Over 3,000 women marched through central Kyiv March 8 on International Women’s Day for the first time since Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began four years ago. They rejected a proposed bill drawn up behind closed doors by Ukraine’s parliament that would have set back women’s rights. They also demanded better protection for women serving in the military and the return of Ukrainian women prisoners held under harsh conditions in Russia.
Protesters were angry at the Ukrainian parliament’s sweeping rewrite of the country’s Civil Code behind the backs of working people. It would have denied women the right to divorce for one year after giving birth, including those in abusive relationships; imposed a vague code of “morality” on women; undermined secular marriage laws; and excluded same-sex couples from legal recognition.
The march backed legislation aimed against discrimination and sexual harassment in Ukraine’s armed forces, where over 75,000 women now serve as drone operators, medics, snipers, officers and more. A petition of 25,000 signatures has been submitted by Veteranka, a movement of women veterans.
The march highlighted the brutal conditions for 7,000 Ukrainians — including civilians — imprisoned by Moscow. Many of them are women who face stripping in front of men, beatings and starvation by their captors.
Organizers said the march was intended to return March 8 to being a day of political struggle for women’s rights, not a celebration or a holiday.
The spirited march in Kyiv, despite the war, is in striking contrast to Russia. There, working-class opposition in the streets to Moscow’s war has been suppressed as the regime has jailed and sometimes killed or exiled protesters or driven them underground.