JINHA

NEWS CENTER – On June 8, women academics and activists will come together in Beirut, Lebanon for a conference on the gendered nature of wars in the Middle East and Central Asia.

The group Women In War (WIW) is hosting its second annual conference, titled “Upholding Gendered Peace at a Time of War: Academics and Activists Speak Out on the Shifting Places of Women in the Arab World," at the Lebanese American University, the Institute for Women's Studies in the Arab World and anti-violence organization Beit el-Hanane. After last year's conference in Sarajevo, this conference will focus on "the multiple aspects of the gender dimension in the political and social upheavals that have swept the entire Middle East and Central Asia that has amounted to a veritable war against women."

Panels will take up the immense rise of sexual violence as a weapon of war and women's resistance to these developments (including in Rojava and Shengal). The host of talks and film screenings analyze sexual violence and women's resistance in areas including Yemen, Palestine, Turkey, Egypt, Lebanon, Afghanistan, Nagorno-Karabakh, Syria and Tunisia. Dr. Nawal El Saadawi of Egypt will give the keynote speech at the conference.

Meral Çiçek, of Kurdish Women's Relations Office REPAK, will be among the speakers addressing the role of women in resistance, with a talk focusing on the Rojava women's revolution. Yekîtiya Star representatives from Rojava will also be traveling to Beirut for the conference.

"At the end of the day, Kurdistan is not an island; as the Kurdish women's movement, we aren't just struggling for ourselves, but for the whole region and all of humanity," said Meral Çiçek. Women from across the region will be sharing experiences, struggles and efforts for a gendered and just peace in the region.

(fk/cm)