FIRST LADIES DEMAND RIGHTS

On International Women's Day in March, Hillary Clinton warned that Ame rica's democratic values and way of life were threatened by the fact t hat 'half the world's citizens are undervalued, underpaid, under-educa ted, under-represented, fed less, fed worse, not heard, put down'. Mad eleine Albright followed by announcing that the advancement of women's rights was a US foreign policy priority. Why have women's issues been raised now by America's first two ladies, two years after the most re cent Women's Conference in Beijing? After all, the UN adopted the Conv ention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women as long ago as 1979 and issued a further Declaration on the Eliminati on of Violence Against Women in 1993.