Mary Robinson condemns US ‘attacks on truth’ during women’s day rally
Mary Robinson addressed an International Women’s Day event in front of Belfast City Hall. Picture: Rebecca Black/PA
Former president Mary Robinson has called for solidarity to guard against “attacks on truth”.
Addressing an International Women’s Day rally in Belfast, she claimed the current United States administration is “flooding the atmosphere with lies”.
Crowds at the event, including representatives from Women’s Aid, Global Women’s Strike, Youth Action and Surviving Economic Abuse, also cheered calls by a number of speakers to end the conflict in Iran.
The event started at Writer’s Square before marching along Royal Avenue to City Hall, with people holding aloft banners.
Ms Robinson told those gathered: “We have an administration in the United States which is flooding the atmosphere with lies, not to be believed, but to confuse, to confuse that there is no truth.
“Truth is our relations with each other… we must flourish together. We must know there is strength in our solidarity through that solidarity.”
Ms Robinson said she was delighted to mark International Women’s Day in the Northern Ireland capital alongside speakers including Iranian human rights activist and academic Azadeh Sobout, Helen Crickard from Reclaim the Agenda and Aoife Nic An Tuile from Youth Action.
She condemned the “epidemic of violence against women and girls” in Northern Ireland, Ireland and across the globe, and spending on wars at the same time as cuts on spending in international aid.
“Now we have this war by Israel and the United States on Iran which has opened up such devastation in the Middle East,” she said.
“We are seeing the undermining of the rule of law which is very worrying for our world because it’s a rule by power and we must counter that, so we have a lot of issues that require exactly the theme of this International Women’s Day here in Belfast is, strength in solidarity.
“We have to grow that solidarity and grow it in ways that strengthen it in order to counter a very severe range of backlashes against rights now.”
She also condemned the “misogyny of social media for every women who stands up, or even if they don’t stand up”.
“It is an extraordinarily dark part of social media now, and getting worse because AI is enabling the denuding of women and girls, the ways in which it’s possible to literally try to destroy people’s lives through attacks on social media,” she said.
“All of this needs the strength in solidarity.”
Ms Robinson also highlighted the environmental crisis as the “biggest threat to our future”, and announced an Ireland branch of her Project Dandelion initiative to work on food sovereignty on the island.
Ms Sobout called for democracy for her country, describing it as being “under bombardment”.
“I stand before you as an Iranian woman who opposes the men who rule my country today, the theocratic regime that answered demands for dignity and freedom with massacre, and the men who ruled it before, a monarchy sustained by foreign intelligence and imperial power,” she said.
“There is little space for people like me in the political script written about Iran because we are told that we must choose, between dictatorship and bombardment, between oppression and destruction, submission and annihilation, we reject that choice.”
Ms Nic An Tuile urged unity and solidarity to work to prevent violence against women and girls.
She said: “Violence against women affects everyone we know, our mothers, our grandmothers, our sisters, our friends and our girlfriends.”
“The north of Ireland is the most dangerous place in Europe to be a woman, but no more, it’s time to stand up united. Violence against women is not inevitable but preventable,” she added.
“Ending this violence is not just a fight for women but a fight for humanity, let us raise our voices, support survivors and build a world where respect and kindness replaces harm. Together we can create a safe space where everyone can thrive.”
CONNECT WITH US TODAY
Be the first to know the latest news and updates
