15 | - Número: 037 | 5 de Maio de 2012

For a few days in their history, for an interval in their lives, women were seen in those Arab countries as equals, alongside men, both in suffering and determination, which ultimately led to the fall of dictatorial regimes.
Without them, victory wouldn‟t have been possible.
We, Europeans, followed these events with attention, expectation, hope even dressed as joy, keeping a due distance regarding the sovereignty and self-determination, the right of the Arab peoples of tracing their own destiny. We made cooperation available, opened dialogue windows, extended the crosswalk of Friendship. But one must say it clearly: we have not lost our optimism, seeds have been sown for the defence of women‟s rights which will no longer wither, but our concern cannot be concealed: following the fall of the old regimes, old walls of gender segregation have once more risen, which we believed had been forever eradicated.
Women are yet again being chased from public places, ill treated, offended. The paths are long that lead to democracy, to gender equality, to the end of patriarchal societies.
I am uncertain as to what season of the year this is when talk of change in the southern Mediterranean is being made. There are parts where winter burns and summer chills. There are others of a soft autumn where nothing ever happens. But I do know the true Arab Spring will not begin as long as women won‟t fully enjoy their human rights.
Yes, I know this also can happen in Europe, and I remember Iulia Tymoshenko.
But let‟s see the case of Egypt, where the only demonstration forbidden in Tahrir Square was the celebration of Women‟s International Day, when women were beaten, subject to virginity tests and undressed in public.
Under the guise of parliamentary elections which elected 9 women only, women‟s rights disappeared from the political agenda, even from the new generation politicians‟ speech. To top it all, one of the elected female parliamentarians declared shortly after that her priority was to revoke the law guaranteeing women their right to divorce.
This leads us to another type of reflexion: is it possible to build a pluralist democracy, one that guarantees human rights and the rule of law, based on a State controlled by islamic parties imbued of the most backward religious conservatism? It is no wonder then that Mrs. Saïdi‟s report, to whom we take this opportunity to congratulate on this excellent work, and whose proposals we subscribe from first to last, places in Tunisia and Morocco, despite all, the bulk of its hopes of making the so-called Arab Spring blossom, and that this may work as a contagion effect to other arab States of the Mediterranean southern shore.
The future is being played in these countries‟ constitutional reforms, parallel with an actual enforcement of CEDAW and the consignment of the precedence of international law over national law.
Themes such as the Statute of Women, Family Code, succession rights, participation of women in the political life, violence against women, their access to Justice, poligamy, require a particular attention from the Council of Europe.
Hence it comes as natural the availability of the Venice Committee‟s resources, the reinforcement of parliamentary relations through the “Partner for Democracy” instrument.
For all this, and much more, the Council of Europe assumes itself as a cornerstone for the dialogue between Northern and Southern countries. And the North-South Center is the Council of Europe‟s entity best equipped for this knowledge and political practices.
I would like to finish with a word of appreciation to our colleague Deborah Bergamini, president of the NorthSouth Center, for the remarkable work she has been doing. And to remind that it was she, with a motion for a resolution, who was at the basis of the decision to elaborate this report to which Mrs. Saïdi gave form.
The Conference of Rome, conducted in October last on “Women as agents of change in the South of the Mediterranean”, provided an impulse to a North-South process of empowering women, deserving of our full support.
Hence we fail to understand the attitude of those, in the european camp, who are considering abandoning the North-South Center, under the pretext of the crisis, when there are States on the Southern side joining in.
We leave here a plea to our parliamentarian colleagues for the formation of a solid block in defence of the North-South Center, that genuine paragon of interdependence and solidarity, values which have always been a part of the Council of Europe‟s genetic code!