Rita Acosta Interview at the Montreal International Womens Conference

Program Title: Rita Acosta Interview at the Montreal International Womens Conference
Description: Women from more than 30 countries gathered in Parc Extension, Montreal for the first Montreal International Women’s Conference. The conference was organized by the Committee of Women of Diverse Origins and went from August 13-16.
The organization works with women from diverse origins around the world to take on a number of social issues from migrants’ rights to violence against women. Some of the countries represented include the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Iran, Palestine, Pakistan, Mexico, Ecuador, and Mali.
This conference, honours and marks 100 years since the declaration of International Women’s Day. Among the issues discussed are the impact of developmental aggression including large scale mining projects; women’s access to reproductive health; the social cost of migration and migrants’ rights; racism and exploitation in the workplace; and concerns of indigenous communities here and abroad.
The end result of the conference was to build an international anti-imperialist alliance.
The following interview was conducted and recorded by one of several young women from the InterTribal Youth Centre, the South Asian Women's Community Centre, the Quebec Native Women's Association, the Y des Femmes de Montreal and Radio CKUT.
The young women involved in the radio project got the opportunity to interview women from across the world involved in the feminist militant movement.

Host(s): CKUT
Featured Speakers/Guests: Rita Acosta works at Le Mouvement. Her presentation, Trapped: Female Immigrants & Refugee Survivors of Sexual Violence described work she does with with refugee women who are survivors of sexual violence. At the Mouvement they work on 3 levels – prevention and fighting back, political awareness and legislative change. They see sexual aggression against refugee women perpetuated by men from all categories: armed groups, gangs, police, and unarmed men. Acosta spoke of femicide as genocide against women, where women are targeted simply because they are women. She further denounced collusion from the state when it fails to protect women, labeling this violence against women a state crime.

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