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Women's councillor calls for "single voice against gender violence" amid spate of attacks.

Santa Cruz de Tenerife, November 9 2009

SANTA Cruz de Tenerife councillor for women Angela Mena called for a “single voice against gender violence” ahead of the November 25 International Day Against Gender Violence.

by James Tweedie

Ms Mena’s comments on Monday November 9 were a response to a spate of violent deaths of women in the Canaries this year.

The most tragic month of 2009 was May, when three women were murdered: Carmen Rosa Dorta in Guía de Isora on May 12, Emilia Esperanza Fernández Rodríguez in Tacoronte on May 20 and Santa Cruz resident Elizabeth Canino Rivero, whose body was discovered in La Laguna on May 28.

Maximina Rosario Rodriguez Denis was murdered in Gran Canaria on June 15 and on September 12 María Fernanda López de Furia was killed in Los Abrigos, Granadilla.
Ms Mena said that all five were victims of the kind of senseless violence which she had vowed to fight as part of the duties of her office.

Just two days later, local police in Santa Cruz announced that they had arrested two men for assaulting their partners in public and had gone to the aid of another victim, although they were unable to locate the alleged perpetrator in that case.

In the first case a police patrol responded to a report of a man attacking a woman in the vicinity of the military barracks near the British Consulate in Plaza Weyler.

The officers immediately spotted the 43 year-old woman, who told them that the culprit was a friend who she had left sleeping in her house.

A witness confirmed that there had been a heated argument which had ended in violence. The alleged attacker was found in a state of intoxication without ID documents and arrested.

In the second incident occurred in the nearby Valentin Sanz area, where officers found a man and woman arguing in the street.

The woman asked for help, saying that her partner was refusing to give her the keys to her home, and that he had attacked her and seized her violently by the neck. The 44 year-old man was arrested and the woman was taken to a health centre.

But the final case – which occurred behind closed doors – was the most shocking. A 48 year-old woman called alerted the police that she had been assaulted at home by her boyfriend.

The officers found the victim in a very nervous state with her clothes torn in several places.

She said that her partner had pushed her down the stairs, hit her several times and threatened her with a large knife. The officers found evidence of a major struggle in the flat.

Due to her injuries the police took the woman to a health centre before proceeding to the police station to determine the attacker’s identity.

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