End State Violence Against Women! Statement for International Day to Eliminate Violence Against Women
The International Women's Alliance calls on our members, supporters, and friends to participate in the International Day to Eliminate Violence Against Women, or IDEVAW, which women's organizations have observed since 1981 as a day to expose gender based violence. This date holds significant importance because of the Mirabal sisters who were martyred on this day, November 25, 1960, by the fascist dictatorship of Rafael Trujillo of the Dominican Republic. Their martyrdom represents the valor of the many women who participated in the fight to topple Trujillo's 30 year long reign beset with state violence across the nation. With every year that passes, we commemorate IDEVAW drawing inspiration from the Mirabal sisters, calling on more women to continue confronting state violence as the most prominent and egregious violence women and children face today.
2026 marks the 26th year anniversary that the UN has recognized this date internationally, we continue to expose the scale and true nature of this issue. Within the declaration of the United Nations they note that violence against women is a manifestation of historically unequal power relations between men and women, which have led to domination over, and discrimination against, women by men; and has prevented the full advance of women. We understand that it is not as simple as seeing women's issues as caused by men, as the historic division of labor between women and men is what laid the basis of this inequality and created these class divisions. As civilizations developed and the growth of exploitative societies continued, women became relegated to a subordinate status.
We take this day to highlight that the most violent situations women face are because of the exploitation, oppression, and imperialist militarization created by the global capitalist economic system. We remind women to not only fight for our democratic rights that are confined within this system, but to also continue the fight to fundamentally change our conditions. In the current global system, women's equality is limited to being equally exploited and oppressed as men. As members of a militant women's alliance, we have a duty to challenge ourselves and deepen how we view violence and to boldly take the needed actions to eliminate it. We urge non women's' organizations to take up the struggles of your sisters, because a society cannot be truly free without ensuring women's safety and full emancipation.
In the last year, the situation of women has only worsened. 676 million women and children lived within 50km of a deadly conflict event in 2024. This is the most women and children have been exposed to state violence since the UN started tracking in 1990. The impact of war on women is twofold: while men are called to war, women take on the economic and social responsibilities of the home. These governments inciting war then use these women to justify more war in name of women's liberation, and often use state-sanctioned violence against women and children as a tool of war. women are also experiencing increased rates of forced migration because of countries increasing their labor export policies for imperialist countries to take advantage of. Migrant women then face discrimination as these imperialist countries pass repressive policies against migrants. Around the world more and more states are rolling back progressive rights and defunding programs that benefit migrants, the LGBTQ+, women, and children.
Members across the globe are taking action today! Our member Women Against Military Madness (WAMM) is highlighting the impacts on women of children under the occupation of the zionist Israeli state and their genocidal campaign to fully settle in the Gaza strip. GABRIELA in the Philippines in the collaboration with One Billion Rising is holding a protest for IDEVAW calling for women of the world to rise against corruption and fascism! Minnesota Abortion Action Committee is calling for Crisis Pregnancy Centers out of our communities, demanding people receive all of their options when visiting an abortion clinic! GABRIELA USA has launched the "Care for Caregivers" campaign to expose the Philippines state neglect of migrant women and the economic exploitation they face because of the labor export policy. As a global alliance, from Malaysia to the United States, during our weeks of action we are united in action to condemn the genuine root of VAW and confront those responsible.
We must concern ourselves with the issues of those women that are the most vulnerable to violence. Working women in the garment factories whose livelihood is not being met while multinational corporations report record-breaking profits. Peasant women produce 60% of the world's food, yet many are indebted to their landlords and struggling to feed their starving children. Indigenous women whose ancestral lands are being taken by mining and logging corporations are then militarized when they fight back. Refugee and migrant women who are subject to increased chances of trafficking and disappearances by the state or organized crime stimulated by patriarchal and feudal ways of thinking. Women in militarized zones where rape and torture are being used as a war tactic. These are the women who we fight for in our campaigns and who we fight alongside in building a better world, free from violence and exploitation!
We must forge the broadest unity with women across the globe to fight for a society that recognizes, promotes and protects the rights and interests of women and is void of all forms of discrimination and violence against women. By intensifying local struggles and campaigns against capitalism, fascism, and all reaction, strengthening our international solidarity, and contributing to the people's struggle for national liberation, sovereignty, and self-determination we can achieve our goal of liberating women from historical oppression and exploitation!
Women all over the world must get engaged in different forms of struggle! Let us continue in fighting to eliminate violence in all its forms!
WOMEN AND CHILDREN FIGHT FOR YOUR RIGHTS!
WOMEN UNITE AGAINST MILITARISM AND EXPLOITATION!
END STATE VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN AND CHILDREN!