Sakellaropoulou for Women’s Day: We have in mind the women of Ukraine

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“A day like today, a day of honor for women around the world fighting for a better tomorrow, we have in our hearts and minds the women of Ukraine. Those who are left to fight for their homeland, who face the Russian tanks unarmed, who listen to the roar of war closed in the basements of their houses or in the subway galleries, hugging their babies in their arms, or bringing them into the world while around them “The bombs are falling,” he said the President of the Republic Katerina Sakellaropoulou in her speech in Parliament on International Women’s Day.

Mrs. Sakellaropoulou also referred to the lyrics of George Sarantaris: “Strange women had arrived / With white faces and snow in their hands / Now they were begging for bread / And trembling with sadness and cold”.

He continued: “But whatever poetry says, whatever journalistic reports convey, whatever images capture the ordeal of these women, no matter how much we admire their heroism and are shocked by their sufferings, our overcomes the pain and anger, despair and strength that accompany them when they fight, when they meet the wounded, when they walk in the cold and fog in search of shelter. A procession of uprooted mothers, daughters, sisters, is now crossing Eastern Europe, reaching the gates of Poland, Romania, Hungary, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Moldova, asking for help. And it evokes painful memories of our own history, of our own refuge. The tragedy of 1922, the drama of Cyprus. This year, one hundred years after the Asia Minor catastrophe, the images of Ukrainian women are reminiscent of those who arrived from the land of Ionia in Greece, having lost everything, but keeping alive in them the hope and courage for a new beginning. “With our active support for the thousands of expatriates, we are honoring their memory.”

The President of the Republic made a flashback to our history, pointing out that “in our heroic uprisings, in our national claims, in our triumphs and defeats, we will meet many forms of brave Greek women, who in the critical moments of our national life passed to the forefront of history and public life, fought, sacrificed, worked hard and contributed greatly to the building of the new Greek state.

“Last year, celebrating the 200th anniversary of the Revolution of 1821, we commemorated not only the brave women that history kept in its delta, but also the anonymous, the silenced, the many. This year, we turn our attention to the women of Asia Minor, women of all social classes and all educational levels, who rebuilt their homes in Greece out of nowhere, transforming the country, sealing our material culture, introducing new models of social behavior, which worked as a catalyst for the progress of the women’s movement. They are the ones who formed associations, unions, unions and organizations with ethno-political orientation in the critical period before the Asia Minor catastrophe, the same ones who took collective action in favor of the Greek soldiers in 1922, thus expanding their living space and compensating for their exclusion from political foreground. “

One hundred and thirty-seven purely women’s associations were active, according to the researchers, in the territories of the Ottoman Empire between 1877 and 1922, manifesting both the freedom of movement of the Asia Minor women in a purely male-dominated public space and the national consciousness of women. where the presence of Hellenism was strong. I will mention only the largest women’s organization in Asia Minor, founded in late 1921 by Evangelia-Aurelia Peridou under the name Defense of Greek Women of Asia Minor, and its appeal to the organized women of Greece, Europe and America to ask them “Their soul and their material contribution”: “What we desire is not conquest, nor oppression. “Straightforwardly, our efforts and our whole struggle have one spirit: Freedom, Equality, Independence, the modern social and political perception”.

The tone of their message Greek women of Asia Minor is shockingly modern, shockingly topical. And if their struggle did not succeed, their spirit did not die out. They were pioneers in claiming economic and political rights, many of them grouped around the Association for Women’s Rights founded in 1920 by Thracian Avra ​​Theodoropoulou. Anxious, creative, hardworking and dynamic, they left their mark on letters and art. Let us remember only Alexandra Papadopoulou, who wrote in the late 19th century and is considered the first Greek novelist, Dido Sotiriou, Eleni Vakalo, Maria Iordanidou, or our great actresses Marika Kotopouli and Kyveli.

But speaking of the past, we speak of the future; speaking of the present, we illuminate tomorrow. At this difficult turning point in world history, where everything is fluid, war is present, our societies are experiencing a multidimensional crisis with an unclear outcome, the position of women, despite the important steps that have been taken for the full and equal exercise of rights. often slides backwards. The escalation of gender-based violence, the persistence of stereotypes, the difficulties at work, the pervasive and multifaceted insecurity, exhaust her. The homicides are on the rise, casting a heavy shadow on our social life. Alongside all this, or rather in the stubbornness of all of them, the women of our country struggle daily to fulfill their multiple roles, to overthrow discrimination and inequalities, to develop with freedom and autonomy. They are successful in the professional spaces in which they operate, utilizing their many potentials. They claim their participation in the decision-making centers, their promotion to positions of responsibility. They create. They insist.

We look forward to these women, we must empower and support them. But in order not to leave Women’s Day just an occasion for celebrations or wishes, let us all, regardless of gender, mobilize in the battles that are being fought today on multiple fronts. “Fronts that remain open, whether they are about the fight for life or the fight for equal rights,” he concluded.

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