Iraqi women's plight is far from over

Louise Nousratpour
Friday March 13, 2009
The Morning Star

IRAQI Women's League guest speaker Shatha Besarani rejected the occupation forces' claim that her country was on the road to democracy.

Ms Besarani told the TUC women's conference in Scarborough on Friday that the Iraq puppet regime was engaged in a "hostile" war against the trade union movement, vandalising its premises, freezing its bank accounts and physically assaulting union leaders.

Arguing that "no true democracy can exist without a free labour movement," she reported that the Iraqi Teachers Union - a well-organised union which has secured significant pay increases in recent years through strike action - had been forced to hand over the keys to its headquarters along with membership and other records.

"This brutal pattern, however, was established by Paul Bremer - the US overlord responsible for setting up the Occupation Authority in 2003," she declared.

"He threw out most of Saddam's legal codes but kept the 1987 law that makes it illegal for public-sector workers to organise in a union."

Ms Besarani said that the situation for women was no better.

She pointed to a recent report by humanitarian charity Oxfam, which warned that the situation has worsened for women since the 2003 US-led invasion.

Last month, Iraq's minister for women resigned in protest at the lack of resources and accused the government of not making women's needs a priority.

"All Iraqis have suffered, but women face the additional danger of being sidelined in a male-dominated society - only 17 per cent of the workforce are women, compared to 83 per cent men," she noted.

"Iraqi women are trapped in a downward spiral of poverty, desperation and gender-specific violence. Oxfam described their plight as a 'silent emergency'."

Despite the ongoing war and occupation, which has ravaged the country, killed over one million and made millions more refugees, Ms Besarani was optimistic about the future.

"The results of the last election in January indicated a rejection of religious sectarianism in favour of national unity," she told delegates.

Ms Besarani stressed the importance of international solidarity to help Iraqi women and trade unionists in their struggle for "free trade unions and an independent Iraq."

She urged delegates to continue to give political and practical support to Iraqi people, including writing letters of protest to the Maliki government and US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to highlight the issues.