New Campaign Launched: ‘Desperately Seeking Sanitary Towels’

Posted on August 12, 2009
Filed Under Campaign, England, Trafficking Asylum, Women's Group | Comments Off

The Jewish Council for Racial Equality (JCORE) has launched an appeal to raise donations of sanitary towels for refugee and asylum-seeking women. They are calling on shoppers to add an extra pack of sanitary towels to their basket or donate £1 to buy seven supermarket-value packs. The campaign began after JCORE Support Coordinator Caroline Glasner saw women pleading for sanitary towels from a vastly insufficient supply at a centre for destitute asylum seekers.

JCORE works with the Jewish and wider communities to promote a positive multi-ethnic UK through education, action and dialogue. Action includes appeals such as this, which provide practical help to refugee and asylum seekers via the New North London Synagogue drop-in for destitute asylum seekers, Barnet Refugee Service and the Helen Bamber Foundation. The women who attend the drop-in have fled traumas such as torture, rape, separation from their children or murder of family members.

The campaign aims to tackle negative media portrayal of asylum seekers, attract donations and support from a new audience and fulfil the pressing needs of asylum-seeking women for sanitary protection. Last year Caroline’s “Desperately Seeking Undies” campaign raised tens of thousands of pounds and thousands of pairs of underwear for refugee and asylum seekers. It culminated in a celebrity undies auction in which a donation by artist Banksy raised £30,000 alone!

Caroline said “I am touched and amazed at the generosity and compassion shown in response to the appeal for sanitary towels. It is hard for women to imagine being without adequate sanitary protection and yet so easy to donate a pack or a small amount to help.”

Sanitary towel packs can be sent to: JCORE PO Box 47864 London NW11

Or donations made at http://www.jcore.org.uk

For further information contact: caroline@jcore.org.uk

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Item from the current issue of Women’s Asylum News which also includes articles on:
* It’s time to speak out about asylum: Launch of The Testimony Project
* The European Court of Human Rights has found Turkey in violation of its obligations to protect women from domestic violence, and for the first time has held that gender-based violence is a form of discrimination under the European Convention.
* UK Court of Appeal Test Case for Subsidiary Protection:
* Yarl’s Wood Allegations
* BAWSO Training on Forced Marriage and Female Genital Mutilation, Wales
* ‘Stolen Futures: Trafficking for Forced Child Marriage in the UK’
* ‘Out of Sight, Out of Mind: Experiences of Immigration Detention in the UK’
* ‘Unsafe Haven: The Security Challenges Facing Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender Asylum Seekers and Refugees in Turkey’
* Charter of Rights of women seeking asylum: A Kirklees Refugee Forum Event

To download this issue as a pdf file go to http://www.asylumaid.org.uk/data/files/publications/109/WAN_Issue_85.pdf

Or to request an accessible format version (Word document) contact Claireb@asylumaid.org.uk and / or if you would like to contribute to future editions or subscribe to WAN.

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