Sexual and Gender-Based Violence

The chance for higher education, a job with a fair wage or respect in the home is not guaranteed for women in Haiti. Cases of gender-based violence frequent the women's ministry. Young men say that respect and equal opportunity for women are key to national development.

Marie Josie Joseph, 41, says that Haitian women live as if life is supposed to be hard.

Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega and the Sandinista government have failed the country's women. That was the message delivered by Azahalea Solís, an attorney and a member of Nicaragua's Autonomous Women's Movement, speaking at the Ben Lindner Center in Managua on January 17 to an audience of Nicaraguans and American students from various universities.

Wikigender would like to hear your views, lessons learned and best practices or policies in ending violence against women.

Increasing women's participation in politics and economy and ending violence against women to be a key focus of the visit.

MURDER is an everyday tragedy in Guatemala, one of the world's most violent countries. With around 15 killings a day, most violent deaths merit only a couple of paragraphs in the papers. But the slaying last week of two girls, aged six and 11, has shocked the country and been widely reported outside Latin America.

Jorge Velazquez struggled to watch the news this week.

The news headlines in Guatemala, which has one of highest murder rates in the world, are often enough to upset anyone.

But when Jorge recently saw the news that two young girls, aged around six and 12, had been found strangled to death in a street in Guatemala City, suddenly a flood of memories came back to him.

In 2004, a Kurdish woman was shot dead in her hospital bed in Istanbul for having had a baby out of wedlock. Her life was taken by relatives as the price of redeeming family honor. Last week, another Kurdish woman was shot dead in Paris because of her prominent role in one of the world's bloodiest guerrilla groups. Her life was taken by unknown assassins in an apparent bid to sabotage Ankara's fledgling efforts for peace with the rebels.

Men put down their guns 10 years ago here in Liberia, yet violence is still a regular and terrifying feature of women's lives.

Doctors report having treated babies who were raped, men are impregnating girls as young as 12 and any public conversation about the prevalence of female genital mutilation (practiced by the majority of the 16 tribes in Liberia) is taboo.

These are what true women warriors look like. Mujeres de la Guerra, Historias de El Salvador (documentary, book, photography) highlights 28 women leaders in El Salvador telling their stories of participating in the Salvadoran civil war and their continued work for justice and peace today.