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Finland on Thursday celebrates a century of full political rights for women, who were the first in the world to win the right to vote and be voted into office, and still enjoy a high profile -- as well as the top post in the land.
In 1906, Finland became the first country in Europe to give women the right to vote.
While elsewhere New Zealand and Australia had done the same in 1893 and 1902, respectively, nobody up until then had allowed women to be voted into office without restrictions.
After a general election in 1907, when the Nordic country was still a Russian grand duchy, 19 Finnish women promptly entered parliament. Meanwhile, in Britain women belonging to the suffragette movement still risked their lives for equal rights.
Norwegian women had to wait seven years, French women 38 years and Swiss women 66 years longer than Finns before winning the right to vote.
A century on, women still play a larger role in Finland's political life than in most other countries.
Finland's president, Tarja Halonen, is a woman. Other women deputies occupy 37.5 percent of parliamentary seats, placing them in fifth place worldwide, according to recent United Nations statistics.
Only Rwanda, with 48.8 percent, Sweden, with 45.3 percent, Costa Rica with 38.6 percent and Norway with 37.9 percent of female deputies are ahead.
Elsewhere in Europe, Germany is in 16th position with 31.8 percent and France takes a lowly 85th spot with 12.2 percent, the same as Slovenia.
Italy is the EU's worst performer with only 11.5 percent of parliamentary seats filled by women, while the worldwide average is hardly better, averaging 16.6 percent.
With eight female cabinet ministers out of 18, the Finnish government is also near the top worldwide.
Spain is the only European country where women enjoy complete parity in government, thanks to Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero.
Parliamentary representatives from Council of Europe members and 11 other countries are to take part in a commemoration ceremony in the Finnish single chamber parliament, the Eduskunta, which has 200 members, 76 of whom are female.
Women's voting rights and democratic reforms will be commemorated across Finland this year and next, until the country's 90th independence day anniversary on December 6, 2007, takes over as the main object of national celebrations.
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AFP 301040 GMT 05 06
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