PARIS: Oksana Shachko, one of the founders of the Femen feminist protest movement, has been found dead in her Paris apartment, the group said on Monday.
Activists from Femen, known for its bold topless protests, said the 31-year-old Ukrainian had been found on Monday with a suicide note next to her body.
“It is with great regret and deep pain that I must confirm the death of Oksana,” said Inna Shevchenko, one of Femen’s leaders, who also lives in the French capital.
Another Femen founder, Anna Gutsol, wrote on Facebook: “RIP. The most fearless and vulnerable Oksana Shachko has left us.
“We mourn together with her relatives and friends,” she said, adding that the group was awaiting “the official version from the police.”
Shachko was one of four feminist activists who founded Femen in Ukraine in 2008.
Exiled in France since 2013, she had since left the group and was working as an artist.
Operating under the slogan “I came, I stripped, I won,” Femen quickly drew attention around the world with its bare-breasted protests against sexism.
Their protests eventually started targeting authoritarianism and racism, with Russia’s Vladimir Putin a particular target, alongside France’s far-right National Front party.
But in recent years the group has struggled with internal divisions as well as legal proceedings against its members.
In 2011, Femen said Shachko was among three members “kidnapped” by security agents and forced to strip naked in a forest after staging a topless protest mocking Belarussian strongman Alexander Lukashenko.
The agents had poured oil over the three women, threatened to set them on fire, and cut off their hair, Femen said.
She was abducted again by unknown assailants during a visit by Putin to Ukraine, according to the group.
Femen’s lawyer said Shachko was beaten so badly that she was briefly hospitalized.
Protest movement co-founder Oksana Shachko found dead in Paris
Protest movement co-founder Oksana Shachko found dead in Paris
- Operating under the slogan “I came, I stripped, I won,” Femen quickly drew attention around the world
- Shachko was one of four feminist activists who founded Femen in Ukraine in 2008
Arts festival’s decision to exclude Palestinian author spurs boycott
- A Macquarie University academic who researches Islamophobia and Palestine, Abdel-Fattah responded saying it was “a blatant and shameless act of anti-Palestinian racism and censorship,” with her lawyers issuing a letter to the festival
SYDENY: A top Australian arts festival has seen the withdrawal of dozens of writers in a backlash against its decision to bar an Australian Palestinian author after the Bondi Beach mass shooting, as moves to curb antisemitism spur free speech concerns.
The shooting which killed 15 people at a Jewish Hanukkah celebration at Sydney’s Bondi Beach on Dec. 14 sparked nationwide calls to tackle antisemitism. Police say the alleged gunmen were inspired by Daesh.
The Adelaide Festival board said last Thursday it would disinvite Randa Abdel-Fattah from February’s Writers Week in the state of South Australia because “it would not be culturally sensitive to continue to program her at this unprecedented time so soon after Bondi.”
FASTFACTS
• Abdel-Fattah responded, saying it was ‘a blatant and shameless act of anti-Palestinian racism and censorship.’
• Around 50 authors have since withdrawn from the festival in protest, leaving it in doubt, local media reported.
A Macquarie University academic who researches Islamophobia and Palestine, Abdel-Fattah responded saying it was “a blatant and shameless act of anti-Palestinian racism and censorship,” with her lawyers issuing a letter to the festival.
Around 50 authors have since withdrawn from the festival in protest, leaving it in doubt, local media reported.
Among the boycotting authors, Kathy Lette wrote on social media the decision to bar Abdel-Fattah “sends a divisive and plainly discriminatory message that platforming Australian Palestinians is ‘culturally insensitive.'”
The Adelaide Festival said in a statement on Monday that three board members and the chairperson had resigned. The festival’s executive director, Julian Hobba, said the arts body was “navigating a complex moment.”
a complex and unprecedented moment” after the “significant community response” to the board decision.
In the days after the Bondi Beach attack, Jewish community groups and the Israeli government criticized Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for failing to act on a rise in antisemitic attacks and criticized protest marches against Israel’s war in Gaza held since 2023.
Albanese said last week a Royal Commission will consider the events of the shooting as well as antisemitism and social cohesion in Australia. Albanese said on Monday he would recall parliament next week to pass tougher hate speech laws.
On Monday, New South Wales state premier Chris Minns announced new rules that would allow local councils to cut off power and water to illegally operating prayer halls.
Minns said the new rules were prompted by the difficulty in closing a prayer hall in Sydney linked to a cleric found by a court to have made statements intimidating Jewish Australians.
The mayor of the western Sydney suburb of Fairfield said the rules were ill-considered and councils should not be responsible for determining hate speech.
“Freedom of speech is something that should always be allowed, as long as it is done in a peaceful way,” Mayor Frank Carbone told Reuters.
