It was the largest and the boldest Women’s Day march in the history of Mexico City. Tens of thousands of women pulsed through the downtown streets, a river of violet mirrored by the jacaranda trees in full spring bloom. Women of all ages, sectors, classes, barrios, schools and political and sexual orientation marched; they filled the streets with their bodies and their cries.

When four thousand women from forty-nine countries met in a Zapatista community to find ways to end violence against women, we knew what we were up against. Many, if not most, of the women brought with them the scars of gender violence. We also knew we were meeting at a critical and contradictory point in the history of women’s movements–a point when an all-time high in public attention and mobilization coincides with a rise in the violence the movements aim to stop.

This year different Mexican women’s groups organized two actions for the historic conmemoration of March 8, International Women’s Day. The  8M march and the Mar. 19th women’s work stoppage.

An in-depth analysis of the actions of the Organization of American States reveals a disturbing political bias, a willingness to manipulate events and data for political purposes, and a pattern of double standards under the leadership of Secretary General Luis Almagro. In favoring rightwing governments and forces, while attacking or attempting to eliminate the left in power, Almagro has marked a course that has eroded the regional organization’s legitimacy in two critical areas of OAS operations: election observation and human rights monitoring