Women Human Rights Defenders
WHRDs are self-identified women and lesbian, bisexual, transgender, queer and intersex (LBTQI) people and others who defend rights and are subject to gender-specific risks and threats due to their human rights work and/or as a direct consequence of their gender identity or sexual orientation.
WHRDs are subject to systematic violence and discrimination due to their identities and unyielding struggles for rights, equality and justice.
The WHRD Program collaborates with international and regional partners as well as the AWID membership to raise awareness about these risks and threats, advocate for feminist and holistic measures of protection and safety, and actively promote a culture of self-care and collective well being in our movements.
Risks and threats targeting WHRDs
WHRDs are exposed to the same types of risks that all other defenders who defend human rights, communities, and the environment face. However, they are also exposed to gender-based violence and gender-specific risks because they challenge existing gender norms within their communities and societies.
By defending rights, WHRDs are at risk of:
- Physical assault and death
- Intimidation and harassment, including in online spaces
- Judicial harassment and criminalization
- Burnout
A collaborative, holistic approach to safety
We work collaboratively with international and regional networks and our membership
- to raise awareness about human rights abuses and violations against WHRDs and the systemic violence and discrimination they experience
- to strengthen protection mechanisms and ensure more effective and timely responses to WHRDs at risk
We work to promote a holistic approach to protection which includes:
- emphasizing the importance of self-care and collective well being, and recognizing that what care and wellbeing mean may differ across cultures
- documenting the violations targeting WHRDs using a feminist intersectional perspective;
- promoting the social recognition and celebration of the work and resilience of WHRDs ; and
- building civic spaces that are conducive to dismantling structural inequalities without restrictions or obstacles
Our Actions
We aim to contribute to a safer world for WHRDs, their families and communities. We believe that action for rights and justice should not put WHRDs at risk; it should be appreciated and celebrated.
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Promoting collaboration and coordination among human rights and women’s rights organizations at the international level to strengthen responses concerning safety and wellbeing of WHRDs.
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Supporting regional networks of WHRDs and their organizations, such as the Mesoamerican Initiative for WHRDs and the WHRD Middle East and North Africa Coalition, in promoting and strengthening collective action for protection - emphasizing the establishment of solidarity and protection networks, the promotion of self-care, and advocacy and mobilization for the safety of WHRDs;
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Increasing the visibility and recognition of WHRDs and their struggles, as well as the risks that they encounter by documenting the attacks that they face, and researching, producing, and disseminating information on their struggles, strategies, and challenges:
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Mobilizing urgent responses of international solidarity for WHRDs at risk through our international and regional networks, and our active membership.
Related Content
AWID Member Community Guidelines
Co-creating welcoming and safe spaces
The co-creation of our feminist realities starts with ourselves and how we treat each other. We are dedicated to creating and protecting safe and supportive spaces for our communities both online and in person. We also consider that safe and welcoming spaces are co-owned and co-created.
We expect our members to act in a manner that is ethical, responsible and consistent with the values of AWID and assume collective responsibility to ensure an atmosphere of mutual respect and solidarity.
All AWID members are encouraged to:
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Connect with others, help break isolation and further solidarity. It’s easy to feel lost and alone, and a little friendliness and responsiveness goes a long way.
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Interact and engage peacefully. Differences in opinion will naturally arise, so please think of these differences as useful for expanding your thinking and ways of seeing the world.
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Help build a space that recognizes and validates multiple lived experiences and diversities of bodies and gender expressions. Recognize that we all carry intersectional identities.
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Use inclusive language. Be respectful of how people want to be referred to in terms of gender identity or expression (like pronouns), and practice inclusive language.
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Listen and make adjustments in your behavior and ways of engaging if someone says they feel uncomfortable. Don’t ask others questions that you wouldn't want to be asked yourself.
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Help challenge oppressive behavior, which includes harassment, verbal or physical violence, violation of consent, and any action that perpetuates classism, ageism, ableism, racism, misogyny, heterosexism, transphobia and other oppressions. If needed, please reach out to AWID staff.
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Practice speaking and listening with an open mind and heart and without judgement.
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Be honest, open and heartfelt. Speak and share authentically about your experiences, your challenges, your hopes and dreams, and your vision for your own life and your community.
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Practice active listening and self-awareness. Be aware of how much time and space you are taking up- leave room for others, practice active listening and learning.
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Be mindful and credit others for their work and activism. Remember that we are all working collectively to contribute to change-- Ensure that you recognize the contribution of others and credit them when appropriate e.g. in discussions, or in articles, pictures etc.
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Stay safe! We encourage you to take measures to protect yourself online and in person, especially if you have reason to believe that speaking out will put you in danger. Members may use aliases or profile images that conceal their identity. For more information please refer to the “Digital Security First Aid Kit for Human Rights Defenders” produced by APC - Association for Progressive Communications.
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Respect the privacy needs of others! Do not share or forward any information without explicit permission.
Our Values
Solidarity
We take a position in solidarity with each other and diverse struggles for justice and freedoms. We strive to mobilize and strengthen collective action and practice meaningful ways of working with each other.
Human rights
We believe in a full application of the principle of rights including those enshrined in international laws and affirm the belief that all human rights are interrelated, interdependent and indivisible. We are committed to working towards the eradication of all discriminations based on gender, sexuality, religion, age, ability, ethnicity, race, nationality, class or other factors.
Responsibility, Accountability, and Integrity
We strive for transparency, responsible use of our resources, fairness in our collaborations and accountability and integrity with our members, partners, funders and the movements with(in) which we work. We are committed to reflecting on our experiences, sharing our learnings openly, and striving to change our practices accordingly.
Intersectionality
We believe that for feminist movements to be transformative and strong we must continue to work across our similarities and differences. We also must interrogate power and privilege both within and outside our movements.
Bodily autonomy, integrity and freedoms
We celebrate everyone's right to choose their identities, relationships, goals, work, dreams and pleasures, and what they do with their mind, body and spirit. We believe in working towards access to resources, information and safe and enabling environments that allow this to happen.
Justice and systemic change
We work towards a world based on social, environmental, and economic justice; and interdependence, solidarity, and respect. We work towards dismantling systems of oppressive power and against all its manifestations, including patriarchy, fundamentalisms, militarisms, fascisms and corporate power that threaten our lives and our world. We want a just world where resources and power are shared in ways that enable everyone to thrive.
Please note:
AWID reserves the right to delete comments, suspend or revoke membership when our community guidelines have been violated. AWID members are not authorised to represent AWID in any official capacity unless stipulated in writing. Members cannot use AWID spaces to proselytize or recruit members to join a religious faith or organisation. Members cannot use AWID spaces to request funds for personal use although links to external fundraising efforts or activism campaigns are permissible.
هل عليّ الإجابة على جميع الأسئلة مرة واحدة أو يمكنني العودة الى الاستطلاع؟
يمكنكم/ن حفظ اجوبتكم/ن والعودة للاستطلاع متى أردتم/ن ذلك. KOBO بحفظ مسودات إجاباتك في الزاوية العلوية اليسرى من صفحة الاستطلاع وإعادة تحميل سجلك عند العودة إلى الاستطلاع.
Navleen Kumar
"She was not a person. She was a power."
- a fellow activist remembering Navleen Kumar
Navleen Kumar was a fervent land rights and social justice activist in India.
With commitment and integrity, she worked for more than a decade to protect and restore the lands of Indigenous people (adivasi) in Thane district, an area taken away by property and land developers using such means as coercion and intimidation. She fought this injustice and crime through legal interventions at different courts, realizing that manipulation of land records was a recurrent feature in most cases of land acquisition. In one of the cases, that of the Wartha (a tribal family), Navleen found out that the family had been cheated with the complicity of government officials.
Through her work, she helped restore the land back to the Wartha family and continued to pursue other cases of adivasi land transfers.
“Her paper on the impact of land alienation on adivasi women and children traces the history and complexities of tribal alienation from the 1970s, when middle class families began to move to the extended suburbs of Mumbai as the real estate value in the city spiralled.
Housing complexes mushroomed in these suburbs, and the illiterate tribals paid the price for this. Prime land near the railway lines fetched a high price and builders swooped down on this belt like vultures, to grab land from tribals and other local residents by illegal means.”
-Jaya Menon, Justice and Peace Commission
During the course of her activism, Navleen received numerous threats and survived several attempts on her life. Despite these, she continued working on what was not only important to her but contributed to changing the lives and realities of many she supported in the struggle for social justice.
Navleen was stabbed to death on 19 June 2002 in her apartment building. Two local gangsters were arrested for her murder.
Snippet FEA Decent Pay (ES)

SALARIOS DECENTES
Reason to join 1
Forma parte de una organización feminista de membresía internacional y de una comunidad. Nuestrxs afiliadxs residen en todas las regiones del mundo. Aprenden entre sí y se brindan apoyo mutuo en una red global fundada en la solidaridad.
Yo, Imposible proyección: la guía de participación
Sidney Abbott
Реалии обеспечения ресурсами и состояние финансирования феминистских движений быстро меняются – является ли этот опрос единичным?
Нет, не является. Он основан на 20-летней истории AWID по мобилизации более объемного и качественного финансирования для социальных изменений под руководством феминисток(-ов) и является третьим этапом исследования «Где деньги для феминистских организаций?». Наша цель – проводить опрос «Где деньги?» каждые 3 года.
Nadyn Jouny
Lo personal es político, y la apasionada y valiente Nadyn Jouny personificó este mantra feminista. Nadyn experimentó de primera mano el dolor de la violencia estructural de los sistemas legales que despojan a las mujeres de sus derechos.
Cuando Nadyn decidió solicitar el divorcio, los tribunales religiosos chiítas, bajo las Leyes de Estatuto Personal Libanesas, le negaron la custodia de su joven hijo Karam. Nadyn, como tantas otras mujeres del Líbano y de otros países, se vio atrapada entre el dolor imposible de dejar una relación no deseada y abusiva y de perder a la vez los derechos sobre su hijo. Sin embargo, Nadyn se defendió, y lo habría de hacerlo hasta el último día.
Nadyn utilizó su habilidad con los medios de comunicación para convertirse en una voz franca a favor de las mujeres que luchan contra la discriminación en la legislación familiar, en el Líbano y a nivel internacional. Nadyn cofundó el grupo autofinanciado "Protecting Lebanese Women" [Protegiendo a las Mujeres Libanesas] (PLW, por sus siglas en inglés) y se unió a muchas otras madres libanesas que se enfrentaban a problemas similares de custodia. Juntas, trabajaron para crear conciencia sobre las injusticias extremas a las que se enfrentaban, a nivel nacional, protestaron ante los tribunales religiosos por sus derechos y, a nivel internacional, llamaron la atención de los medios de comunicación.
Nadyn también trabajó con ABAAD - Resource Center for Gender Equality [Centro de Recursos para la Igualdad de Género], otra organización por los derechos de las mujeres en el Líbano, para realizar campañas en favor de los derechos de las mujeres, la igualdad en la legislación familiar y relativa a las custodias y contra los matrimonios forzados y precoces.
Para muchxs de sus colegas, Nadyn llegó a "simbolizar la lucha de una madre libanesa contra la supresión y la misoginia de todo tipo" (en inglés), al utilizar "su experiencia personal y trayectoria individual de empoderamiento, dio a otras mujeres esperanza para que ellas también pudieran ser un catalizador para el cambio positivo" - ABAAD - Centro de Recursos para la Igualdad entre los Géneros, Líbano.
El 6 de octubre de 2019, Nadyn murió trágicamente en un accidente de automóvil cuando se dirigía a protestar por los injustos aumentos de impuestos en un país que ya se enfrentaba a una espiral de crisis financiera. Nadyn Jouny tenía solo 29 años en el momento de su muerte.
Snippet FEA Sopo Japaridze Quote (FR)
"Nous savons que tout est contre nous et il y a très peu de chances de changer cela. Mais nous croyons en l'intervention et je pense que nous avons une opportunité et nous devrions l'utiliser. C'est pourquoi nous faisons tout ce que nous faisons. Nous sommes prêt·e·s à pousser pour des choses inouïes."
Sopo Japaridze dans OpenDemocracy
Photo @სოლიდარობის ქსელი / Solidarity Network
Reason to join 6
Participez au Forum international de l'AWID - un rassemblement féministe mondial majeur - et bénéficiez de réductions spéciales et de points d'entrée pour le dialogue virtuel réservés aux membres de l'AWID. Co-créé par des mouvements féministes, le Forum est un espace unique de discussion profonde et d'imagination où nous remettons en question et renforçons notre organisation, et joignons nos luttes et nos réalités féministes.
Ali Chavez Leeds

«Tasseography» (Tasséomancie)
La tasséomancie est une méthode de divination qui interprète les motifs dans les feuilles de thé et/ou le marc de café. Il s’agit d’une pratique qui se transmet par les femmes de mon côté arménien et qui m’a été enseignée par ma mère, qui elle-même l’a apprise de sa mère, et ainsi de suite. Lorsque je regardais ma grand-mère lire le marc de café du café arménien préparé pour la famille et les amis, je remarquais que, souvent, elle voyait ce qu'elle avait envie de dire. Ces gravures disent certaines des choses que j’ai envie de voir dans le monde ; j'espère que vous aussi.

«Our Promise» (Notre promesse)
Cette gravure célèbre la résilience, le sacrifice et la force des combattant·e·s de la liberté de l’Asie du Sud-Ouest et de l’Afrique du Nord à travers l'histoire et la solidarité qui existe. Elle a été inspirée à l'origine par un article que j'ai lu sur une exposition organisée à Tatvan, un district de Bitlis, qui mettait en lumière la présence arménienne dans la région. Mes ancêtres sont originaires de Bitlis, se situant aujourd'hui sur le territoire de la Turquie actuelle.

«Looking at the Cup» (Regarder la tasse)
La tasséomancie (la lecture du marc de café) est une pratique culturelle utilisée par les femmes arméniennes depuis des siècles pour se parler entre elles et les unes aux autres, un langage codé permettant d'entamer des conversations, d'établir des relations et de tisser des liens.
À propos d’Ali Chavez Leeds
![]Ali Chavez Leeds portrait](/sites/default/files/styles/max_325x325/public/2021-10/portrait.jpeg?itok=0yU3PqLe)
Suzette Jordan
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Se tiver alguma dúvida ou questão, entre em contacto connosco através deste formulário, indicando "Inquérito WITM" (WITM Survey) no título da sua mensagem.
Doris Valenzuela Angulo
Doris Valenzuela Angulo était une activiste sociale, leader et défenseure des droits humains afrodescendante de Buenaventura, en Colombie. Elle faisait partie du réseau national Comunidades Construyendo Paz en Colombia (CONPAZ, Communautés construisant la paix en Colombie) composé d’organisations présentes dans les communautés affectées par le conflit armé œuvrant en faveur de la non-violence et la justice socio-environnementale.
Doris s’opposait à la violence paramilitaire continue, aux pressions incessantes des mégaprojets cherchant à déplacer sa communauté, et à la complicité de l’État. Confrontée à l’un des contextes les plus difficiles de son pays, elle joua un rôle de premier plan dans l’initiative de résistance non-violente sans précédent Espacio Humanitario Puente Nayero, un lieu urbain conçu pour assurer la cohésion communautaire, la sécurité, la créativité et l’action collective.
Ce combat non-violent unique en son genre des familles de l’Espacio Humanitario Puente Nayero attira l’attention et le soutien des agences tant locales qu’internationales. En septembre 2014, la Commission interaméricaine des droits de l’Homme accorda des mesures de protection préventives à la communauté, ordonnant au gouvernement colombien d’adopter des mesures nécessaires en vue de protéger la vie et l’intégrité physique des habitant·e·s. Les menaces et la violence des paramilitaires se poursuivirent néanmoins. Malgré l’assassinat de son fils Cristian Dainer Aragón Valenzuela en juillet 2015,Doris continua à mettre toute son énergie à éviter le recrutement forcé des enfants et des jeunes par les néo-militaires. Elle devint alors également une cible, recevant constamment des menaces pour son activisme et le travail qu’elle accomplissait.
Les incessantes agressions et menaces de mort dont elle était l’objet forcèrent Doris à quitter la Colombie. Elle vécut en Espagne de février 2017 à février 2018, dans le cadre du programme de protection temporaire d’Amnesty International pour les défenseur·e·s des droits humains en danger.
Doris a été assassinée en avril 2018 à Murcie, en Espagne, par son ex-compagnon. Elle n’avait que 39 ans.
Hommages :
« Doris, cette année passée avec toi nous a montré combien une personne peut avoir la capacité de transformer et créer de l’espoir en dépit des événements profondément négatifs et dévastateurs qui jalonnent sa vie... Nous poursuivons notre engagement à défendre tous les droits humains. Ton courage et ta lumière nous guideront toujours. » - Montserrat Román, Amnesty International, Groupe de La Palma, Espagne
Extrait de « Mots pour Doris Valenzuela Angulo », d’Elsa López
« ... Tu le savais. Tu l’as toujours su. Et malgré tout cela, tu as résisté sans faillir à tant d’injustice, de misère, de persécution. Tu t’es élevée, fière et acharnée, contre ceux qui continuaient à vouloir que tu abandonnes tout espoir, que tu t’abaisses, que tu te rendes. Debout, tu as réclamé haut et fort ta liberté et la nôtre, qui était la tienne. Rien ni personne n’est parvenu à paralyser tes efforts pour changer le monde et le rendre plus généreux et plus vivable. Tu vis parmi nous, aujourd’hui plus vivante que jamais malgré la mort. Tu vis encore par tes actes, par ton courage, par ta grandeur lorsque tu pleurais pour cette terre promise que tu invoquais à chacun de tes cris, pour tous ces déserts que tu as habités. Toi. Toujours en vie. Doris Valenzuela Angulo.
Ce ne sont que des mots. Je sais. Je le sais, moi aussi. Mais les mots nous unissent, nous protègent, nous donnent la force et le soutien nécessaires pour continuer à aller vers la lumière que tu défendais tant... »
Snippet FEA Union Otras Photo 1 (EN)

