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Press Update 1 re Global Women’s Strike – Friday 8 March 2002 WOMEN SAY "INVEST IN CARING NOT KILLING" We are striking FOR a world which values all women’s work & every life and to END "America’s new war" and all wars International Women’s Day, 8 March 2002 will celebrate the third Global Women’s Strike (GWS). For up-to-the minute online news in English and Spanish, plus leaflets in 18 languages, visit http://womenstrike8m.server101.com. Also available: 40-second Webcast and 27-minute video of Strike 2001 on VHS (English, Spanish subtitles). Never before so much wealth – yet so many of us with so little. The Global Women’s Strike is women’s answer to globalisation and militarisation which prioritise the production of things over caring for people, and therefore threaten our lives and the planet. Women demand a total change of social and economic priorities for women and therefore for men: · Payment for all caring work – in wages, pensions, land and other resources · pay equity internationally·paid maternity leave, breastfeeding breaks and other benefits · don’t pay ‘Third World debt’· accessible clean water, healthcare, housing, transport, literacy and information · non-polluting energy and technology to shorten our hours and burden of work; · protection and asylum from all violence & persecution · freedom of movement.
ARGENTINA: The Sindicato de Amas de Casa (Housewives Union) in Santa Fe is holding daily women’s assemblies in the poorest neighbourhoods as part of the popular uprising. Co-ordinating GWS actions, "The Sweep" will press their demands to deal with the Argentinian crisis. IRELAND: Women in Media & Entertainment holding a 10-hour vigil outside a church in Galway to exchange music, poetry, other "creative contributions". GUYANA: Red Thread multi-racial women’s group holding a ‘Cacerolazo’ (pots & pans protest) in Linden bringing together Indigenous, Indo and Afro-Guyanese women calling for an end to exorbitant prices for electricity, phones and water, and for affordable land and housing materials for single mothers. NEW ZEALAND: Auckland International Women’s Day Group holding a "Value Women’s Work" rally and march, demanding equal pay, support for National Caregivers Day, free childcare, support for nurses and against the oppressive conditions conditions of immigrants and refugees. PERU: Aymara Centre ‘Pacha Aru’ co-ordinating activities in Aymara and Quechua communities in the Andes; working closely with the Domestic Workers Centre which is pulling together a network of grassroots women’s groups and trade unions in Lima and the rest of the country. SPAIN: WFH Campaign co-ordinating national events, including "occupation" by women of Barcelona’s main Plaza San Jaime, demanding welfare benefits for all women, including immigrants; several branches of National Union Confederacion General del Trabajo (CGT) supporting Strike actions; Basque country feminist collective calling a one-hour stoppage. UNITED STATES: events in San Francisco, Philadelphia, New York, New Jersey, Boston, Los Angeles, Wisconsin – opposing war-mongering and corporate thievery, and ending welfare "reform" which is cutting mothers’ money, forcing them to take any job anywhere at any wage. Central event in London: Invest in Caring Not Killing:
Whistle-Stop Tour and "Cacerolazo" Giant puppet, drummers, dancing and chanting. Bring your brooms, pots and pans to bang. Wheelchair users, kids, cyclists . . . All welcome Assemble: 12noon, Shell Centre, York Rd, WaterlooStarting: 12.30pm; then to Ministry of Defence - women of different faiths will bear witness; Institute of Directors; Ending: 3pm, World Bank, Haymarket, Piccadilly Women mental health system survivors protest outside a psychiatric hospital based near Shell. Other countries participating so far: Support from men Publicity materials: Also available: Mugs, badges and T-shirts For more information about events elsewhere in UK and internationally: |