JINHA

NEWS CENTER - Ecuador women protested to Turkey over an incident in which demonstrators were violently ejected by Erdoğan's personal guards during a speech by visiting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in the capital, Quito on February 4, 2016. Silvia Buendía, an Ecuadorian lawyer from Guayaquil, a human rights activist for women and LGBTQ people, spoke to JINHA about the protest in Ecuador, women's movement in Ecuador and the Kurdish women's movement in Kurdistan.

*Can you introduce yourself? Are you a member of Surkuna Feminist Organization? If yes, can you explain how women came together and formed this organization? What kinds of difficulties have you dealt with in Ecuador as women.

I'm an Ecuadorian lawyer from Guayaquil, a human rights activist for women and LGBTQ people. I also write about sexual diversity and women's issues for a few Ecuadorian outlets. I collaborate with many feminist organizations, one of them is Surkuna. Although I am not a member of Surkuna, we are collectively members of the broader women's collectives that form a resistance to fight for women's rights in Ecuador. Surkuna is a relatively young organization, born in 2013, and it's dedicated to promoting and strengthening concrete, projects for the defense, conquest, support and protection of women's rights, with a focus on sexual and reproductive rights. Their methods are directly working with women and social movements.

*Can you tell us about your current projects? What are the current women involved, and what are they involved in? What are your current goals?

Today in Ecuador we are experiencing a deep stagnation in the progress for women's rights. Our legislative frameworks haven't adapted any of the advances made in law and are still misogynistic, patriarchal and "machista". This affects our young people most of all, poor, indigenous, rural women and women with diverse sexuality. The rollback of rights is occurring within the context of intolerance, authoritarian and violent language coming from the mouth of the President Rafael Correa. The current government has dedicated itself to repressing protest, restricting freedoms and constitutional guarantees, targeting journalists, academics, political adversaries and anyone who questions him publicly, singling people out for media attacks, but especially women.

Correa has stated publicly that he's a practicing Catholic and is thus unwilling to consider laws that would decriminalize abortion, not even for rape victims. This sexist public discourse has led to the first time in Ecuador's history that women have started to be processed penally for suspicion of interrupting their pregnancies. The president has also overhauled the strategies to prevent teenage pregnancies. So, now public policy is to focus on abstinence education, and not practical sexual education that informs teens how to assert their sexual and reproductive rights in a pleasurable, informed and safe way. That's why we in the women's movement are putting all of our efforts into bringing sexual and reproductive education to the public from a scientific point of view, using World Health Organization recommendations.


* Women protested Turkish President Erdoğan while he was in Quito to boost diplomatic and trade ties with Ecuador. Several women were set upon by Erdoğan's personal guards. Can you tell us about the protest?

When we found out that President Erdogan was making a state visit to our country, a group of us human rights activists got together and prepared to receive him with protests. We knew his itinerary and we were there waiting for him at every stop, holding signs that rejected his visit. The protests were always peaceful, non violent. On Thursday February 4 women were there to demonstrate their resistance, the feminist women's collective made up of more than 10 women's groups: Surkuna, Coordinadora Política Juvenil, CONFEMEC Mujeres por el cambio, Coalición por los derechos sexuales y reproductivos, Foro de Salud Ecuador, Salud Mujeres, Frente Ecuatoriano de Defensa de los Derechos Sexuales y Reproductivos, etcetera.

So, in total more than ten distinct groups, together to form a broad feminist platform including young women and not so young women, lawyers, doctors, academics, activists. Only seven of us managed to get in to the auditorium of the IAEN (Higher Institute of National Studies), where the Turkish president was going to lead a conference. When Erdogan began his speech, the seven women pulled out their placards and began yelling "Erdogan murderer". Instantly they were beaten out of the room by the guards of President Erdogan. The guards not only pushed them and struck them, but once they were on the floor they kicked the women in their breasts, faces and genitals. Ecuadorian police officers watched this beating without doing anything to stop it. Those who were in charge in that instant, who were hitting and giving orders, were the Turkish guards.

*Can you give us your thoughts on the ongoing blockades of Kurdish cities in Turkey?

What we have heard in Ecuador about the blockades maintained by President Erdogan against Kurdish cities in Turkey is desolating. We know about human rights violations, food shortages, military siege and murders carried out by the Turkish army. We felt in absolute solidarity with the Kurdish people in deciding to carry out our small and symbolic protest in front of Erdogan.

It was our way to say that in Ecuador, just like in any place where he goes, he is known to be guilty of genocide.

*In the Rojava part of Kurdistan, women have been leading an ongoing revolution. Women have built autonomous women's centers that assist women experiencing male violence, in addition to autonomous women's units in all areas of life. Do you have any thoughts on this effort to create a women-led revolution?

Personally I am moved by the Kurdish women defending their revolution in Rojava, with their rifles shouldered, on the first line of combat. It's obvious that the Revolution in Rojava is a women's revolution, and it inspires women around the world. I can understand how difficult it is for women in any part of the world to take up arms and make war, but to me it is very clear that these women are fighting for their lives, for their futures, for their liberty. And I also understand that In Rojava not all the women bear weapons. Most of them are dedicated to political construction of a new society. They are women of resistance, as are we, the women fighting in Ecuador.