Women's Day Unites Causes

Women around the world called Sunday for equal pay, reproductive rights, education, justice, and decision-making jobs while celebrating progress toward female empowerment during events marking International Women's Day. The event is commemorated in different ways and to varying degrees in different places, the AP reports. This year's theme is "Give to Gain," with a focus on fundraising for organizations focused on women's issues and less tangible forms of giving such as teaching peers. Some demonstrators urged governments for guarantees on a series of issue. Sexual abuse also was a focus, with Gisele Pelicot marching in Paris and Virginia Giuffre's family members planning to speak outside the ranch Jeffrey Epstein owned in New Mexico.

• Berlin: Roughly 20,000 people attended a march, twice what police expected, the news agency dpa reported. Speakers decried violence against women in Germany, as well as gender discrimination.

• Brazil: Marchers denounced gender-based violence, fueled by the latest case to outrage the country involving the alleged gang rape of a 17-year-old girl in Copacabana. The case in Rio de Janeiro's famed, beachside neighborhood took place in January but gained national traction this week when four suspects handed themselves over to authorities. At least 15 protests were planned across the country, with organizers calling for the defense of women's lives and an end to femicide.
• Spain: Tens of thousands of women took to the streets in major cities, calling for equality and an end to violence against women and in support of oppressed women in Afghanistan and elsewhere. "Our struggle is together with the women, both Iranian and Afghan. In this struggle, we are together," said Khadija Amin, an Afghan journalist, at a march in Madrid. Marchers also called for an end to war in the Middle East.
• Paris: More than a hundred thousand people rallied, including Gisele Pelicot, whose ex-husband was jailed last year for drugging and raping her and letting other men rape her while she was unconscious, per France 24. Pelicot became a worldwide symbol of resilience when she waiving her anonymity in the case and declared that shame belonged solely with her abusers.

• Gaza City: Palestinian women reminisced about their lives before the war, per the AP. The majority of them live starkly different lives now—in tents that do little to protect them from winter rains and the scorching summer heat, and they spend hours every day in pursuit of basic necessities. "We woke up at six to wait for the water trucks. We go to the charity kitchen and wait in line," said Wisal Badawi, as she was joined by other women carrying jerrycans and empty pots and waiting for food and water. "The Palestinian woman is suffering."
• Ecuador: In the Amazonian town of Puyo, a march included members of various Indigenous groups, many wearing traditional clothes. Women said they were there to raise their voices about the degradation of the environment and oil and gas expansion. "Today is about reporting to the world about the violation of rights that us Indigenous women have to endure—specifically the rights to nature," said Ruth Peñafiel, 59, from the Kichwa community in the northern Amazon. "We want to live in a healthy environment and in harmony with the forest, so we are asking for respect and that public policies for nature are put in place."

• Epstein ranch: Advocates planned to rally outside Zorro Ranch in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where sex offender Jeffrey Epstein is accused of sexually abused and trafficked underage girls and young women. Relatives of Virginia Giuffre, who accused then-Prince Andrew of Britain and other influential men of sexually exploiting her as a teenager trafficked by Epstein, were scheduled to speak. "This weekend, we are taking action because the same systems that shield powerful abusers at home are the ones perpetuating violence abroad," Rachel O'Leary Carmona, executive director of Women's March, said in a statement. "The years-long cover-up and protection of Jeffrey Epstein's allies and co-conspirators exposed a culture of impunity that tells survivors their pain is negotiable when powerful men are involved."