FIRST AUSTRALIAN TRIBUNAL ON WOMENS HUMAN RIGHTS May 21, 1999 Melbourne Town Hall 10:00 am In our community, many women are subject to violations of their human rights - women who work in their homes for $1.30 per hour; young women who are abused in their families; lesbian couples who are denied access to services and legal protections or benefits heterosexual couples take for granted. These issues, and other womens human rights abuses, were highlighted in the Platform for Action which arose out of the 1995 United Nations World Conference for Women held in Beijing. Australia was a signatory to this Platform for Action, which identified critical areas of concern for womens human rights which Governments needed to prioritise. On May 21, 1999, the Women's Rights Action Network Australia will hold the First Australian Tribunal on Women's Human Rights. The Womens Human Rights Action Network Australia (WRANA) is a national feminist human rights organisation comprising various non-governmental human rights and womens rights groups, which was established in June 1998 to foster effective partnerships between womens and human rights sectors. The WRANA Tribunal will review the Australian governments commitment to womens human rights issues in the spirit of the Beijing Conference. At the Tribunal, ten to twelve women living in Australia will testify about their experiences, whether as indigenous women, women outworkers, homeless women, older women, lesbian women, women who have experienced violence, women who have experienced prison life. At the conclusion of the day a panel of experts in the human rights field, including leading Aboriginal activist and magistrate Pat OShane will make recommendations to Government and community on the issues they have heard about. In September, these recommendations will be released as part of a more extensive report suggesting ways to address the issues highlighted. This report will provide strategies and recommendations for Non-Governmental and community organisations, human rights bodies, governments in domestic, regional and international arenas; including recommendations pertaining to the five year review of the implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action, to be held in New York in June 2000. The Tribunal will be launched on May 14th with a cartoon exhibition at the Overseas Service Bureau in Fitzroy, Victoria, displaying cartoon illustrations by prominent Australian women cartoonists around the themes of the Tribunal. The cartoons will immortalise the spirit of the Tribunal which is to highlight the everyday reality of so many Australian womens lives as they cope with issues such as poverty, racism, homelessness, income support, sexuality discrimination, and inaccessibility of reproductive technologies. The women who will come forward and testify about their experiences at the Tribunal itself have been supported by various community organisations and will have worked extensively with members of the Womens Rights Action Network Australia Tribunal Working Group. The women's testimonies will not only make visible the often hidden abuse which many women suffer, it empowers the testifiers to move from being victims to becoming survivors engaged as political actors in changing their own lives and in creating the conditions necessary to end such abuse in the lives of fellow Australian women. The Tribunal is being organised by a Working Group which meets on a weekly basis and has employed two part-time coordinators to facilitate the organisation of the event. If you would like more information about the Tribunal or would like to attend this groundbreaking event, please contact Caroline or Amrita in the Tribunal Office on (03) 9482 7136, or e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] *********************************** chickclick.com http://www.chickclick.com girl sites that don't fake it. http://www.chickmail.com sign up for your free email. *********************************** LL.VE -- Leftlink - Australia's Broad Left Mailing List mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.alexia.net.au/~www/mhutton/index.html Sponsored by Melbourne's New International Bookshop Subscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=subscribe%20leftlink Unsubscribe: mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]?Body=unsubscribe%20leftlink
