WHRDs are women human rights defenders. They are women who work to defend human rights and all who defend women’s rights as human rights. They advocate for gender equality, economic and environmental justice, sexual rights and more.

On June 8, 2011, Ana Fabricia Cordoba, a member of the Ruta Pacifica de las Muerjes, was shot dead by an unidentified gunman. She was a community organizer and an outspoken advocate for human rights. She continued her work even with the knowledge that her repeated warnings of the threats against her life were routinely ignored. She was a WHRD.

On May 11, 2011, Maryam Bahreman, a member of Iran’s One Million Signatures Campaign, was arrested. She suffered 71 days in detention and 55 days in solitary confinement. She remains in prison, despite an order from the Prosecutor’s Office for her release. Maryam Bahreman is a WHRD.

Violence against human rights defenders is gendered, with women defenders working on women’s rights at increased risk of being threatened and suffering sexual harassment, sexual violence and rape. The Women Human Rights Defenders International Coalition (WHRD IC) was created in 2005 to address the issue of violence again WHRDs.

Together with AWID (Association for Women’s Rights in Development) the WHRD IC Working Group on Urgent Responses, of which MADRE is a member, has released a series of publications that focuses on the specific needs of  WHRDs at risk. The series highlights resources available to WHRDs and offers steps toward eradicating violence against them.

“Ten Insights to Strengthen Responses for Women Human Rights Defenders at Risk” is the latest in the series. It seeks to contextualize the violence that WHRDs face so that practices to protect them can be implemented. Insights include widening the sphere of who is considered a WHRD, using the Human Rights Defenders framework to protect WHRDs and making sure they have both international and local support systems.

In addition to being a member of the coalition, MADRE works worldwide to ensure the safety of women who are threatened with violence through projects like the Afghan Women’s Survival Fund and the Underground Railroad for Iraqi Women.

You can download a PDF of “Ten Insights” here. More about women human rights defenders can be found here .

The Farm Bill is up for reconsideration this year. Reviewed every five years, it’s a pivotal piece of legislation. The first round of Farm Bill hearings gets underway today, and we’ll be keeping a close eye on the developments.

What happens to the Farm Bill greatly impacts what we eat, what food costs and how safe our food is. It also affects international trade and climate change policy. Just in the past year, we’ve seen the devastating effects of food crises around the world – from Somalia, where thousands perished during the famine, to South Sudan, where worsening hunger threatens a massive food crisis. The new Farm Bill must respect the environment and help secure access to healthy food and clean water, in the United States and worldwide.

Unfortunately, insight into the deliberations already reveals a likely cut of 7 million acres from the Conservation Reserve Program. This decision would lead to 11.6 million metric tons of carbon that, usually absorbed by soil, would instead be released into the atmosphere, worsening the climate change threats of drought and famine.

But some have already pointed to two pieces of legislation worth rallying around: the Beginning Farmer and Rancher Opportunity Act that would invest in younger, sustainability-focused farmers and the Local Farms, Food, and Jobs Act of 2011 that would support small farmers and the local food movement.

The new bill will have to be ready by this summer in order to be passed before the 2008 version expires in September. As deliberations continue, we must demand a Farm Bill that supports sustainable development, addresses a worsening climate crisis and secures access to food for all.

When she was just 14 years old, Sahar Gul was married off to 30-year-old Ghulam Sakhi, a former soldier in the Afghan Army,  for approximately $5,000. When her husband’s family tried to force her into prostitution and she refused, they locked her in the basement bathroom and tortured her.

It was five months before she was rescued by the police of Baghlan Province in northern Afghanistan.

Sahar Gul’s horrifying story is just one of the few that have captured international attention in the years since the beginning of the Afghanistan War. We’ve heard of Bibi Aisha, whose nose and ears were cut off by her in-laws when she tried to escape her abusive marriage. We’ve heard of Gulnaz, who was charged with adultery for being raped and sentenced to twelve years in prison. Their stories are evidence of the widespread and entrenched human rights abuses that Afghan women face on a daily basis.

Over a decade after women’s rights and humanitarian needs were used by the US government as reason for going to war, Afghanistan remains a dangerous place for women. 87% of all women suffer domestic abuse. A woman’s life expectancy is around 45 years. One is eleven women dies during pregnancy.

The US occupation has exacerbated the harsh conditions of Afghan women’s lives.  It has supported a government that passed a law that allows husbands to deny food and water to their wives if they refuse sex, grants guardianship of children exclusively to their grandfathers and fathers and keeps women from being employed unless allowed to do so by their husbands.

But Afghan women are bravely combating these conditions. Even in the face of assassination for advocating for their rights, Afghan women continue to do so. MADRE created the Afghan Women’s Survival Fund to help some of these brave women women escape to safety. It has helped one such woman, Naseema, to escape with her three children from her violent husband.

More information about MADRE’s Afghan Women’s Survival Fund can be found here.

“In the network of broadcasters, I continue to find opportunities where I can develop myself professionally. In October, I represented the network in a meeting about political communication and the elections in Ecuador. Opportunities like these really help my work as an indigenous broadcaster.” – Magaly Rivera Huayta

In the village of Hercomarca, Peru, two women excitedly talk into a microphone in a crowded room. They are broadcasting the community’s only news program.

The broadcasters, Pelagia Gutierrez and Pio Mendoza, are part of the Voices for Justice radio program, conducted by MADRE’s sister organization CHIRAPAQ.

(c) CHIRAPAQ

Voices for Justice reaches hundreds of people in isolated Indigenous communities who do not otherwise have access to crucial news about health and human rights. Run by and for Indigenous women in Quechua and Spanish, the weekly radio program has expanded to more than 30 Indigenous communities in the Ayacucho region of Peru.

Recently, Voices for Justice held a launch event of the Anaconda Prize for Indigenous and Afro-Amazonic film. The event screened the film “The Image of all the People” and showcased an exhibition on forced sterilization of Indigenous women and on sexual and reproductive health. The exhibition also demanded that Peruvian law protect all women from human rights violations.

With MADRE support, CHIRAPAQ is able to strengthen an Indigenous communication network. While mainstream Peruvian media often marginalizes Indigenous Peoples and the issues they face, the broadcasters of Voices for Justice offer an alternative to that narrative.

By amplifying their voices, they work towards a future where the rights of Indigenous Peruvian women are guaranteed.

You’ve undoubtedly heard about the Susan G. Komen for the Cure Foundation’s disastrous decision to cut off nearly $700,000 in funding for Planned Parenthood last week. Disastrous for them, that is. Within days, Komen was backpedaling in the face of massive outrage by Planned Parenthood supporters.

At first, the Foundation claimed its decision was because of a new shift in policy, cutting funding for any organization under investigation by the government. Then they claimed it was because Planned Parenthood does not directly provide mammograms.

None of these claims could conceal the reality that this was a calculated and politically-motivated move to attack Planned Parenthood because of its vital work to provide abortions. (Others have provided more details about the ideological roots of the Susan G. Komen Foundation’s decision: see here.)

But I was furious, along with millions of other people, because once again, anti-abortion ideology was used to undermine women’s right to abortion as well as the right to health care in general. Komen-style scorched-earth strategies aiming to shut down Planned Parenthood for providing abortion simultaneously target many other essential women’s health services.

Abortions make up only 3% of all the services provided by Planned Parenthood. The rest include annual check-ups, birth control, and yes, breast cancer screenings. These services are often conveniently ignored by anti-choice activists bent on attacking abortion rights. And let’s not ignore the reality that access to abortion is an indispensable part of women’s reproductive choice.

I remember another time funding was used as a weapon in the arsenal of anti-choice activists. Last week’s debacle brought back ugly memories of the Global Gag Rule. That’s an on-again off-again US foreign policy that has barred organizations that received US funds from counseling, referring or providing information on abortion. That rule was reversed by President Obama upon taking office, but it’s still waiting in the wings for any future anti-choice President.

Because of the Global Gag Rule, under the Bush and other Republican administrations, clinics that lost funding were forced to shut down. In communities in the world’s poorest countries, health care providers were faced with a painful choice. They could give up on offering information about abortion (few offered abortion services in the first place) and end their advocacy for safe, legal abortion in their country. Or they could risk losing the funding that helped them stay afloat and provide—not just reproductive health services—but a full range of desperately-needed care to poor women and their families. Women lost in every scenario.

And women, starting with the poorest, will keep losing until we realize that women deserve the full range of reproductive rights, including abortions. Last week, a PR debacle forced the Susan G. Komen Foundation to reverse its terrible decision. But anti-choice activists and policies are still a threat to women receiving reproductive care, in the US and around the world.

From January 22 to January 31, the Nobel Women’s Initiative traveled to meet with women human rights defenders in Mexico, Honduras and Guatemala. Their mission was to hear and retell the stories of the various women they met along the way.

These three countries are among the most dangerous places in the world to be a woman. Honduras was recently declared by the United Nations the most violent place on earth. Five of the world’s ten most dangerous cities are in Mexico. And in Guatemala women continue to combat epidemic levels of gender-based violence.

Nobel Peace Laureates Rigoberta Menchú Tum and Jody Williams were joined by blogger Veronica Arreola, Filmmaker Pamela Yates and columnist Laura Carlsen, among others. The delegates blogged about their experiences in these three countries. You can read their entries by clicking here.

The delegates reflected on issues of violence against women, the ongoing drug wars, US foreign policy and Indigenous resource rights. But the most resounding issue was the widespread impunity that plagues citizens of Mexico, Honduras and Guatemala. As Jody Williams wrote, “women we met with said laws don’t matter unless they are implemented.  They want justice and an end to impunity.” One woman echoed that sentiment in her conversation with the delegates: “Impunity is the key to decades of oppression, disappearances, murders.  Impunity gives a ‘blank check’ to the government to continue its oppression.”

In response to such entrenched impunity, Veronica Arreola asked: “How do the women of Honduras operate within this broken structure? One thing is clear, they rely on each other. And they rely on us to listen and do what we can.”

That crucial need to listen and do what we can, that’s where organizations like MADRE and the Nobel Women’s Initiative come in. It’s why we work with local women who best understand the intricacies of the situations they face and who know how to overcome impunity, secure their rights and cut down on violence. MADRE is working with women’s organizations in Guatemala to combat femicide and demand rights for long-marginalized Indigenous Peoples. By listening to their needs, together we are making real change.

To read more about the Nobel Women’s Initiative delegation, hear stories from the women they met and to see pictures, click here.

On November 25, 2005, US Marines executed 24 unarmed civilians in Haditha, Iraq. Many of the victims were children. One was a 76-year-old man in a wheelchair. Following several attempts at a cover-up, it was revealed that US military Sergeant Frank Wuterich had ordered his men to “shoot first, ask questions later.” He was charged with nine counts of involuntary manslaughter, two counts of assault with a dangerous weapon and three counts of dereliction of duty.

Last week, Wuterich was sentenced to a reduction in pay and rank. He will serve no prison time for his part in the murders of two dozen Iraqi civilians.

Wuterich’s unconscionably light sentence is the end to a six year prosecution in which one Marine was acquitted and the charges against six others were dropped. It is also emblematic of the US occupation of Iraq. One million Iraqis have been  killed. Five million have been displaced. Millions more have been wounded and traumatized. Add to these a shattered infrastructure and gender-based violence at epidemic levels, and it becomes clear that Iraq has been devastated by this illegal war.

Wuterich’s sentence points to an unwillingness by the United States to acknowledge any of the legal or moral responsibilities it holds towards Iraq and its citizens. Even as troops withdrew from the country in December 2011, this responsibility remains.

MADRE stands with our Iraqi partners, the Organization of Women’s Freedom in Iraq (OWFI), as these women attempt to rebuild their country, reassert their rights and call on the US to take responsibility for a war that Iraqis will suffer from for decades to come.

To read more about MADRE’s work with OWFI, click here.

Last week marked Otto Perez Molina’s first week in office as Guatemala’s new president. For many, Molina’s first week was an important indication of the future of his presidency, especially with regard to Indigenous rights in Guatemala.

Molina has already appointed various military officials to his cabinet, many of whom are accused of vast human rights abuses against the Indigenous population during the country’s 36-year armed conflict. And while proclaiming respect for Indigenous communities in his inaugural speech, the flags symbolizing Indigenous peoples were removed from the National Palace and the Presidential offices upon Molina’s entry.

But as concerns arise over Indigenous rights under the new administration, former Guatemalan dictator Rios Montt has been forced to confront his role in the acts of genocide committed against Indigenous communities during the civil war. Under Montt’s seventeen-month rule, at least 1,771 people were killed, 1,485 girls were raped and 29,000 people were forcibly displaced from their homes.

The long-awaited decision to bring Rios Montt to trial comes as welcome news to Indigenous groups and human rights activists. However, news that the judge has allowed the former dictator to stand bail has upset many of the victims’ families, who are eager to see Montt brought to justice.

And while Montt will stand trial for the mass atrocities committed against Indigenous peoples in the 1980s, it is important to recognize the ongoing violence Guatemala’s Indigenous communities face. Just last year, 19 human rights defenders were assassinated, many of whom were advocating for Indigenous rights. And hundreds of Maya Q’eqchi’ families from Guatemala’s Polochic Valley remain displaced ten months after being violently pushed off their land by a sugar company claiming to own the land.

To learn more about crimes committed against the Indigenous population under Rios Montt’s rule and his trial, watch the video below:

A new report on the high level of sexual violence against displaced women and girls in Haiti has just been released. The report was authored by our friends at NYU Law’s Center for Human Rights and Global Justice (CHRGJ) and the Global Justice Clinic (GJC). Its findings link the high levels of rape to a fundamental and widespread lack of basic resources like sanitation, clean water and adequate food.

The report, “Yon Je Louvri: Reducing Vulnerability to Sexual Violence in Haiti’s IDP Camps,” identifies those most likely to be victims of sexual violence as young, female, with limited access to basic resources and living in camps with no participatory and responsive government structures. It also offers suggestions on both short and long term solutions to combating this rise in sexual violence. These include installing lighting in camps and locks in latrines, immediate access to medical services and legal assistance and long-term strategies for women’s economic empowerment.

MADRE and our Haitian sister organization KOFAVIV are working hard to make these recommendations a reality. We have called for similar efforts in numerous reports and in appeals to international legal bodies. And while many of these recommendations have yet to be implemented, MADRE and KOFAVIV are partnering to provide women with immediate solutions to the crisis. For example, flashlights and whistles serve the dual purpose of protecting women from attacks and giving a woman control over her life and her body. This newfound sense of control can lead to her empowerment in other realms, including politics. Our partners are also helping survivors of rape access medical care and legal support and holding job-skills trainings.

Together, MADRE and KOFAVIV are also combating another face of the epidemic: sexual exploitation and survival sex. Because of poverty and a lack of economic opportunity, many women and girls are forced to trade sex for shelter, money or even a single meal.

In the face of this epidemic, KOFAVIV is providing care and counseling as well as training sessions and skill-building activities to girls forced into survival sex. At the KOFAVIV Center, these young women receive a hot meal, participate in self-esteem workshops and take part in bonding activities such as jewelry making, tie-dying and learning to make artisanal crafts. By providing women and girls with the necessities they are often forced to trade sex for, they are out of harm’s way. Coupled with a knowledge of their rights and trainings to expand economic opportunity, KOFAVIV is helping these women build better futures. But KOFAVIV has run out of funding for this crucial project, leaving women and girls engaging in survival sex without the tools necessary to build economic independence, secure their rights and break their reliance on survival sex.

Learn more about survival sex among Haiti’s displaced by clicking here.

Midwives for Peace, our sister organization,  is a grassroots group of midwives who provide pre-natal care and childbirth support for women living in the West Bank and Israel. They hold regular meetings  that bring together Palestinian and Israeli midwives to join in friendship amidst conflict; there they discuss women’s health, offer support, and empower one another.

Midwives for Peace sent us news about one recent meeting in a town near Jerusalem, where an important issue was brought up:  a birthing center in a rural area in the northern West Bank  which offered crucial women-centered obstetric care had been shut down.

With the support of MADRE, Midwives for Peace are planning to reopen a local home-based birthing center to meet the urgent need for midwifery care.

(c) Jessica Alderman

One midwife said, “We believe that empowering birth experiences last a lifetime. We would like to do our part to provide more women with the opportunity to benefit from the high quality care that we provide.”

More information about Midwives for Peace’s work  can be found here and here.