As part of the campaign “Stop Violence against Rural Women”, Conamuri and other organizations member of CLOC/Via Campesina Paraguay marched on November 25 to the Court of Justice of Asuncion, the country’s capital.

The second Forum of Public Denunciation will take place there before the State over cases of violence against women. They will try to show that the corresponding authorities have failed to fulfill their role of defending women’s rights either through action or omission.

The situation of indigenous and peasant women of Paraguay is extremely serious since besides gender violence there are many other structural causes: for example the countryside has been abandoned by the state and the responsible authorities fail to take action.

“There are no public programs of rural development. Peasants and indigenous are left to themselves as a result of the policies of multilateral agencies and transnational agribusiness companies.
Nearly 3 million hectares of genetically modified soy are planted to export, forcing peasants out of the countryside and into the cities, where there are no job opportunities”, Balbuena explained.

She mentioned the example of young rural women who massively leave the country “in search for a plan and their families wait for their remittances. The state’s policy is of abandonment, small-scale rural production is left behind and many fruit and vegetables are imported”, said Conamuri’s spokeswoman.

However, the Paraguayan organizations are trying “to resist this model” for example by repudiating the Parliament’s policies, where “99% of the lawmakers are right-wing”.

This week, 70,000 Paraguayan people mobilized across the country in protest against cuts in the social policies as well as budget cuts on the Tekopora program and health care.

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