Accent of Women

Today’s show is about the heroic struggle of the Anganwadi women workers in India. The Anganwadi are pre and post natal workers – the equivalent of Australia’s midwives, early maternal healthcare nurses and early natal healthcare workers. Since the 70s, these workers have been asked to work as volunteers, and in 2017, they fought and won a long hard battle for recognition as workers. Now, 5 years later, they are fighting for increased wages and conditions.Jiselle Hanna had the opportunity to interview the President of this workers union is Shivani Kaur, and the only place I could get her was directly on the picketline. The internet connection is not great and there is a lot of background noise. But the story is too important not to broadcast and I ask listeners to persist through the quality in order to hear this important story.

On today’s program of Accent of Woemn, we hear from Iranian women about their challenges with the COVID pandemic and the shadow pandemic (gender-based violence). Today’s panelists are: Sudi Farokhnia – a women’s rights activist and community organiser for more than 20 years, and she is one of the co founders of iranian circle of women’s intercultural network.Sona Kazemi – a research fellow of Migration Studies, Disability Studies, and Medical Humanities at the Ohio State University. 

Tensions over the Ukraine-Russia crisis have been simmering for more than two months, with diplomatic efforts to resolve the issue showing little sign of progress.Russia has more than 100,000 troops on its border with Ukraine, sparking Western warnings of an imminent invasion.Anti-war activists across Europe are organising and strategising to resist the war, and a coalition of these activists organised a public meeting on 25 January – and it’s a broadcast of this panel that I bring you today on Accent of Women. The two organisations involved in this panel are European alternatives and Another Europe is possible. The panel host is Alena Ivanova, and the guests are Oleksandra Matviychuk, Yuliya Yurchenko and Mary Kaldor.

The Sri Lankan government celebrated the 74th anniversary of the country’s independence from the British empire on 4 February. But for Tamil speaking people on the island, 4 February 1948 marks the day one oppressor handed power to another. It is Tamil Oppression Day. From that day onward, local politicians promoting Sinhala-Buddhist chauvinism co-opted the ruthlessness of colonial rule, leading to many pogroms and other heinous acts to be committed against Tamil and other minority communities. The violence has never ceased. 

What are the prospects for democracy in a country whose economy is in freefall, where millions face poverty and food insecurity, and where violence is increasing at an alarming rate? On today’s program we’ll discuss the coup in Myanmar, one year on.Today’s guest is Debbie Stothard, the founder of the Alternative ASEAN Network on Burma – she is based in Bangkok, and has worked on Burma solidarity activism for decades.

Tonga is facing an unprecedented disaster from the massive volcanic eruption that occurred on Saturday January. It covered the Pacific nation in ash, triggered a 15-metre tsunami that destroyed almost all homes on two small islands and damaged undersea communications cables, largely cutting off the country. The Tongan people are in an urgent process of recovery and clean up, and to tell us what is happening there, I had the opportunity to speak with two community organisers.

Today is our first show for 2022, and it’s with heavy hearts that we farewell a friend and supporter of this show, a staunch Gooniyandi Woman, Viv Malo. Today’s show is dedicated to Viv, and features her voice on 3CR and at rallies and demonstrations around this country. But first, a bit about Viv.

On today’s program, we look at women climate warriors across the world, and the work that they are doing in relation to fighting against the tide of environmental destruction, for the survival of the planet.

In the last week, the Federal Court has heard a case for the extradition of a Sydney nanny back to Chile to face charges of Crimes Against Humanity during the Pinochet dictatorship of 1973 to 1990. Adtriana Rivas is accused of kidnapping seven communists during the Pinochet era, and is implicated in their torture and murder. Rivas was a part of the infamous Chile National Intelligence Directorate, abbreviated to DINA.On today’s program, Pilar Aguilera co-founder of National Campaign for Truth and Justice in Chile, Australia. 

Today on Accent of Women we turn our focus to Sudan. On October 25, the Sudanese military carried out a coup, announcing the dissolution of the power-sharing Sovereignty Council and the transitional government. It arrested Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok and declared a state of emergency. Since that time, there have been massive street protests, in fact, it is a revolutionary situation on ground there. There’s been a media and internet black out for almost three weeks, making it very difficult to obtain information, and convey to the protesters all of the support there is for their struggle.

Today on Accent of Women we turn our focus to the Philippines.  The current President, Rodrigo Duterte is facing charges by the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity.  These charges arise from Duterte’s War on Drugs that has seen over 20,000 people extrajudicially murdered in the streets.  There’s an ever growing COVID crisis, spiralling the existing economic crisis out of control.  And the country goes to a Presidential election in May 2022.  President Duterte is constitutionally preventing from running for an additional term, but they may not stop him.

In response to the massive Israeli military assault on Gaza in May, Palestinian workers organised a general strike that swept across the West Bank, Israel and Gaza. In solidarity, thousands of workers worldwide joined in a “Block the Boat” campaign that prevented Israeli ships from docking in a number of international ports.  These recent events pose the question for solidarity activists – How do we win in Palestine? And this was the very topic of a public meeting held by Australia Asia Worker Links on the 9 October.

On today’s program, we look at the worsening humanitarian crisis and civil war in Myanmar. Since the military coup against Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy party in February 2021, there have been 5042 attacks that either targeted civilians or causued harm to them. The COVID pandemic is out of control with thousands of people dying everyday, and the exact amount of COVID being impossible to ascertain. Today's guest is Debbie Stothard from the Alternative ASEAN Network on Burma.

On 6 September, 6 Palestinian prisoners escaped from the heavily fortified Gilboa prison in Israel, sparking a wide scale man hunt and eventual capture of these political prisoners. Despite their eventual capture and torture by Israeli authorities, the event has been called The Great Escape across the world, Israel has been left humiliated by its lax security, and Palestinians have become emboldened.I interviewed Palestinian socialist and educator, Reem Yunis on Monday 20 September, one day after the final pair were captured and re-imprisoned.

Amidst South Koreas fourth wave of COVID, spurred on by the Delta variant, the Korean workers have upped their industrial action in opposition to the level of overwork in some industries, but the Government’s desire that people bear the personal cost of the pandemic. Koreans are opposing the social distancing measures, and say that COVID has highlighted the inadequacies of the public health system. While unions have increased their industrial action, forcing the government to the bargaining table, the government has also increased its repression and suppression of Freedom of association laws. On 2 September, 4000 police officers raided the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions building to arrest the President, Yang Kyeung-soo. The union movement is not deterred by this and continues its militant action. On today’s program, to talk about the situation in Korea, is Mikyung Ryu – the International Director of the Korean Confederation of Trade Unions.

The Texas state law, passed last May, imposes the so-called “fetal heartbeat” rule adopted by half a dozen states previously, which effectively prohibits abortion after about six weeks of pregnancy—before most women even know they have become pregnant. From 1 September, this law takes effect. It creates criminal penalties against health professionals, as well as allowing any citizen in the country, completely unrelated to the case, to bring an action against health professionals.  My two guests are Rachel Mehendale and Tasnim Lat, two doctors in Texas.  I want to emphasise that the views that my guests express on today’s program are theirs alone, and not that of their employer. 

Malaysia's new Prime Minister, Ismail Sabri Yaakob, was sworn in on Saturday 21 August, after the resignation of the former Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin, and his entire cabinet, less than 18 months in office. The resignation came amidst infighting in Yassin’s coalition cost him majority support. But Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yaakob faces an uphill task in uniting a polarised society and reviving a slumping economy and a worsening pandemic. Malaysia has one of the highest COVID-19 infection rates and deaths per capita. Today's guest is Irene Xavier from the Labour Law Reform Coalition.  

On Tuesday 17 August, the Taliban seized power in Afghanistan two weeks before the U.S. was set to complete its troop withdrawal after a costly two-decade war. Since then, we have seen footage of desperate Afghanis trying to flee that country, amidst threats of death by the Taliban. To help us analyse the collapse of Afghanistan, we talk to Farkhondeh Akbari, a human rights activist and researcher who has investigated human rights violation by armed parties in Afghanistan, and currently based at the Australian National University.

76 years ago, on the 6th and 9th of August, the USA military dropped atomic bombs on the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The two bombings killed around 175,000 people with another 90,000 dying by the end of the year due to radiation injuries.Some 5 years after these bombings, a global anti-nuclear armaments campaign emerged and in 2007, the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) was founded. In 2017, they won the Nobel Prize for peace, for their work towards global nuclear disarmament. One of the people that accepted the award was a woman named Setsuko Thurlow – a survivor of the bombing in Hiroshima. In 2019 she gave a speech at Harvard Law School.

This is our concluding episode - Budour Hassan is Palestinian socialist feminist and journalist and a legal researcher for the Jerusalem Center for Legal Aid and Human Rights. She talks about the latest Israeli assault on Palestinians, the role of women in the Palestinian resistance, the feminist movement against gender violence, solidarity with women prisoners, Abolitionist Feminism, and the needed regional and global socialist feminist solidarity. She is interviewed by Accent of Women supporter, Frieda Afray.