El Salvador

El Salvador: Feminists Combat Violence against Women

From November 25 to December 11, approximately 2,000 feminists across El Salvador mobilized a large-scale initiative to combat violence against women.  AMS (Association for the Self-Determination and Development of Women), the Feminist Collective, the COMUN Collective, the Union of Women and other feminist organizations led this effort to demand that the government of El Salvador comply with its promises to quell the alarming trend of violence against women. The women of AMS, in conjunction with the Petateras and with support from JASS, presented their Report on Violence Against Women to the President of El Salvador on November 25.

Guatemala

United to End Violence against Women

November 25, the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, marked the annual 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence Campaign commences around the world. The UN decided to launch its 2009 global anti-violence campaign in Guatemala given the context of extreme violence and impunity there and following the Nobel Women’s Initiative (NWI) Conference on Women Redefining Democracy held in Guatemala this past May and the fact-finding mission and observatorio led by JASS allies, the Petateras and Radio Feminista.

Mesoamerican Declaration against Violence against Women

La Cuerda - Special Edition for Campaign against VAW (Spanish)

International Women's Democracy Conference

The Nobel Women’s Initiative, in partnership with JASS and the Rigoberta Menchú Tum Foundation, hosted “Women Redefining Democracy for Peace, Justice and Equality,” May 10-12, 2009, in Antigua, Guatemala. Women from around the world examined the challenges of democratization and reshaping democracy. Reporting on the conference is available on the JASS blog, JASS Facebook, the NWI blog, and Open Democracy.

Fact-finding Mission on Women & Violence in Guatemala

JASS and our allies, accompanied by one of international human rights lawyers handling the Juarez femicide case, Rhonda Copeland, conducted a fact-finding mission, May 13-14, 2009 in Guatemala City. Several women’s and human rights organizations gave testimony, including CONAVIGUA, Moloj, Sector de Mujeres, and the Human Rights Commission. The Guatemalan Petateras organized a Forum on Violence at San Carlos University, where testimonies and facts were shared among international and Guatemalan feminists to shed light on the situation of violence in Guatemala.

Americas Social Forum

Las Petateras, in collaboration with Feminist International Radio Endeavor (FIRE), mobilized with hundreds of feminist activists at the Americas Social Forum in Guatemala, October 7-12, 2008, accompanied by four grassroots activists from the US. Read the report

Feminist Declaration at the America's Social Forum

Nobel Women's Declaration of Solidarity

Urgent Action Letter to the Government of Nicaragua

Read the blog

See pictures

Honduras

Honduras: Solidarity with Teachers During Violent Clashes

JASS joined regional and international human rights allies in solidarity with the teachers’ union movements of Honduras whose members were attacked by Honduran military and police forces in Tegucigalpa, August 27 – 8. Four teachers were seriously hurt and all of the injured were denied medical attention at the main public hospital, according to Honduran Feminists in Resistance. Read JASS Mesoamerica Associate Daysi Flores' Blog. Read More.

Feminists in Resistance Take to the Streets

Hondurans inaugurated a new president on January 27, 2010, following November 2009's controversial elections. Feminists in Resistance joined the greater resistance movement in a march to the airport to bid farewell to the ousted president, Manuel "Mel Zelaya," who departed the country on the same day. JASS and the Nobel Women’s Initiative urge the Obama Administration to condemn violence perpetrated against women’s and human rights defenders since the coup. Read more.

Elections Alone Do Not Make a Democracy

Women’s and human rights defenders continue to suffer violence at the hands of state security forces in Honduras, and recent elections have done nothing to abate the attacks. Feminists and advocates have spoken out; JASS and the Nobel Women’s Initiative urge the Obama Administration to condemn these abuses and show the rest of Latin America that the US is serious about democracy, not mere political expediency. Read more.

Rallies in Solidarity with Honduran Women

JASS mobilized with hundreds of women across the Americas on July 22nd in solidarity with the Honduran Feminists in Resistance to the coup that occurred in Honduras on June 28th. Read more
Visit the Las Petateras blog.

Mexico

Women of Atenco Obtain Justice

On June 30, Mexico’s Supreme Court of Justice fully exonerated 12 community land rights activists from San Salvador Atenco, Mexico, each of whom had previously been sentenced to between 31 and 112 years in prison for crimes allegedly committed during clashes with the Mexican government in 2006. JASS Mesoamerica Regional Coordinator Marusia López Cruz has worked directly with the families of the incarcerated activists since 2007, connecting their struggle for justice to international advocacy efforts, including coordinating multiple advocacy visits to Mexico by 1998 Nobel Peace Laureate Jody Williams.

Demanding Justice for the Women of Atenco

In May 2006, Mexican police responded with violence to protests in the town of San Salvador Atenco, killing two people, injuring many more, and indiscriminately detaining town residents, as well as other bystanders not involved in the confrontation. Of the hundreds detained, at least 45 were women, many of whom were beaten, raped, and otherwise assaulted by police while in state custody.

Official complaints filed by the women who suffered abuses were ignored; in fact, many were charged with crimes such as "blocking public roads", convicted, and served prison time. Today, twelve people charged with more serious crimes remain in jail as political prisoners; they are victims in a long-running battle between monied interests and poor, indigenous people in Atenco who are fighting to defend their property rights and for the right to self-determination. Furthermore, despite several investigations, women who were assaulted by members of state security forces have yet to see their abusers brought to justice.

For over two years, JASS, in partnership with the Mexican organizations Consorcio para el Diálogo Parlamentario y la Equidad, the Frente de Pueblos en Defensa de la Tierra, and Comunicación e Información de la Mujer, as well as Las Petateras and the Nobel Women’s Initiative, have taken action in solidarity with the people of Atenco.

In September 2009, JASS, the Nobel Women’s Initiative, and allied Mexican organizations brought Nobel Peace Laureate Jody Williams to San Salvador Atenco, where she expressed support for the people of Atenco and called on the Mexican government to halt the repression.

Williams was joined by indigenous women fighting state repression in other parts of Mexico, including Oaxaca, Guerrero, and Chiapas. Martha Sanchez from the Guerrero Indigenous Women’s Coordinating Committee and the Indigenous Women’s Alliance for Mexico and Central America reminded the audience of the long history of “indigenous peoples and organizations fighting against caciques, militarization, and to end to policies that focus on integration, assimilation and the imposition of a single culture.”

In February 2010 Williams again traveled to Mexico to speak out on behalf of the people of Atenco. Williams advocated justice for the Women of Atenco and for the release of all who remain imprisoned as a result of the violent repression in 2006. In meetings with members of Mexico’s Supreme Court and with representatives of Mexico’s foreign ministry and the ministry of governance, and with members of congress, Williams presented each with a letter signed by 11 Nobel Laureates demanding justice for the people of Atenco. At a press conference on February 24, three members of Mexico’s Congress joined Williams and the other 10 laureates in their demand.

For press reports (in Spanish) about Nobel Peace Laureate Jody Williams’ February 2010 advocacy efforts, click here, here, here and here.

Members of the Frente de Pueblos en Defensa de la Tierra-Atenco thank Nobel Prize Winners for their support (in Spanish)

Murders in Juarez, Mexico

Emblematic of the violence and impunity facing Mesoamerican women, two young women – family members of two women’s human rights defenders – were brutally murdered in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico on November 28 and 29, 2009. In response, JASS and the Nobel Women’s Initiative released statements in English andSpanish calling on the Mexican government to bring an end to the violence.