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Strategies & Market Trends : 2026 TeoTwawKi ... 2032 Darkest Interregnum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: elmatador who wrote (68173)	11/15/2010 7:28:09 AM
From: average joe	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 218145

Ukraine's topless group widens political role Police detain activists from the women's rights organization Femen during a protest in front of the police headquarters in Kiev November 9, 2010. KIEV \| Mon Nov 15, 2010 5:57am EST KIEV (Reuters) - Brazenly provocative, the bare-breasted young women of Femen are becoming an eye-catching -- if unsolicited -- fixture on Ukraine's political scene. Anna Hutsol, Femen's spikey-haired 26-year-old leader, says she commands a small army of 300 mainly student activists ready to peel off in public to support Ukrainian women's rights. As the group broadens its activities to embrace wider causes, she says Femen is undeterred by increased police action. "We plan more protests this year," Hutsol told Reuters. Femen activists caused a minor diplomatic stir last month during a visit by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin with a topless street protest in which they made raunchy references to his personal life. Last week two semi-clad Femen members disrupted an Iranian exhibition with a protest in support of an Iranian woman held in jail for adultery and complicity of murder. The Ukrainian authorities, who once laughed off Femen's activities as cheeky but harmless antics, may now be losing patience after the anti-Putin demonstration which touched a raw nerve in sensitive ties with a powerful neighbor. "The police are becoming more aggressive now. But at least that shows we are being taken seriously," Hutsol told Reuters in an interview in a downtown Kiev cafe. UKRAINIAN WOMEN'S PLIGHT Established in 2008 by a group of Kiev university students, Femen says its main aims are to improve the role of women in Ukraine's male-dominated, post-Soviet society. "We want to show that our women have a demeaning role in our society. Their place is seen as in the kitchen or in bed," said Alexandra Shevchenko, a 22-year-old economics student who regularly plays a leading role in topless protests. Sex tourists and visiting foreign businessmen who feed Ukraine's sex industry are the group's main targets. It has also campaigned against sexual harassment of students in universities and railed against international beauty contests such as the Miss Universe competition. Even Mykola Azarov -- the country's dour, grey-haired prime minister -- found himself an unlikely target of Femen when he drew fire by naming an all-male government. But this is no classic women's movement. In conversation, Femen activists invoke no role models. Ex-prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko, Ukraine's best known woman, is for them just another actor on a stale political scene. reuters.com