A crowd of women and activists marched through Valletta calling for justice on International Women’s Day, with many holding placards highlighting institutional failures which have placed women in danger or resulted in their death.

The protest titled Women United Against Injustice walked through Valletta, with protestors holding placards highlighting institutional failures relating to the fight for justice for murder victim Sion Grech, and in the murder of Bernice Cassar.

Addressing the crowd, activist and academic Angele Deguara said that Women’s Day is recognised around the world as a day when women come together to fight oppression and fight for change.

Today we remember how women are denied social justice and how the court system leaves many women in situations against their will, she said.

“Women go through the legal system seeking protection, but end up with nothing - not even their families – and without justice, to the point that some of them are killed after they are failed by the system,” she said

Deguara said that “society is patriarchal in every possible way” and that women around the world are consistently humiliated, raped, abused, and killed by men, while men are themselves the leaders of the most important institutions which are there to protect everyone and not just those in power.

She said that the education system remains conservative and, instead of promoting change, continues to emphasise that men are superior and that women should be responsible for children and that it is therefore difficult to obtain a suitable work-life balance.

She also noted how women can still go to prison for getting an abortion.

“When we seek justice, the problems are never-ending.  Delays, deferred cases, prejudice, missing evidence, lack of coordination, continuous lack of resources and therefore continuous lack of justice,” Deguara said.

As a result, many do not feel that they are protected, she said.

She said that women even in court are humiliated by being asked how many partners they’ve had or what clothes they were wearing when they were raped.  She noted how women have to go through the “psychological abuse” of even being asked such questions in open court.

Deguara noted how the compilation of evidence in the case of the murder of Sion Grech was not done well, leading to her alleged killers being allowed to walk free after a trail.

She questioned who is responsible for such things, and said that it is women who are having to deal with the consequences of what is wrong in the system because they are the ones who end up getting killed.

“We want the institutions to work, and not to attend the funerals of more women who have had to deal with incompetent institutions,” she said.

"It is your fault - we want justice now,” she said of the institutions.

Moviment Graffitti activist Arianna Zunino also addressed the protest, saying that women continue to suffer inequality in a patriarchal society.

“We don’t want to hold anymore vigils for dead women. Enough is enough,” she said.