WUNRN
Samia Allalou
Common Ground News
April 27, 2009
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Newly graduated Algerian
policewomen during a graduation ceremony held in |
Those who think that Algerians
have been passive victims of their country's political problems need look no
further than the Algerian women's movement for a change of mind. Twenty-five
years ago, a unique relationship developed between
W.L.U.M.L. provides assistance
to women whose lives are governed by so-called "Islamic" laws or
customs. The organization opposes the use of faith to further political causes
and builds awareness of women's rights violations committed in the name of
Islam.
In 1984, Algerian women watched in amazement as the government passed a law that institutionalized women's legal status as "minors." Women had demonstrated against the ratification of this law for more than two decades, believing it stood in stark opposition to Article 29 of the Algerian constitution, which declares, "Citizens are equal before the law, regardless of birth, race, sex, opinion or any other condition of personal or social circumstance."
Algerian
feminists responded immediately. Demonstrations against the law intensified and
three women were put in solitary confinement without proper investigation or
trial. In reaction to this injustice, nine women from Algeria, Morocco, Sudan,
Iran, Mauritius, Tanzania, Bangladesh and Pakistan founded W.L.U.M.L. to
support the struggles of these women in Algeria and elsewhere.
W.L.U.M.L.
member Marieme Helie Lucas, an Algerian sociologist, recalled: "The three
Algerian women were released within a month and a half of campaigning, with
telegrams arriving on the president's desk from everywhere in the world."
The
non-profit organization continued playing an important role in Algeria during
the civil war in the 1990's between the outlawed political party, the Islamic
Salvation Front (F.I.S.), and the Algerian government. Despite the difficult
environment, women continued the struggle to reinstate their legal rights as
equal citizens while simultaneously enduring indiscriminate violence as a
result of the war.
W.L.U.M.L.
provided these Algerian women with a platform to voice their frustrations by
inviting them to participate in international conferences, including the United
Nations' World Conference on Women in Beijing in 1995, where they could
publicly denounce the crimes against women that the F.I.S. and other armed
Algerian groups had committed. Work on behalf of Algerian women continued even
when violence from the war gradually lessened and international focus was
diverted elsewhere.
In
January 1999, the Algerian government presented its official report on
discrimination against women to the Convention on the Elimination of all forms
of Discrimination Against Women. In response, the W.L.U.M.L. and New York
University's International Women's Human Rights Law Clinic collaborated on an
unofficial report outlining "the rise and ongoing threat of politicized,
violent religious fundamentalism [in Algeria] and its project to impose its
particular view of Islam through the theocratization of the state and/or
through violence and terror."
In
2001, female workers in the small Algerian town of Hassi Messaoud were savagely
assaulted by a crowd of 300 men following a sermon by an extremist imam at the
local mosque. W.L.U.M.L. encouraged international networks to respond to the
incident by sending letters to the Algerian government. Along with several
Algerian human and women's rights associations, they pressed for the defendants
to be tried in court. Several perpetrators were convicted and found guilty in
2004, and the assaulted women were formally acknowledged as victims.
More
recently, Cherifa Kheddar, the chair of Djazairouna, an association of families
that are victims of terrorism, was threatened in 2008 with unfair dismissal and
continuous harassment by Algerian authorities after she revealed to the public
the government's reconciliation policy (the Law on Civil Concord) with armed
Islamic political groups, including the Islamic Salvation Army (A.I.S.), the
Armed Islamic Group (G.I.A.) and the Islamic Front for Armed Defense
(F.I.D.A.), and for speaking out about crimes committed but pardoned without
trial.
In
the end, the government suspended Kheddar from her position, although it never
formally dismissed her from the job. After a nomination bid from W.L.U.M.L.,
Cherifa was awarded the International Prize for Human Rights by the
International Service Human Rights Awards on Dec. 8, 2008.
Today,
the international spotlight is no longer on Algeria, but W.L.U.M.L. remains
watchful of discrimination against Algerian women. This unfailing support of
W.L.U.M.L.'s international network provides women's movements in the country
with the necessary strength to stand up to all kinds of pressure and to
continue the difficult path towards full acceptance of women's rights in
Algeria and beyond.
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