Human Rights Council (HRC)
The Human Rights Council (HRC) is the key intergovernmental body within the United Nations system responsible for the promotion and protection of all human rights around the globe. It holds three regular sessions a year: in March, June and September. The Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) is the secretariat for the HRC.
The HRC works by:
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Debating and passing resolutions on global human rights issues and human rights situations in particular countries
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Examining complaints from victims of human rights violations or activist organizations on behalf of victims of human rights violations
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Appointing independent experts (known as “Special Procedures”) to review human rights violations in specific countries and examine and further global human rights issues
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Engaging in discussions with experts and governments on human rights issues
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Assessing the human rights records of all UN Member States every four and a half years through the Universal Periodic Review
AWID works with feminist, progressive and human rights partners to share key knowledge, convene civil society dialogues and events, and influence negotiations and outcomes of the session.
With our partners, our work will:
◾️ Raise awareness of the findings of the 2017 and 2021 OURs Trends Reports.
◾️Support the work of feminist UN experts in the face of backlash and pressure
◾️Advocate for state accountability
◾️ Work with feminist movements and civil society organizations to advance rights related to gender and sexuality.
Related Content
What is the United Nations Financing For Development Process?
The United Nations (UN) Financing for Development (FfD) process seeks to address different forms of development financing and cooperation. As per the Monterrey Consensus it focuses on six key areas:
- Mobilizing domestic financial resources for development
- Mobilizing international resources for development: foreign direct investment and other private flows
- International trade as an engine for development
- Increasing international financial and technical cooperation for development
- External debt
- Addressing systemic issues: enhancing the coherence and consistency of the international monetary, financial and trading systems in support of development.
Sarah Maldoror
“I’m no adherent to the concept of the ‘Third World’. I make films so that people - no matter what race or color they are - can understand them. For me there are only exploiters and the exploited, that’s all. To make a film means to take a position.” - Sarah Maldoror
Her groundbreaking film and “revolutionary picture” Sambizanga (1972) follows Angolan militants’ anti-colonial liberation struggle, as well as captures a woman’s perspective in a historical moment she finds herself in.
“For many African filmmakers, cinema is a revolutionary tool, a political education to raise consciousness. It is inscribed in the evolution of a Third Cinema striving to decolonize thought and advocate radical changes in society.” - Sarah Maldoror
Throughout her career, Sarah - together with a number of African and Caribbean artists - co-founded (1956) the first Black theatre troupe in France. She made around 40 films, comprising important documentaries that amplify the lives and work of black artists, including her friend and poet Aimé Césaire who wrote to her:
“To Sarah Maldo
who, a camera in hand,
fights oppression, alienation
and flies in the face
of human bullshit.”
Sarah was also committed to giving African women more ownership of the filmmaking process. In an interview, she pointed out:
"African women must be everywhere. They must be in the images, behind the camera, in the editing room and involved in every stage of the making of a film. They must be the ones to talk about their problems."
Sarah left an incredibly powerful legacy to be carried forward.
Born 19 July 1929, Sarah passed away on 13 April 2020 from complications of the coronavirus.
Watch Sambizanga and read a film review in a 1973 New York Times article
Snippet FEA Union Otras Photo 5 (ES)

Snippet - Join CSW69 Conversations Intro_ES
Súmate a través de nuestras conversaciones #CongelarFascismos
Mientras atravesamos las múltiples crisis globales, los movimientos infatigablemente construimos el poder más allá de las estructuras de poder tradicionales. La ola de órdenes ejecutivas que ha emitido la presidencia de los EE.UU. tiene la intención de amedrentarnos, pero no hay ideología fascista capaz de borrar nuestra existencia y resistencia.
Te invitamos a formar parte de la campaña de construcción de solidaridad para poner al descubierto y resistir a las fuerzas fascistas que socavan los movimientos feministas y por la justicia de género en tu contexto.
- Provoca conversaciones en espacios valientes: Comparte historias de lucha y resistencia a los fascismos en tu contexto en la plataforma de la Comunidad de AWID. ¿No te has afiliado aún? Únete aquí.
- Apoya a los movimientos que se han visto afectados: Amplifica las iniciativas de recaudación de fondos, las oportunidades de dotación de recursos y los esfuerzos de ayuda mutua mediante la etiqueta #CongelarFascismos (estamos en X, Instagram, LinkedIN, y también en Bluesky)
- Organízate alrededor de distintas alternativas: Hemos construido nuestra comunidad de práctica sobre alternativas económicas feministas y recursos autónomos. Inscríbete para participar aquí. (en inglés)
14th AWID international Forum is cancelled (forum page)
El 14°Foro Internacional de AWID ha sido cancelado
Dada la situación global, nuestra Junta Directiva tomó la difícil decisión de cancelar el Foro que estaba programado en 2021, enTaipei.
Can I submit a session proposal?
The call for session proposal is now closed.
We launched a Call for Activities on November 19 2019 and the last date to receive proposals was February 14, 2020.
Carmela Elisarraraz Mendez
María Digna Montero
María Digna Montero fue una garífuna (afrodescendiente e indígena) defensora de la tierra e integrante de la Organización Fraternal Negra Hondureña (OFRANEH), una organización de base que trabaja para proteger a las comunidades garífunas, sus derechos ancestrales, su cultura, sus recursos y su territorio.
María también enseñaba en la escuela local, e integraba el grupo de trabajo de Educación Bilingüe Intercultural de OFRANEH.
El 12 de octubre (Día de la Resistencia Indígena) de 2019, sujetos desconocidos le dispararon a María varias veces en el patio de su casa.
Fue una de las seis defensoras garífunas asesinadas entre septiembre y octubre de 2019 y, según OFRANEH, no hubo ninguna investigación de estos crímenes por parte de las autoridades. En un comunicado oficial, la organización también subrayó la conexión entre la violencia contra líderes garífunas y el incremento de las industrias extractivas que explotan los recursos naturales en sus comunidades, y definieron esta violencia como «parte de una estrategia de intimidación y de expulsión sistemática por parte del Estado de Honduras.»
«El recrudecimiento de la tensión y de los riesgos crecientes para la seguridad y derechos humanos de las lideresas en las comunidades y territorios ancestrales es producto del despojo, desplazamiento y criminalización hacia las comunidades, y de los mega proyectos extractivos que impulsa el Estado junto con las corporaciones nacionales e internacionales.» - Pronunciamiento de OFRANEH, 13 de octubre de 2019
Snippet FEA Principles of Work S4 (FR)

HORIZONTALITÉ
Snippet - Feminist Mixer - ES
Encuentro feminista: Citas rápidas para feministas
✉️ Requiere inscripción previa. Regístrate aquí
📅 Martes 11 de marzo de 2025
🕒 De 06:00 a 08:00 p. m.,
🏢 Chef's Kitchen Loft with Terrace, 216 East 45th St 13th Floor New York
Organiza: AWID
“Where is the Money for Women’s Rights?" AWID’s WITM Toolkit (landing page intro) FR
Une nouvelle édition de la recherche Où est l'argent ? est en cours.
En savoir plusUne méthodologie de recherche autogérée

L’AWID propose la Boîte à outils « Où est l’argent pour les droits des femmes? » (« Where Is The Money for Women's Rights? », WITM) pour soutenir les individus et les organisations qui souhaitent mener leur propre recherche sur les tendances de financement en adaptant la méthodologie de recherche de l’AWID à une région, une question ou une population spécifique.
La Boîte à outils WITM de l’AWID est le produit de dix ans de recherches. La rméthologie WITM de l’AWID proposent une démonstration politique et pratique des ressources et des étapes qu’exige une solide recherche-action.
L’équipe 'Ressources des mouvements féministes' offre également un soutien technique et politique, avant et pendant le processus de recherche. Parcourez la boîte à outils et contactez fundher@awid.org si vous souhaitez plus de renseignements.
When can I register for the Forum?
We will announce this soon. Stay tuned!
Carole Seymour-Jones
Nilcéa Freire
Nilcéa Freire était une activiste, politicienne et universitaire brésilienne. Ardente défenseuse des droits des femmes et des minorités sous-représentées dans le pays, sa vie et son travail ont été marqués par une longue histoire de luttes et de victoires.
"Nous devons, tout en résistant, continuer à chercher à progresser, et ce que nous pouvons accomplir actuellement, je pense que nous le devons à la fantastique organisation des jeunes femmes blanches, et surtout des femmes noires, dans toutes les capitales d’États et les grandes villes brésiliennes.” - Nilcéa Freire
En 1999, elle est devenue la première femme à occuper le poste de doyenne de l'université d'État de Rio de Janeiro. Elle y a dirigé la mise en œuvre de la première politique d'action positive pour les étudiant·e·s des écoles publiques, demandant au sein d’une école publique que des places soient spécifiquement réservées aux étudiant·e·s noir·e·s à faible revenu. Ce système a été adopté dans des dizaines d'autres universités publiques.
Quelques années plus tard, Nilcéa dirigea le Secrétariat spécial des politiques pour les femmes sous le gouvernement de l'ancien président Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. C’est à ce titre qu’elle conduisit la première Conférence nationale des femmes. Plus de 12 000 femmes de tout le pays y participèrent et le résultat de ce travail collectif fut incorporé dans le Plan national des politiques pour les femmes.
Son engagement envers les femmes, les Afro-Brésilien·ne·s et les populations autochtones se reflète aussi fortement dans son travail de défense de leurs droits, qu’elle a mené dans le cadre des initiatives du bureau de la Fondation Ford du Brésil, dont elle était la directrice régionale.
L’activiste féministe Manoela Miklos a dit de Nilcéa qu'elle était "une femme sans égal·e".
Nilcéa s’est éteinte à Rio de Janeiro à l'âge de 66 ans, le 29 décembre 2019, des suites d’un cancer.
"Je n’ai pas de mots face à l’annonce de la mort de notre chère Nilcéa Freire. Il m’est trop triste de savoir qu’elle est partie si tôt. Elle s’est toujours rangée du côté de celleux qui ne tolèrent pas les injustices de ce monde. Elle était la ministre des femmes, sans cesse engagée dans la cause féministe. Elle nous manquera beaucoup!” - Jandira Feghali, Federal Deputy
Snippet - CSW69 On feminist resourcing today - FR
Sur le financement féministe aujourd’hui
- Répondre au quiz « Où est l’argent? » ici
- Our Resource (en anglais)
- Ressources autonomes : comment les activistes peuvent apporter des ressources à notre propre activisme?
- Ce que nous pouvons apprendre des féministes qui se financent elles-mêmes
FRMag - United against violence
United against the violence
by Karina Ocampo
In a hidden corner of Chiapas, Mexico, women and sexual dissidents have come to organize our actions. (...)
< artwork by Sonia Carolina Madrigal Loyola
About the AWID International Forum
More than an event!
The AWID International Forum is a truly global space that gives participants an opportunity to network, build alliances, celebrate, and learn in a stimulating, emotive and safe atmosphere.

More and more, we are trying to bring the Forum process outside of the convening’s borders. Engaging with partners and deepening relationships all year round, connecting with local movements to better understand problems and co-create solutions. The Forum event itself, held every three to four years in a different region of the world, is just a crystallization of all these alliances that we are building as part of our work.
The AWID Forum dissolves our inner and external boundaries, fosters deep discussion, personal and professional growth, and strengthens our movements for gender justice and women’s rights.
As a convening, it is a response to the urgency to promote stronger and more coordinated engagement and action by feminists, women’s rights and other social justice advocates, organizations and movements. We also believe that the Forum is more than just an event – it can facilitate a process to influence thinking and set agendas for feminist movements and other related actors.
Evolving from a national conference of around 800 people, the event now brings together around 2000 feminists, community leaders, social justice activists, and donor agencies from around the world.
The 14th AWID International Forum will take place 11-14 January 2021 in Taipei, Taiwan.
The past Forums
2016 - Feminist Futures: Building Collective Power for Rights and Justice (Costa de Sauipe, Brazil)

Given the complex world that we face today, the 2016 AWID Forum did not focus on a particular “issue”, but rather on creating more effective ways of working together!
Despite the challenging contexts in which the 2016 Forum took place (the Zika epidemic, a strike by Brazilian foreign-service workers, the impeachment of President Dilma Rousseff and subsequent turmoil), it succeeded in bringing together over 1800 participants from 120 countries and territories across all regions of the world.
What happened at the 13th AWID international Forum:
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For 96% of participants who responded to the post Forum evaluation survey, the Forum was a major source of inspiration and energy.
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98% of participants considered it an important convening space for feminist movements and expressed hope that AWID continues to organize forums.
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59% of Forum evaluation survey respondents declared to be very satisfied with the Forum and 34% somewhat satisfied.
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Over 150 sessions were delivered in different formats on a variety of topics ranging from bodily integrity and freedoms, to gender-based violence in the workplace, to strategies for building collective power.
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The first-time Black Feminisms Forum (BFF), held just before the main AWID Forum, brought together 250 Black feminists from all over the world to co-create a powerful space to build and strengthen ongoing, intergenerational, transnational connections
Read more about what the 2016 AWID Forum achieved:
Download the Forum evaluation report
2012 - Transforming Economic Power to Advance Women's Rights and Justice (Istambul, Turkey)

The 12th AWID Forum was the largest and most diverse AWID Forum to date, bringing together 2239 women’s rights activists from 141 countries. Of these participants, around 65% were from the Global South and close to 15% were young women under 30, and 75% attended an AWID Forum for their first time.
The Forum program focused on transforming economic power to advance women’s rights and justice and featured over 170 different kinds of sessions including feminist economics toolbox skills-building sessions, breakout sessions representing all 10 Forum themes, in-depth sessions, and solidarity roundtables.
Building on the momentum of the 2012 Forum, we transformed the website into a resource and learning Hub, which builds on the content generated by participants by featuring multi-media resources on all Forum components.
Visit the 2012 Forum web archive
All AWID Forums
- 2016: Feminist Futures: Building Collective Power for Rights and Justice (Costa de Sauipe, Brazil). Read the 2016 Forum Evaluation report
- 2012: Transforming Economic Power to Advance Women's Rights and Justice (Istanbul, Turkey)
- 2008: The Power of Movements (Cape Town, South Africa). Read our 2008 Forum Report
- 2005: How does change happen? (Bangkok, Thailand)
- 2002: Reinventing Globalization (Guadalajara, Mexico)
- 1999: Leading Solutions for Equality and Justice (US)
- 1996: Beyond Beijing From Words to Action (US)
- 1993: Joining Forces to Further Shared Visions (US)
- 1991: Working Together/Learning Together: A South North Dialogue (US)
- 1989/1990: Global Em-Powerment for Women (US)
- 1987: Moving Forward: Innovations in Development Policy, Action and Research (US)
- 1985: Women Creating Wealth; Transforming Economic Development (US)
- 1983: ‘Women in Development’ (Washington D.C, US)
Do I have to be an AWID member to participate in the Forum?
No, you don't have to be an AWID member to participate but AWID members receive a discounted registration fee as well as a number of other benefits.