Hamburg (Germany), July 16 - Irish women discussing community development, one of them concluding "Things have changed precious little for women."

New York literary figure Quentin Crisp proclaiming "I am of indeterminate sex."

African women learning new agricultural methods through the United Nations agency UNIFEM.

A woman from Ottawa (Canada) - who learned to read after the age of 60 - changing her understanding of the Biblical text "Wives, be obedient to your husbands."

An Afro-American health educator questioning his role as a man in a society of women seeking empowerment.

This variety of images, presented in short videos, fueled lively debate at the public round table "Learning Gender Sensitivity - Practicing Gender Justice" held yesterday ,evening at the Fifth International Conference on Adult Education (CONFINTEA), and moderated by American writer Lu Hanessian.

The multinational, multicultural panel of experts was comprised of five women and one man: the Honorable Josefina Bilbao, Minister of the National Women's Service, Chile; Juliette Dworzak, chairperson of the Board of Trustees of FEMNET, an NGO which maintains an information network for women, and also Director of the Gender and Research Studies Department of the University of Sierra Leone; Smaranda Enache, President of Liga Pro Europa, the first NGO established in Romania after the revolution - dealing with inter-ethnic and inter-cultural issues; Rabea Naciri, Professor at the University of Rabat, Morocco; Kasama Varavarn, Director-General of the Department of Non-Formal Education of the Ministry of Education of Thailand, and chairperson of the governing board of the UNESCO Institute for Education; and the Honorable John Mutorwa, Minister of Basic Education and Culture, Namibia.

"Gender justice is close to the heart of this conference’s participants," noted Ms Varavarn about the well-attended event.

The role of education - in combating genders stereotypes, in encouraging women to take control of their own lives and become full participants in their societies - was evoked from many different perspectives. The importance of accepting the difference between women and men and building partnerships based on mutual respect was stressed.

"What we are proposing is not a battle between men and women, but for them to share the world," said Ms Billbao. "We will keep the dialogue going," pledged moderator Ms Hanessian, as questions continued to come from the audience, long past the scheduled end of the debate.

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