Eau de Jo

'Prostitutes in El Alto, outside La Paz, sewed their lips together as part of a hunger strike to demand that the mayor reopen brothels and bars he ordered closed after residents fed up with under-age drinking stormed the red-light district last week. ”We are fighting for the right to work,” Lily Cortez, leader of the Alto Association of Nighttime Workers, said on local television. Prostitution in Bolivia is legal. She was surrounded by about 10 prostitutes who had sewn their lips together with thread. Some 30 other women were shown fasting inside a medical clinic nearby. The leaders of an association representing bars, restaurants and karaoke establishments were also on a hunger strike, as were student activists who want the bars and brothels to stay shut.'

Bolivia: Prostitutes Sew Lips Together in Protest