Catégorie : 1000 women Peace Nobel 2005

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She says: « Resistance toward all militarism has been the most important development that has shaped my personal philosophy. For these life-changing gifts I shall remain eternally grateful ».

She says also: « The so-called Space Based Infra Red System SBIRS is supposed to observe the flight path of all missiles in the world and locate enemy missiles, which can then be shot down by killer missiles. Thus the installation would become a foreward station for the planned missile shield over the United States, together with the US center Fylingdales in Yorkshire, and the US base Thule in Greenland. President Reagan initiated the project under the name Strategic Defense Initiative SDI, and President Bush junior terminated the inconvenient ABM Treaty between the USA and Russia to continue it under the name National Missile Defense NMD. Scientists warn that it will not work purely for reasons of physics. Only a few of the trial tests have been successful so far, and then only because the coordinates of the enemy missile were made known beforehand ».

.

Helen John – England

She works for the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament CND, and for WoMenwith Hill WwH.

The former midwife Helen John fights in Great Britain with wit and civil disobedience against Star Wars and the world’s largest US espionage center.

On Monday, December 15th, 2003, Helen John is lying on Route A 59, which passes by Menwith Hill in the British county of Yorkshire. Her arms are folded under her head, and she stretches out as if the ice-cold asphalt were an inviting bed. Before and behind her sit or stand two dozen other blockade members, from Yorkshire, London and Manchester, Sweden and Germany. ”Close the base!” they shout, again and again. The US base, identified outside as a ”Royal Air Force” station, is run by the National Security Agency (NSA), the US secret service branch, whose tens of thousands of staff members are responsible for international eavesdropping. The base is part of the ”Echelon” monitoring system which, shrouded in mystery, has been run jointly since 1948 by the US, Great Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand, although only the USA has access to all data produced.

Continuer la lecture de « Helen John – England »

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

It is said about her: « Ermira Mehmeti saw the opportunity to help rebuild the country, starting from rebuilding the relations between ordinary people from grassroots level to the top. It was an opportunity she did not miss ».

Vecer, Macedonia: Media boycott against Democratic Union of Integration, by FOCUS News Agency, Sept. 29 2007. Skopje – As a sign of protest against Tuesday’s incidents when in the Macedonian parliament a security guard of the Democratic Union of Integration /DUI/ attacked a journalist of the A1 television channel Lirim Dulovi, all journalists, photo reporters and operators boycotted on Friday the protest staged by the DUI in Skopje under the motto “Stop state violence”, the Macedonian Vecer newspaper writes. What is interesting is that Ahmeti’s party had found out about the media intentions beforehand, and had hard tried to dissuade them. Ahead of the protest DUI Spokesperson Ermira Mehmeti promised to the journalists they would receive an apology and asked them not to leave. Still the media did not give up their intention and left the protest the moment when the latest acts of violence against media representatives were condemned, and the apology was made in Albanian only, the Vecer notes. The newspaper adds Lirim Dulovi had asked through the media DUI leader Ali Ahmeti to publicly condemn the attack. (full text, Sept. 29, 2007).

.

Ermira Mehmeti – Macedonia

She works for the Democratic Union for Integration (see them on wikipedia).

Ermira Mehmeti is the spokesperson for the Democratic Union for Integration, which emerged following the 2001 conflict in the country. Its leaders are those who fought for more rights and equal treatment of ethnic Albanians and Macedonians. Ermira is working to bring together youth of the two major communities that were in conflict. Her message is that peace and democracy are the crucial values that can bring the country into Europe, that diversity makes the country stronger and should be the corner stone of this young democracy and that reconciliation must be promoted.

Ermira Mehmeti is the symbol of young and emancipated Albanian women living in Macedonia with clear perspectives on their future. She has become the voice of moderation of the young educated generation of ethnic Albanians living in Macedonia. The myth of the uneducated and primitive Albanian community living in the country was broken as she emerged on the political scene.

Ermira is the daughter of a retired lawyer and a social worker working for the Macedonian Red Cross. Her father was a political prisoner in the times of the Communist regime in the Former Yugoslavia. Her mother has spent her life helping those in need, especially families that need social assistance and children without care.

Continuer la lecture de « Ermira Mehmeti – Macedonia »

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She says: « I admired the courage of the women and my love for nature grew. I discovered my capacity to confront situations and I pledged my life to the struggles of the people ».

She says also: « I feel a passionate love for life, especially for day-to-day life. Daily life is a crucial reference point for educational projects. We decide our strategies and projects around it. What does this means specifically? We place ourselves within this daily life with its routines and its unforeseen circumstances ».

.

María Luisa Navarro Garrido – Venezuela

She works for the Sisters of the Sacred Heart 1), and for the Community Center for Popular Promotion (not on the web).

« I am a woman that had two births, I was born and re-born », explains María Luisa Navarro Garrido. The first birth was to her parents in Madrid, Spain, on May 3rd, 1942. The second one, the re-birth, was after her personal decision to live among the Venezuelan people and was reaffirmed when she was given Venezuelan citizenship in 1990.

« Onto my Spanish roots the Venezuelan sap was engraved and that generated in me a great sympathy towards multicultural society and a special love for Bolivar’s people and for the people of Don Quixote ».

She was born in a home full of women; her father was the only man. They told her about his disappointed face when he knew that he had another girl. Nevertheless, she remembers, « he could not hide his fondness for his four littler girls ».

Along with her sisters she had experienced, since the beginning of her life, the very special sensibility of being a woman. « We were very close and we supported and defended each other in all life situations.

Another special experience was to be born in an artisan’s home. My mother sewed. She made all our clothes during our lives, even my sister’s wedding dress. My father painted pictures that touched me, and I helped him by mixing the colors in his palette for him to create landscapes, portraits, seascapes and still forms of life. They also contributed to the newspaper La Rioja. My mother wrote stories and my father illustrated them ».

Continuer la lecture de « María Luisa Navarro Garrido – Venezuela »

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

Irom Chanu Sharmila (born 1970), also known as Sharmila Chanu, is an Indian woman activist of Meitei Manipuri heritage, known for her campaign against the controversial Armed Forces (Special Powers) Act, 1958, colloquially known as the AFSPA. Manipur was, like many other princely states, annexed by the Indian Union in 1949 under disputed circumstances; there have been sporadic separatist movements since. Chanu has been on a hunger strike demanding the repeal of the AFSPA, on November 2, 2000, after soldiers of the Indian Paramilitary Assam Rifles allegedly killed ten young Meitei men in Malom. Three days later, police arrested Sharmila on charges of « attempted suicide », suicide or attempted suicide being unlawful under Indian laws, and she was later transferred to judicial custody. (full text).

Imphal – Irom Sharmila Chanu – the « Iron Lady » who has been taking up fast-unto-death agitation since the year 2000 against the Armed Forces Special Power Act AFSPA), has decided to publish her 6 poems for the general public today … (full text, October 16, 2007).

.

Irom Sharmila Chanu – India

She says: « Although the State may think so, I am in no mood for suicide. In any case, if I were a suicide-monger, how could we talk like this? I have no other choice but fasting » … and: « I had gone there (to Malom) to attend a meeting. The meeting was towards planning a peace rally that would be held in a few days. I was very shocked to see the dead bodies on the front pages of the newspapers. That strengthened me to step on this very threshold of death. Because there was no other means to stop further violations by the armed forces against innocent people. I thought then, that the peace rally would be meaningless for me. Unless I were to do something to change the situation » … and: « I realise my task is a tough one. But I must endure. I must be patient. That happy day will come some day. If I’m still alive. Until then, I must be patient. (My time was over, and my crew and I were preparing to leave, when Sharmila stopped us.) Will you help me? I would like to read about the life-history of Nelson Mandela. I have no idea about his life. Will you send me a book about him? It is full of restrictions here. Make sure you address it to the security ward. If not, I may not recieve it » … (full interview).

Continuer la lecture de « Irom Sharmila Chanu – India »

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She says: « Without women’s participation, peace is impossible to reach. For centuries men have gone to war and the result is chaos. We all need another world. If we live on equal terms, with mutual respect, solidarity, harmony and justice, we shall be building it. And such a world will be a peaceful world ».

She says also: « I worked in a tobacco factory and on Sundays I washed clothes in the stream. I took refuge in God, in religion, because like all human beings I needed something more in my life. That made me a very religious girl. I worked in the tobacco factory until I was 17. I had a pair of sandals made of rubber, a dress to go to mass in and two dresses to wear to work. (I washed one of them and wore the other.) In that way I lived out my youth ».

.

María Esther Ruiz Ortega – Honduras

She works for La Nueva Esperanza / The New Hope Women’s Association (not named in the web).

And she says: « My father was a rural teacher and my mother a housewife. My father became an alcoholic, which led to the domestic violence that I experienced during my childhood. He ill-treated my mother both physically and psychologically. I could not stand it, so when I was only four years old I took my little dress and went away to live with my grand mother and my aunt. And I think that was the beginning. That marked the way ». The one who is speaking is María Esther Ruiz, a feminist from rural Honduras, born in Casa Quemada, a community in the administrative district of Santa Bárbara, in the Northwest of the country.

María Ester was a silent girl and for that reason her mother thought she was mentally retarded and decided to not send her to school. But her father, who was a good reader, registered her at school when she was nine years old. Shortly afterwards, in 1959, he was murdered for being an activist member of the Liberal Party.

« My mother and my three sisters and brothers moved into my grand mother’s house where I was already living. Two years after my father’s death, my mother began a new relationship and went to live with her partner ». So at 11 years old, María Esther had to become a ‘mother’ taking care of her three brothers and sisters and also her grand mother. The old aunt was already dead.

Continuer la lecture de « María Esther Ruiz Ortega – Honduras »

Linked with DELTA Development Education and Leadership Teams in Action.

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She says: « If rural women can build their self-confidence and learn coping mechanisms, they can become self-reliant and independent instead of depending on their male partners. Rural life would be manageable ».

Read: DELTA, Women Leaders Arise from African Soil.

.

Nosandla Malindi – South Africa

She works for the Development Education Leadership Teams in Action DELTA.

Nosandla Malindi was born in 1960. She has diplomas in business counseling and democratic development. Nosandla is trainer and coordinator of Development Education Leadership Teams in Action (Delta) in Libode, an organization that empowers women from grassroots communities to participate and hold leadership positions in decision-making in South Africa.

Delta started in 1992 as a project of the Catholic Welfare Development (CWD). In 1995 it became independent from CWD. Delta has been empowering women in the urban and rural areas in the Western Cape. Nosandla has been a learner and staff from the time of its inception.

Continuer la lecture de « Nosandla Malindi – South Africa »

Linked with Geneva Call, and with Fight against Landmines.

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She says: « For successful commitment, confident enthusiasm overcomes a lack of time and money ».

She says also: « I let my convictions speak for me, but that also means that when a negotiation breaks down I am hurt because it means my convictions could not overcome the problem. To be engaged with the heart means that setbacks are also felt with the heart ».

.

Elisabeth Reusse-Decrey – Switzerland

She works for Geneva Call.

Elisabeth Reusse-Decrey started Geneva Call in 1998 as an independent, humanitarian non-governmental organization (NGO) to complement the work of the Ottawa Treaty to ban landmines by States. At that time, she was a member of the Geneva Parliament (chosen to be its President in 2000-2001) who was most active in disarmament and peace issues.

In 1995, she became involved in the Swiss Campaign Against Mines and was sensitized to the human destruction caused by mines from her vantage point as a professional physiotherapist.

The purpose of Geneva Call is to engage armed non-state actors (NSAs) to renounce the use of landmines and to respect humanitarian norms. Since the Ottawa Treaty only deals with States, she developed a Deed of Commitment that NSAs can sign to show their willingness to destroy stockpiles and renounce using mines.

Continuer la lecture de « Elisabeth Reusse-Decrey – Switzerland »

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She says: « Care for the livelihood of the common people + Care for the ecology + Care for history = Care for our future ».

.

Min Sun – China

She works for the magazine Camellia, Humanistic Geography.

Sun Min comes from a family of teachers who trace their ancestry to the cadets at Jiangwu Hall in Yunnan Province during the 1911 revolution. After graduating from senior high school, she lived and worked in a production team in a village for three years learning about rural society and the livelihood of peasants in China.

After high school Sun continued her studies in the Chinese Department in Yunnan University. She then worked in a cultural department in Yunnan Province and started her research work in the mountain areas. Her investigation includes the socio-history, customs and oral histories of the ethnic minorities in Yunnan Province.

One of the key findings of her study was that tradition is integrally linked with the land and civilization of a people. With the onslaught of economic development Sun Min used her magazine Camellia-Human Geography to address issues of environmental damage, loss of tradition etc. Concern for the livelihood of the common people and ecology and respect for history along with her conscience are the guiding principles for Sun as a researcher and writer.

Continuer la lecture de « Min Sun – China »

Linked with O Ninho, with human trafficking.org, and with How to Fight (Human) Trafficking.

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She says: « To build peace, it is necessary to combat war and all its faces: poverty, prejudice, exclusion, unemployment, despair, HIV/AIDS ».

Read: Prostituição Sexualidade e Sida – Inês Fontinha – Sociologia – Instituto de Ciências Sociais e Políticas da UTL, O Ninho – Lisboa.

She says also: « Lost women, women who took the easy way », that is how people used to call prostitutes in Madeira Island, where Inês Fontinha was born. « In my generation, those women had to face a great deal of prejudice. It was a problem nobody would talk about. Women were always seen as the guilty ones ».

.

Maria Inês Gomes Rodrigues Fontinha – Portugal

She works for the European Federation for the Eradication of Prostitution (FEDIP), and for O Ninho.

The social scientist Inês Fontinha (born 1943) has been fighting the sexual exploitation of women for over 30 years. In the beginning, she supported Portuguese prostitutes through her work for the non-governmental organization O Ninho (The Nest). Years later, she also started to combat sexual trafficking in children, young and adult women. In 1992, she founded the European Federation for the Eradication of Prostitution (FEDIP), a network in several European countries against this crime.

At the beginning of the 1960s, Inês had recently graduated in Social Science, and was invited by a lawyer friend to visit “O Ninho.” The organization, founded in Portugal in 1967 to support young prostitutes, followed the example and was named after a French organization created in 1936. “My friend used to be a volunteer, teaching the women how to read and write”.

When she first met the sex workers, Inês realized their “way” was not “easy” at all. “I saw the suffering in their faces. I heard their stories and decided to understand, through them, that unknown world I had ignored until then.”

Continuer la lecture de « Maria Inês Gomes Rodrigues Fontinha – Portugal »

She is one of the 1000 women proposed for the Nobel Peace Price 2005.

She says: « When I was just 18 years old I went for the first time to Asunción, the capital of the country, trying to escape from the extreme poverty that afflicted the farming community. In Asunción I worked as a maid in the houses of important families, and I was able to see another reality. Then I began to ask myself why my family was so poor while other people had such a good life. Like many other young girls there, I suffered the consequences of being uprooted ».

She says also: « With my parents agreement I moved to the district of Misiones. There, with the help of an uncle who was a catholic priest, I entered the Catholic Agrarian Youth (JAC), where I became one of the leaders. This organisation was a wing of the famous Agrarian League that tried to provide the rural communities with new forms of production based on community work. Three months later this militancy took me to jail ».

.

Sorry, I can not find any photo showing the person of Maggiorina Balbuena, Paraguay.

She works for the National Coordination of Organizations of Female Peasants and Indigenous Women.

Maggiorina Balbuena used to get up at four o’clock every morning, and by the pale light that shone from a homemade night light, she prepared the few implements that she would take to school. She dressed in threadbare overalls. That was her uniform. She had no shoes on her feet. She walked miles to the small, rural school in the Karanday’ty Colony (Karanday: Totora. A plant similar to a palm tree- Karanday’ty: Palm grove).

Today known as Genaro Romero, part of the city of Coronel Oviedo (Coronel Oviedo: the most important city of the Caaguazú district due to its economic development).

This was Maggie’s routine, the routine of a fighter like few others. She fought for the cause of the Paraguayan farmers. The routine was repeated every day except at sowing and harvest times when she worked on the farm wearing her hat made of pirí (Pirí: rush, reed, a plant of high canes that once dried are used as the raw material for handcraft work. Hat pirí: a handmade Paraguayan hat). She was born into a family of farmers from a rural community located in one of the most inhospitable wooded zones of Paraguay. She grew up with the green colour of the fields and she lived with the twin evils of poverty and exclusion.

Continuer la lecture de « Maggiorina Balbuena – Paraguay »