NOTE TO CORRESPONDENTS INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY TO BE OBSERVED AT UN HEADQUARTERS

Press Release

NOTE TO CORRESPONDENTS INTERNATIONAL WOMEN'S DAY TO BE OBSERVED AT UN HEADQUARTERS

This year's International Women's Day will be observed at United Nations Headquarters on Thursday, 7 March, with a panel discussion on the theme, "Celebrating the past, planning for the future".

The panel discussion, which will begin at 10:30 a.m. in Conference Room 4, will be moderated by Samir Sanbar, Assistant Secretary-General for Public Information. Assistant Secretary-General Rosario Green, who was recently appointed by the Secretary-General as his adviser on gender issues, will deliver the Secretary-General's Women's Day message and then address the meeting in her own capacity. As the senior-most official in the Executive Office of the Secretary-General dealing with gender issues, Ms. Green is responsible for helping to ensure system-wide implementation of the Platform for Action adopted by the Fourth World Conference on Women (Beijing, 1995). She also assists the Secretary-General in strengthening the Organization's links with civil society.

Award-winning author and feminist activist Robin Morgan will present the key-note address. Ms. Morgan edited Sisterhood is Powerful and Sisterhood is Global, two now-classic anthologies, and is a former Editor-in-Chief of Ms. magazine.

Other speakers will include Angela King, Director of the Division for the Advancement of Women, and J. Nozipo Maraire, a novelist from Zimbabwe. Ms. King, until recently a Director in the Office of Human Resources Management, took over as the head of the Division in January 1996 and is responsible for overseeing the follow-up to the Beijing Conference and for managing the central United Nations programme for the advancement of women. Dr. Maraire, a neurosurgeon by profession, will read from her critically acclaimed current novel Zenzele: A Letter for My Daughter. The programme will conclude with a performance by New York-based singer/songwriter Cathy Kreger.

The panel discussion will be preceded by the screening at 10 a.m. of a new documentary entitled "Defying the Odds". Produced by the Department of Public Information (DPI) in cooperation with "Why Not Productions" of Toronto, Canada, the film celebrates the achievements of four women in their efforts towards social change and includes footage from the Beijing Conference.

- 2 - Note No. 5322 4 March 1996

International Women's Day, which celebrates women and their struggle for equal rights, is traditionally observed on 8 March, in commemoration of a strike by women workers in garment and textile factories in New York City on 8 March 1857. In 1975, during the International Women's Year, the United Nations began celebrating 8 March as International Women's Day. Two years later, in December 1977, the General Assembly adopted a resolution proclaiming a United Nations Day for Women's Rights and International Peace to be observed every year on a date to be chosen by each Member State.

The observance of International Women's Day this year, coming less than six months after the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women, provides an opportunity to review how far women have come in their struggle for equality, peace and development. It is also an opportunity to unite, network and mobilize for meaningful change.

In connection with the observance of the Day, the DPI is issuing new information material, including background information on the observance and a fact sheet on United Nations work for the advancement of women. At its NGO Resource Centre, located at 801 UN Plaza, 45th Street and First Avenue, the DPI is setting up a one-stop information source for United Nations materials on women's issues for the benefit of the non-governmental organization community and media accredited to the United Nations. United Nations documents, background materials, publications, posters and videos will be available there.

For further information, please contact Graciela Hall at 212-963-6923; for media accreditation, Sonia Lecca at 212-963-6934; and for United Nations television coverage, Jim Ludlam at 212-963-7650.

* *** *