35 years to achieve – and only in Mexico City – the decriminalisation of abortion during the first trimester of pregnancy. That victory was replicated more than a decade later in three states: Oaxaca, Hidalgo and Veracruz.

  In the short term, achieving decriminalisation at the national level is complicated because each of the 32 federal entities has its own penal code, so it would still be necessary for each state to reform its penal and health legislation to stop considering abortion as a crime and then recognise it as a health service and provide public institutions with the human and financial resources to ensure access.

  In practice, in recent years both the narrative and the reality of abortion in Mexico have changed due to the increasing prevalence of abortion pills. A few decades ago, clandestine abortion – that is, abortion performed outside the law – was considered to be synonymous with unsafe abortion, but this is no longer the case. Now there are safe abortion support networks, and in contexts of legal restriction, during the first weeks of pregnancy women and others with the capacity to gestate are able to have an abortion with pills at home, without the need to resort to a health institution.

  The victory of the Argentinian women’s movement in December 2020 has shown that alliances, public debate and the diversification of voices are indispensable in the struggle to expand rights. The exponential increase in safe abortion initiatives is an expression of the achievements of the women’s movement’s struggle for human rights and reproductive justice. The Green Wave, the movement whose distinctive colour became synonymous with the struggle for abortion rights in Argentina, has spread in Mexico and although access to legal, safe and free abortion throughout the country is still a long way off, in recent years the issue has started to be discussed in various legislative bodies, even in states with highly restrictive legal frameworks.

  What kind of additional support would Mexican civil society need from its peers in the region and globally to achieve its goals?

  Social support for the causes we feminist human rights organisations defend is indispensable to obtain achievements such as the SCJN ruling of 7 September 2021. The dissemination of our work and the amplification of our voices is also extremely valuable. Local, national and regional networking to share experiences and good practices has also proven to be a tool from which we all benefit. Similarly, connections with other struggles through reflecting about their intersections can strengthen human rights movements.

  Civic space in Mexico is rated ‘repressed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
  Get in touch with GIRE through itswebsite orFacebook page, and follow@gire_mx on Twitter. 

• MEXICO: ‘The Supreme Court’s ruling marks a before and after in the struggle for reproductive justice’

  CIVICUS speaks about the recent Supreme Court ruling decriminalising abortion in Mexico with Brenda Rodriguez, communications coordinator of Information Group on Reproductive Choice (GIRE, Grupo de Información en Reproducción Elegida).

  GIRE is a feminist and human rights organisation that has been working for almost 30 years so that women and other people with the capacity to bear children can exercise their reproductive rights.

  What is the current state of abortion rights in Mexico?

  In recent years, Mexico has made rapid progress in making abortion a guaranteed health service for all women and people with the capacity to bear children. Currently, 12 states have partly decriminalised voluntary abortion, but another 20 still consider it a crime.

  Even in states where abortion has been decriminalised access to the procedure for all women and pregnant people is not guaranteed. Barriers to access are a constant.

  So there is still a long way to go. Among the many pending issues is the need to stop considering abortion a crime and, instead, to include it in health and public policy regulations to ensure information is provided and guidelines are published guaranteeing comprehensive, safe and quality care.

  Why is the recent Supreme Court ruling important?

  The ruling issued by the Supreme Court on 6 September was a landmark achievement. This ruling decriminalised abortion at the federal level, forcing the Congress of the Union to repeal the articles of the Federal Penal Code that criminalise abortion. As a result, institutions that are part of the federal health system, such as the Mexican Institute of Social Security and the Institute of Security and Social Services for State Workers, will have to provide this service throughout Mexico to anyone requesting it.

  This will have a major impact because these institutions serve the majority of the Mexican population, and a trend long observed by GIRE is that these institutions deny service under the argument that abortion is a crime under the Federal Criminal Code, the legislation that applies to the health personnel serving in them.

  The Congress’s obligation to repeal the crime of abortion at the federal level will become effective once it receives formal notification from the Court, and must be implemented in the course of that same session.

  Do you see this court ruling as a victory of the Mexican women’s movement?

  The recent Court ruling marks a before and after in the struggle for reproductive justice, and it would not have been possible without the tireless commitment of feminist movements at local, national, regional and global levels, of which GIRE is a part.

  The cultural change driven by the feminist movement throughout the Latin American region has been key to advances in pro-choice regulation and social decriminalisation and access to abortion as a health service.

  GIRE has worked for the right to choose for over 30 years, during which time it has worked hand in hand with decision-makers, the media, public opinion and many organisations and collectives. The road travelled has resulted in a strong network on all fronts that has socially decriminalised abortion on the basis of the recognition of reproductive autonomy as a right.

  Our work has been comprehensive. We have produced reports on the state of abortion rights in Mexico and made specific recommendations to ensure that access is guaranteed as a health service. We have carried out public policy advocacy and supported cases challenging human rights violations caused by the denial of the right to abortion. Our communications work has also been key, helping us place the issue of abortion on the public agenda, contributing to its social decriminalisation.

  The strategy to repeal the crime of abortion at the federal level kicked off two years ago. In September 2021, in response to an action of unconstitutionality against the penal code of the state of Coahuila, the Federal Supreme Court unanimously declared that the absolute criminalisation of consensual abortion is unconstitutional. In September 2022, based on this precedent and as part of a legal strategy to eliminate the crime of self-procured and consensual abortion from all criminal codes, GIRE filed an appeal for legal protection against the Federal Congress and executive for having issued a regulation that criminalised consensual abortion.

  It was in response to this amparo appeal – a writ for protection of rights – that the Court reiterated that the absolute criminalisation of abortion violates the human rights of women and pregnant people.

  Have you experienced an anti-rights reaction?

  There are conservative reactions and resistances all the time, but unlike what used to happen until a few years ago, these are no longer so up-front. The most important barrier we face today is the absence of service guarantees, as in some states where voluntary abortion has been partly decriminalised those who would have to provide it continue to put up obstacles. Conservative resistance is even more intense in the 20 state congresses that have yet not reformed their penal codes, but we are confident this will change.

  Although there are never guarantees that backsliding won’t occur, we currently have the advantage of a very pro-choice public opinion.

  What measures need to be taken to ensure effective access to abortion throughout Mexico?

  From a human rights perspective, it is necessary to guarantee access to quality health services, including abortion procedures. For this to become a reality, abortion should no longer be included in criminal codes and should instead only be subject to health and public policy regulations that ensure that information is provided and guidelines published that ensure comprehensive, safe and quality care. GIRE will continue to work to ensure that the crime of abortion disappears from all of Mexico’s state penal codes and access to the service is guaranteed in practice for all people throughout Mexico.

  Is the Mexican process part of a broader regional trend?

  The green tide that rose in Argentina in 2018 permeated the entire region with a force never seen before. Latin American streets have been filled with green scarves – a symbol of autonomy and freedom – and pro-choice slogans. GIRE is a prominent member of this Latin American movement, establishing alliances, creating strategies and new narratives, and sharing knowledge with organisations working throughout the region to make abortion rights a reality.

  This inspiration will continue to guide us. Our movement is unstoppable. In Mexico, the green tide and its libertarian impulse is materialising in the demand, put forward in coordination with other groups and movements, for reproductive rights to cease to be considered an issue that only concerns women and child-bearing people and to be incorporated into the political agenda as a key element of equality.

  ---

  Civic space in Mexico is rated ‘repressed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.

  Get in touch with GIRE through itswebsite orFacebook page, and follow@gire_mx on Twitter.

• NICARAGUA: ‘The regime seeks to annihilate all forms of autonomous citizen organisation’

  CIVICUS speaks with María Teresa Blandón, a Nicaraguan human rights defender and director of Feminist Programme La Corriente, a civil society organisation (CSO) whose legal status was recently cancelled by the authoritarian regime led by President Daniel Ortega and Vice President Rosario Murillo.

  

  What is the reason for the current wave of intensified in repression in Nicaragua?

  Repression increased on the eve of the fraudulent 2021 elections, when the state specifically targeted the leaders of the main opposition groups who had been building alliances to participate in the elections, because even though they knew that conditions were extremely adverse, they insisted that this was the way out of the crisis.

  From January 2022 onwards, the Ortega-Murillo regime further escalated its offensive, possibly due to a failure in its political calculations: it had thought that once the electoral fraud had been consummated and the opposition was thrown in jail, the opposition would abdicate its role and the regime would obtain the endorsement of the international community.

  But neither of these things happened: the opposition did not resign itself and there was no international support; on the contrary, the regime’s isolation only deepened. The Nicaraguan opposition continued to constantly denounce the establishment of a de facto police state and to call for the regime’s exit through civic means. The CSOs that managed to remain in the country continued to denounce systematic human rights violations and repression, hence the approval of new laws to strip them of their legal status and assets.

  Faced with a lack of legitimacy, the Ortega-Murillo regime has deepened its strategy of annihilating any form of citizen organisation that is not subordinate to its interests. To date, more than 1,600 CSOs have been eliminated by the National Assembly and in many cases their assets have been confiscated through the application of laws that openly violate our country’s constitution, which recognises the right to free association and expressly prohibits confiscation.

  Until very recently, the power to cancel an organisation’s legal personality was in the hands of the National Assembly, but a new law assigned it to the Ministry of the Interior, which now has the absolute power to decide who has the right to associate and who does not. The procedure has been expedited and there is no recourse to appeal, which clearly speaks of the situation of defencelessness Nicaraguan civil society finds itself in.

  The judiciary has remained silent in the face of the unconstitutionality appeals filed in 2021, following the approval of the Law on Foreign Agents, which obliges CSOs that receive funds from international cooperation sources to report their activities at a level of detail that makes it practically impossible for them to operate.

  This way, the regime eliminates all forms of autonomous participation, leaves activists and human rights defenders in a more precarious situation, and obtains the resources it needs to feed the clientelist practices that are its trademark.

  One of the problems faced by the regime is precisely its lack of resources to sustain the community development projects carried out by many of the eliminated CSOs. It can no longer count on support from Venezuela, nor can it continue to expand the family businesses that the Ortega-Murillo clan has built while in power. Many of these companies have been sanctioned, including the one that monopolises the fuel business, which has forced them to carry out various manoeuvres to keep them active.

  What work does your organisation do?

  Feminist Programme La Corriente has existed for almost 30 years and was born with the aim of contributing to generating critical thought and encouraging new forms of participation by women in Central America. Over the last 15 years we have expanded our work with young people and sexual and gender dissident collectives.

  Throughout our journey, we have contributed to challenging heterosexism, misogyny and macho violence and built vital networks for the defence of rights. We have prioritised issues related to the prevention of violence, voluntary motherhood, women’s right to decide about their bodies and respect for sexual and gender diversity.

  Efforts to research the reality experienced by women, young people and dissident bodies have been key to the development of training and public communication programmes. For us it is of vital importance to strengthen collective action through social movements capable of thinking and acting on the changes required by Nicaraguan society. We are also part of Central American and Latin American networks and alliances, from where we contribute to advocacy processes with governments and global institutions.

  Precisely because we generate critical thought and defend rights, in May this year the National Assembly cancelled our legal status and in early July the police took over our facilities.

   

  On what grounds was the organisation ordered to shut down?

  Generally speaking, the arguments put forward by the Sandinista deputies who control parliament include an unfounded accusation that CSOs are potential money launderers because they receive funding from foreign sources, deliberately ignoring the fact that these sources are linked to governments and duly established cooperation agencies.

  They also cite alleged bureaucratic infractions such as the expiry of the term of the board of directors, failure to update statutes and refusal to provide information requested by the Ministry of the Interior. On the latter point, it is worth highlighting the abusive ministry’s intervention: in accordance with the new law, it requires CSOs to submit detailed information on each activity to be carried out and personal data of the people with whom they work.

  Such demands denaturalise the meaning of CSOs, turning them into an extension of the state, clear evidence of the totalitarian zeal of this regime. It is clearly an attempt to impose a model of absolute control that requires the dismantling of all forms of autonomous civil society participation.

  Likewise, by shutting down CSOs that work with low-income groups of the population, the regime is trying to regain control of what it thinks of as its social base, which it seeks to recover or retain by means of clientelist policies. This is why it has eliminated organisations that promote access to education for low-income children and young people, fulfil the needs of people with disabilities, promote access to land and other resources for rural and Indigenous women and provide sexual and reproductive health services and support for women who are victims of violence, among others. 

  CSOs that work in the field of citizen participation from a rights-based perspective and with a clear focus on the defence of democratic values have also been closed. They have been declared opponents of the regime and their representatives have been subjected to surveillance, threats, exile and imprisonment. It is also a kind of revenge for generating evidence that contradicts the official discourse and denouncing the systematic violation of rights by the Sandinista regime.

  Why has the regime specifically targeted feminist organisations?

  Hostility against Nicaraguan feminists dates back to the 1980s. The Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN), as a guerrilla force turned into party that came to power, never really reflected on the patriarchal logics of power, but simply replicated them unceremoniously.

  The feminists of my generation had to endure an authoritarian and abusive relationship with the Sandinista government, which at different times expressed discomfort with the existence of women’s organisations, because from their perspective this weakened the unity of revolutionary forces.

  They exercised their veto power to prevent women’s collectives from placing demands related to macho violence and sexual and reproductive rights on the public agenda. The leaders of these collectives were silenced and forced to take on the priorities set by the ruling party leadership.

  The watershed that marked the feminist movement’s definitive break with the FSLN occurred in the late 1990s, when Zoilamérica Narváez, daughter of Rosario Murillo, who is both Daniel Ortega’s wife and Vice President, denounced the abuses committed by her stepfather for more than 20 years. When feminists clearly stood on the victim’s side it meant a break with the FSLN leadership, which has since perceived us as enemies. Zoilamérica’s denunciation encouraged further accusations involving other members of the FSLN national leadership, including the late Tomás Borge.

  Additionally, during the 2005-2006 electoral campaign, part of the feminist movement participated in an electoral alliance of opposition parties that included the Sandinista Renovation Movement, now UNAMOS, which the FSLN considers traitors to the revolution for having demanded democratisation of the party and questioned Ortega’s authoritarian and strongman leadership.

  As he returned to power in 2007, it immediately became clear that Ortega’s strategy was to dismantle feminist networks, which by that point had increased their capacity to put forward ideas and influence Nicaraguan society. The stigmatisation campaign began with a speech by Murillo in which she accused feminists of trafficking in women’s suffering and of wanting to impose a way of life alien to Nicaraguan culture. That same year, the government began to pressure international aid agencies to suspend their support for feminist collectives, causing many of them to leave the country.

  Among the main strands of the Ortega-Murillo regime’s discourse was its supposed commitment to gender equality: they proclaimed as a key advance the achievement of gender parity in all branches of government. This idea was taken up by United Nations (UN) bodies and multilateral financial institutions, but feminists provided clear evidence confirming the persistence of inequalities and the absence of public policies to address women’s demands.

  The absolute criminalisation of abortion, the absence of policies to prevent and punish macho violence, including sexual abuse against girls and adolescents, which is prevalent in Nicaragua, the absence of sex education, the failure to comply with the law that established the creation of a fund to distribute land to rural women and the violation of the labour rights of workers in foreign factories are among the many problems that remain unresolved by a regime that dares to compare itself with the countries that have made the most progress in terms of gender equality in the world.

  What should donors, and the international community in general, do to help Nicaraguan civil society?

  In such turbulent times and with so many hotspots of tension in the world, it is hard to appeal for solidarity with Nicaraguan society, which continues to bet on civic and peaceful change to move away from this new dictatorship and lay the foundations for the country’s democratisation.

  However, we must continue to appeal to democratic governments, regardless of their ideology, so they do not look away from what is happening in Nicaragua and support our just demands for the immediate release of political prisoners, the suspension of the police state, an end to the persecution of CSOs and the Catholic Church and the full restoration of our rights.

  We call for a coherent position on the part of democratic governments, UN agencies, multilateral financial institutions, regional integration blocs and political party forums to avoid any action that could contribute to prolonging the stay of the Ortega-Murillo dictatorship in power.

  At this point it is inadmissible that they denounce the regime’s systematic human rights violations, including the commission of crimes against humanity, while at the same time voting in favour of granting loans to the very same regime, which in addition to increasing a debt that is already greater than the country’s GDP gives it greater room for manoeuvre to remain in power.

  Active support for human rights defenders, independent journalists and CSOs is vital to sustain hope for democratic change that does not impose further suffering on the Nicaraguan people.

  Civic space in Nicaragua is rated ‘closed’ by theCIVICUS Monitor.
  Get in touch with La Corriente through itswebsite or itsFacebook page, and follow@LaCorrienteNica on Twitter.