Women’s Initiatives for Gender Justice and WITNESS launch Video Advocacy project to end violence against women in conflict zones
On 21 September 2010, Women’s Initiatives for Gender Justice and WITNESS launched a three-year video advocacy project to highlight and combat injustices committed against women in armed conflicts in Uganda, the Central African Republic (CAR), Sudan, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and Kenya.
The project, launched during the Clinton Global Initiative meeting in New York, will train women’s rights activists in conflict situations on the use of film to document gender-based violence and raise awareness about this epidemic as part of the global campaign for gender justice.
“ Videos about gender-based violence made by women’s rights and peace activists from within armed conflicts will provide compelling evidence of the extent of these crimes and the urgency for prevention and accountability” said Brigid Inder, Executive Director, Women’s Initiatives for Gender Justice. “Women’s organisations who assisted victims of the recent four-day siege of Luvungi village, eastern DRC, by militia groups where over 250 women and girls were raped, will be a part of this project and in a position to show the human suffering and impact of sexual violence” Inder said.
The Women’s Initiatives for Gender Justice and WITNESS will work together to:
- Train over 50 grassroots women’s rights organizations in Africa to use video to document violence against women and girls;
- Provide long-term, strategic support to key organizations – guiding them in the use of video to bolster local advocacy goals to end gender-based violence; and
- Produce in-depth videos on gender-based violence that will be screened for key decision-makers including domestic law and policy makers, United Nations agencies, and the International Criminal Court.