No. 4

March 16, 2025

Photo Review
International Women's Day 2025

Women in the Forefront of Fight to Humanize Natural and Social Environment

Montreal, March 8, 2025

Around the world women in their thousands and tens of thousands organized actions on International Women's Day to express their determination to overcome all obstacles standing in the way of affirming their rights and the rights of all. Everywhere, women and girls stood up for their just claims on society showing the extent to which they are playing a heroic key role in the front ranks of the battles for their own rights within the context of the battles their own peoples are waging for freedom, democracy and peace.

The women and girls of Palestine continue to resist the heinous genocidal war of the U.S./Israeli Zionists and theirs is a place of honour. All over the world, women and girls are at the head of the actions to end the Zionist occupation of Palestine and end the genocide. The women of Cuba and other countries facing brutal economic attacks and interference by the U.S. and its allies to engineer regime change are defending their independence and their sovereignty. In India, Bangladesh and all over Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean, Europe, Oceania, Canada and the United States women made their mark.

In Canada, signs and banners in the marches, demonstrations and meetings held to celebrate International Women's Day affirmed women's rights -- to equality, to health care, education, to care for the youth, social programs to protect the vulnerable, protection of the environment, and the fundamental right to participate in decision-making on all matters of concern to society. They expressed the solidarity of women the world over with the cause of the Palestinian people and the heroic sacrifices of Palestinian women in that fight, with the people of Sudan, the farmers of India, with Cuba and Venezuela and Haiti and all those under attack by the imperialist powers. They demanded that social wealth be used to meet the needs of the people not the rich, that the rights of all be provided with a guarantee and that the natural environment be protected.

In the United States, women lead every struggle on every front. They are uniting the people in action to oppose the impunity of the Trump administration, defend fellow workers and fight for the kind of society they want and need. The photos in this supplement speak for themselves.

TML salutes the fighting women of the world who are in the van of the movement for social progress. The affirmation of women's rights is integral to the work to bring about new arrangements that put human beings at the centre of all considerations. Women and girls the world over are making sure it is done!

CANADA
Montreal

Press Conference -- Women Taking Back our World

Press conference, March 7, 2025

Launch of World March of Women 2025

International Women's Day kicked off in the Montreal suburb of Candiac, with a vibrant atmosphere marked by signs and flags saluting March 8 and getting everyone into the spirit. Around 200 women joined in to launch the 2025 World March of Women on the banks of the St. Lawrence River.

Demonstration at U.S. Consulate

Outside the U.S. consulate in downtown Montreal at 11:00 am a militant rally denounced the threats of U.S. President Donald Trump to annex Canada and the imposition of tariffs. Mothers at the Front organized this and similar Together for Our Daughters actions across Quebec and in Ottawa.

Action Under the Banner
Women Taking Back Our Power: Taking Back Our World

About 1,000 people took to the streets at 4:30 pm in support of women around the world.

Women's Forum Brunch and Discussion

On March 9, the Montreal Women's Forum held a successful brunch to mark International Women's Day. The event began with the screening of a video showing the achievements of women in Quebec and Canada since March 8, 2024. This highlighted the determination of women to organize themselves to assert their rights -- to housing, to health care and education, to protect the environment, to put an end to government austerity policies, as well as their militant support of the struggle of the Palestinian people throughout the year and their opposition to war, for Canada to get out of NATO and NORAD and that they be dismantled.

The heroic Palestinian women were applauded at length for their determination, audacity and resistance, a source of inspiration, and it was emphasized that the liberation of Palestine is the responsibility of all peace-loving people.

Discussion during the brunch was animated. The International Women's Day actions in Quebec the previous day were spoken about enthusiastically. Participants were inspired by the struggle of Cuban women and the Cuban people for an end to the U.S. blockade against Cuba and the removal of Cuba from the U.S. list of state sponsors of terrorism.

Women are at the forefront in defending the right of the people to decide their own destiny. There was vigorous deliberation on the inhumane exploitation facing immigrants and migrant workers, including the use of closed permits that tie them to an employer, and being treated as disposable and without rights by the Canadian and provincial governments. The battle of women against sexual exploitation was considered, as well as the struggle of the Haitian people against foreign interference, particularly from Canada, France and the United States. The discussion would have continued for several more hours, but the group decided instead to continue to hold information meetings and discussions on current issues over the coming months.

Frelighsburg

St. Jean-sur-Richelieu

Joliette

Sherbrooke

Quebec City

Cacouna

Chicoutimi

Trois-Pistoles

Percé

National Capital Region

Women at the Front organized a human chain outside the U.S. Embassy in Ottawa.

St. John's

Halifax

Toronto

A spirited rally and ensuing march celebrated International Women's Day in Toronto on March 8 under the banner Fighting for Our Lives! Building Our Resistance! There was standing room only in the hall where the rally was held, and the speeches were broadcast to many more on the street as they arrived for the march.

Following the Indigenous opening, the rally honoured Indigenous elder Ursula Jacko who fought the forced sterilization of Indigenous women and was part of the International Women's Day organizing committee in Toronto for many years after its establishment in 1978.

Speakers from the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Ontario, and CUPE 79 representing City of Toronto inside workers, as well as an auto worker from Unifor spoke about the current situation and attacks on the rights of workers by the Ford government. They denounced Ford's claims to have a mandate to escalate those attacks, as well as the U.S. President's threats against Canada, affirming that working women are in the front ranks of the class and will not allow their rights to be trampled and that the people, united, are unstoppable.

A speaker from the AFL-CIO in the U.S. brought greetings from U.S. workers and spoke about the wide scale organizing and resistance taking place in the U.S. against the Trump Presidency, including by auto workers, steelworkers and federal civil service workers. She said that now was an important time to build the unity between working peoples in the U.S. and Canada.

A young Indigenous woman spoke about Indigenous laws and governance based on relationships among the peoples and of the peoples to the land. She pointed out that Indigenous women are and always have been the leaders in their nations.

A young woman from the Palestinian Youth Movement paid homage to Palestinian women everywhere who have been pillars of the resistance of the Palestinian people to Israeli occupation and aggression. She denounced the brutal use by Israel of sexual violence and the threat of violence against Palestinian women as part of the occupation's attempts to destroy the bonds of Palestinians with the land and between the peoples.

A speaker from the Naujawan Support Network spoke about the fight of international students and migrant workers for their rights and particularly the conditions faced by women. A speaker from the Sudanese diaspora in Canada spoke about the war and manmade famine in Sudan waged in particular against Sudanese women, whose existence and resistance is silenced.

The rally was followed by a march through the streets of downtown Toronto.

Thunder Bay

Winnipeg

Edmonton

Fighting women from many sectors of the economy and representing many social matters of profound concern gathered at Women for Rights and Empowerment (W4RE)'s annual International Women's Day celebration with a delicious dinner, lively conversation and discussion. The event was a great success in its aims “to inform each other, celebrate our resistance and our achievements, strengthen our commitment to be there for each other, affirm our claims as women to have a say in all the affairs of society, and discuss the battles ahead,” Women for Rights and Empowerment said. The evening was permeated with the sense that all the fighting women are one in their fight to uphold their rights and the rights of all.

Knowledge Keeper, Earth, began the evening by inviting everyone to participate in the four directions ceremony and by singing the Women Warriors’s song. MC Merryn Edwards presented Mandy Lamoureux, president of Canadian Union of Public Employees Local 3550, with Bread and Roses in honour of the fierce fight of the education workers who have been on strike since early January. Both Mandy and CUPE 4625 president Kelly Salisbury spoke about the stand these workers are taking, as they enter their third month of striking.

Women representing the City of Edmonton, Canada Post and Edmonton Catholic School Division workers spoke about their fight for wages and working conditions acceptable to their members and defending quality public services for all.

Dayana and Ariana spoke about how as children whose parents are undocumented they are barred from accessing education and the Education 4 All! campaign to change this. Judith Gale from Bear Claw Beaver Hills House spoke about advocating for the rights of our unhoused brothers and sisters.

Randa Alhijawi, President of the Canada Palestine Cultural Association spoke about the struggles of Palestinian women to defend their lives, land and rights and the importance of the local solidarity movement. These and other speakers all brought forward how the women are organizing and fighting in the front ranks of all the movements to bring about the world which is needed.

Peggy Morton from the Communist Party of Canada (Marxist-Leninist) and founding member of W4RE spoke about carrying forward this spirit of resistance, defiance and audacity into the coming federal election and beyond, the importance of speaking in our own names and continuing to put forward our demands for our rights, and taking up the major problem to be solved, which is how to put the decision-making power in our own hands!