Kurds rally with Armenians to commemorate genocide

By Ava Homa 

Kurds rally with Armenians to commemorate genocide

Kurdistan24 - Washington 7 hours ago 0 comments 136 visit

Kurds were present among the protestors, including Ezidis from Phoenix, and non-Kurd members of the Rojava Solidarity Committee Los Angeles, holding signs to declare solidarity with Armenians.

Tag : Armenian Genocide Kurdish Solidarity 2016 Rally for Justice Los Angeles Kurdish National Congress Turkish Consulate

LOS ANGELES, United States (Kurdistan24) – On Sunday, an estimated 60,000 protestors rallied before the Turkish Consulate in Los Angeles to commemorate the 100+1 anniversary of the Armenian genocide.
Kurds were present among the protestors, including Ezidis from Phoenix, and non-Kurd members of the Rojava Solidarity Committee Los Angeles, holding signs to declare solidarity with Armenians.
The Kurdish American Education Society, Kurdish Community of Southern California, Kurdish Human Rights Advocacy Group and Kurdish National Congress of North America joined the Armenian Genocide Committee to support the 2016 Rally for Justice.
Armenians perceive the killing of a million and a half by Ottomans as an act of genocide. Turkey says half a million Armenians died when they rebelled against their rulers after World War I.
Kurdish political groups and NGOs have apologized for the fact that throughout the Kurdish-populated regions, some Kurds participated in the genocide of the Armenians. However, other Kurds opposed the genocide, and in some cases even helped hide or adopted Armenian refugees.
Southern California has the largest Armenian community outside of Armenia. According to US census data, over 200,000 people of Armenian descent live in Los Angeles.
Vazgen Barsegian, an Armenian activist, told Kurdistan24, “It was very emotional for me seeing my fellow Kurdish brothers and sisters sincerely joining our struggle and demanding justice. I grew up in Van with Kurdish people, so seeing my fellow Kurdish brothers and sisters marching by my side meant a lot to me.”
A Kurdish activist, Cklara Moradian, told Kurdistan24, “Building connections between our communities [Armenian & Kurdish] is crucial, not just because we share such intertwined histories of survival, but so that moving forward we can raise our voices in unison against the atrocities being committed by Turkey today.”
Moradian added that Kurds’ presence “was about showing up, visibly, to give our support. In the future, we hope to collaborate on more movement building, social and political. I deeply believe that we can more effectively fight for the recognition of each of our unique individual struggles when we rise in solidarity with each other.”

One of the organizers of the rally, Mikael Matossian, said, “The truth is clear: the Armenian Genocide is not a solely Armenian issue, but a human one. The oppression felt by our ancestors in 1915 mirrors the experiences of other ethnic minorities who also have weathered imperialism, colonialism, and genocide."
“The repressive tactics of the Ottoman Empire have carried on into the modern Republic of Turkey, targeted toward Kurds and Armenians there. Motivated by this shared struggle against a common enemy, Kurdish and Armenian activists united today to call on the Turkish government to end its currently racist and xenophobic-motivated policies, and deliver justice to the Armenian people in the form of recognition and reparations," he added.
Soraya Fallah, Kurdish Human rights activist, says atrocities that happened 100 years ago are continuing today. "During the Ottoman Empire, Armenians were killed, years later Kurds were killed and today in the 21st century still Kurds are killed and massacred in Erdogan’s self-declared empire,” she stated.
"If there is no recognition, establishment, and mechanism of prevention, genocide will repeat and continue; the way we still see it today," Fallah continued.
She added that the rally was very powerful. “It is amazing to see a nation transforming their mourning to the power of a movement for justice and unity and endowing their identity to their children and new generation!” Fallah declared.
Solin Rojihalat, one of the organizers of the contingent told Kurdistan24, “I had the pleasure to simply witness a person with Greek and Armenian flags dancing to the Armenian 'Hay Qajer;' the Kurdish 'Lo Berde' of the same melody. A few Armenians took pictures with some of our friends in the Kurdish contingent.”
“We want to find each other. Whether we’re planets that orbit the same sun or we’re simply earnest people with a desire to know one another, we catch sight of one another and know that we're here together," Rojihalat said.
In a statement to mark Armenian Remembrance Day on April 24, President of the United States Barack Obama called the massacre the first mass atrocity of the 20th century and tragedy that must not be repeated. But he refused to use the word "genocide," a term he used before becoming president in 2009.

Reporting by Ava Homa
Editing by Karzan Sulaivany

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Happy International Women's day 2016

Beauty: duty and crime for Iranian women

 an article by Ava Homa for International women day

Young fashion in Iran. (Flickr/Stefanie Eisenschenk)

Tag : InternationalWomenDay2016 Iranianwomen beauty plasticSurgery Patriarchy

International Women’s Day offers another opportunity to recognize "the social, economic, cultural and political achievement of women." The media often portrays two contradictory images of Iranian women. The first is that of the oppressed woman, stoned and silenced—like Sakineh Ashtiani, who was convicted of adultery and sentenced to death by stoning in 2009. The other extreme is a less familiar image, that of the empowered woman, educated and strong—like Shirin Ebadi, the Iranian lawyer and human rights activist who received the Nobel Peace Prize in 2003.
Like all stereotypes, neither of these images accurately depicts women in Iran today. The majority of the women in this country live somewhere between these two extremes. That is, most women in Iran are neither subjected to stoning nor are they empowered through education.
According to recent statistics, Iranian women have taken up education in droves. However, despite the fact that 65 percent of university graduates in the country are females, most positions available to them are secretarial. And women who manage to find higher-paying jobs in Iran are pressured to quit after marriage. So, with few protections against harassment and discrimination, Iranian women are dependent on male family members and vulnerable to exploitation and violence.
Instead of stones thrown at women as punishment, acid is being thrown at women today to “keep them in their place.” In October, across the populous and religious city of Isfahan, 25 women had been victims of acid attacks—for no discernible reason other than their failure to live up to Iran’s strict dress code. The anonymous assailants claimed that they were defending the hijab.
Under the law, women in Iran are required to be wholly covered except for their hands and faces. However, a growing number of educated urban women are finding holes within the law and pushing the boundaries of the country’s dress code. Women may wear a headscarf, but they also leave some stylish hair uncovered. Or they may cover their bodies, but also wear tight overalls that show off their curves. For others, their exposed faces are often completely made up.
The conservative clerics in Iran consider the dodging and bending of the dress code laws to be a threat and, as a result, the Iranian parliament passed a law in October that protects individuals who “enjoin good and forbid wrong.” In other words, “correcting” the behaviour of women who do not follow the appropriate Islamic apparel is encouraged. Incidently, the spate of acid attacks against women began after this law was passed.
And yet, while modest attire for ladies is mandated, Iran is also a culture that equates feminine identity with beauty. A woman’s value is measured against an ideal of a small, pointed nose and full lips, of full breasts and buttocks. It is against such standards that women are judged as marriageable or unmarriageable. Defined by their bodies and forced to be economically dependent, it is not surprising that most women in Iran have few prospects other than marriage.
Women in Iran are turning to plastic surgery to obtain the desired lips, breasts and buttocks in an attempt to increase their chances of marriage. In fact, Iran has become the nose job capital of the world. The Iranian newspaper Etemad reports that every year, 200,000 Iranians reduce the size of their nose.
For Iranian women, beauty is mandatory yet illegal. An Iranian woman has to cover up, yet she is also expected to be beautiful. She is expected to be educated but has to excel at household duties. These paradoxical expectations subject women to constant scrutiny, judgement, ridicule and animosity.
While women in Western countries also face strong pressures to have the right body, Iranian women face the added risk of being attacked for trying to do so. Iranian women have little recourses in the justice system. An Iranian woman still cannot work or travel abroad without her husband’s permission. Women also often don’t retain custody of children following divorce. Furthermore, women are not considered to be reliable witnesses in a court and a woman can only inherit half of what a man can inherit.
Women's rights groups were hopeful that discrimination against women would ease under President Hassan Rouhani, but they have seen few improvements. According to the Global Gender Gap Report by the World Economic Forum, Iran ranked 130 out of 136 countries in 2013. Just 3 percent of Iran’s parliamentarians are women. Even influential ministers such as Maryam Mojtahidzadeh, head of the women's ministry, talk about ‘complementary’ roles for women—not equality.
There are some signs of hope. Ashtiani’s sentence was commuted and she was freed last year. And despite the obstacles faced, women’s workforce participation is slowly growing; women make up 13 percent of the paid workforce. Meanwhile, women like Parwin Zabihi, an activist in Iranian Kurdistan (Rojhalat), and Soraya Fallah, a Kurdish activist in Los Angeles, continue to push for improvements and international pressure aims to ease the difficulties experienced by women in Iran.

Reporting by Ava Homa
Editing by Karzan Sulaivany
source: http://www.kurdistan24.net/en/news/38b36735-0c10-4cb9-b366-c92dde5ce10c/Beauty--duty-and-crime-for-Iranian-women