{"id":573822,"date":"2026-07-29T13:06:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-29T13:06:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/573822\/"},"modified":"2026-07-29T13:06:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-29T13:06:08","slug":"womens-rights-group-supported-by-jk-rowling-withdraw-legal-challenge-against-belfast-festival","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/573822\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8216;Women&#8217;s rights&#8217; group supported by JK Rowling withdraw legal challenge against Belfast festival"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A LEGAL CHALLENGE by a group against\u00a0the cancellation of an event at the Belfast community arts festival\u00a0F\u00e9ile an Phobail has ended.<\/p>\n<p>Womens Rights Network Northern Ireland brought the challenge after the festival pulled an event scheduled to take place in the city on Tuesday of next week.<\/p>\n<p>However, the group today withdrew the legal proceedings after what it called \u201can agreement with F\u00e9ile an Phobail\u201d.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/feilebelfast.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/v7-Feile-August-2026_Online-4.pdf\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The festival programme<\/a> said the event would explore \u201cwomen\u2019s rights, law and legislative clarity\u201d, including \u201csex-based rights, single-sex spaces and fairness in women\u2019s sport\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>It did not list any speakers, but <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/ni_wrn\/status\/2077795312836427938\" rel=\"nofollow\">a poster for the event<\/a> featured the logos of anti-trans groups The Countess and Sex Matters, a European think-tank around \u201csex-based rights\u201d called Athena Forum, and Gaels for Fair Play, a group which campaigns against the inclusion of trans women in ladies\u2019 football and camogie.<\/p>\n<p>In a statement last week, the festival said it \u201cwas unaware from the initial submission that this event would promote campaigns against rights for the transgender community\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>Womens Rights Network Northern Ireland subsequently announced it was taking legal action against the festival and has rejected claims that it is \u201ctransphobic\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>It had sought an injunction in the High Court to prevent the festival\u2019s organisers from \u201crevoking, frustrating or denying the plaintiff access to the premises to hold the panel discussion\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>The group said in a statement this afternoon that the event would now go ahead at \u201calternative venue\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>In its own statement, F\u00e9ile an Phobail welcomed the court\u2019s decision and said it was a vindication of their decision to \u201cstand up for those who are marginalised\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cF\u00e9ile\u2019s decision to withdraw this event from our programme stands,\u201d the statement added.<\/p>\n<p>Correction:\u00a0The original version of this piece stated that the High Court had rejected the group\u2019s legal challenge, but has since been updated.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A LEGAL CHALLENGE by a group against\u00a0the cancellation of an event at the Belfast community arts festival\u00a0F\u00e9ile an&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":573823,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[4501,239156,42,73,43,2443,40,38,41,39,239767],"class_list":["post-573822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-belfast","tag-feile-an-phobail","tag-headlines","tag-high-court","tag-news","tag-northern-ireland","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories","tag-womens-rights-network"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573822","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=573822"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/573822\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/573823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=573822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=573822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=573822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}