Activists unite on Women’s Day

CAMPAIGNERS for gender equality took to European city streets on Friday to mark International Women’s Day with celebrations and protests, while in Turkey the police fired tear gas to break up a crowd of several thousand women in Istanbul in the evening.

In Spain, hundreds of thousands of women, wearing purple and raising their fists, took to the streets calling for greater gender equality.

The issue has become deeply divisive in Spain ahead of a national election on April 28. A new far-right party, Vox, has called for a 2004 law on domestic violence against women to be scrapped, and stands to win dozens of seats, opinion polls show.

In Berlin, city authorities declared the day a formal holiday and thousands joined a demonstration at the German capital’s Alexanderplatz.

In Paris, demonstrators from Amnesty International waved placards outside the Saudi Arabian embassy that read “Honk for women’s rights”, and called for the release of jailed women activists, including some campaigners for the right to drive in the deeply conservative kingdom.

In Athens and Kiev, women protesters demanded equality and an end to violence against women.

In Istanbul, Turkey’s largest city, hundreds called for the release of Syrian women in jail. But in the evening, Turkish police fired tear gas to break up a crowd gathered for a march, witnesses said. It was not clear if anyone was hurt or if people were detained.

Turkish police regularly block protests in central Istanbul and elsewhere.

Ankara tightened restrictions after the imposition of emergency rule following an attempted coup in 2016. The state of emergency was lifted last July.

Sudan’s President Omar al-bashir on Friday ordered the release of all women arrested in connection with anti-government demonstrations, hours after protesters marched in the two largest cities. |