Mesoamerican Women Defenders Initiative is Awarded

International Letelier-Moffitt Human Rights Honor

6 June 2014. The Mesoamerican Women Human Rights Defenders Initiative is proud and pleased to be
named the 2014 recipient of the Letelier-Moffitt Human Rights International Award. Over the years, the
Letelier-Moffitt Award has recognized individuals, grassroots organizations and human rights groups on the
frontlines of the defense of human rights throughout the Americas. We are honored to join such a
distinguished group.

By bringing a gender analysis to the violent contexts they confront, and developing the political and
empowering nature of self-care, the Mesoamerican Initiativefounded in 2010 and managed by a
coordinating team of Consorcio para el Dilogo Parlamentario y la Equidad-Oaxaca, AWID, UDEFEGUA,
La Colectiva Feminista, Central American Womens Fund, the National Women Defenders Network in
Honduras, and JASS (Just Associates)seeks to strengthen and protect women and their movements, and
underline how human rights and gender equality are fundamental to any movement for peace and social
justice.

The award not only recognizes our efforts, but more importantly recognizes the critical role that women
human rights defenders play in the defense of all human rights and the difficult circumstances they work
under throughout the hemisphere. Women defenders in Mexico and Central America are on the front lines of
struggles for rights to land and territory, labor rights, sexual and reproductive rights and against violence.
They face grave dangers in the course of their work. This award motivates and inspires us to continue
working for the holistic protection of women human rights defenders, who are the backbone of social
movements for peace, equality and justice in Mexico and Central America, stated the members of the
coordinating team.

This International and U.S. award, hosted by the Institute for Policy Studies, is named for Chilean diplomat
Orlando Letelier and Ronni Karpen Moffitt, IPS colleagues who were killed in Washington D.C. Sept. 21,
1976 by a car bomb detonated by agents of Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet. The Institute explains that
"the awards honor these fallen colleagues while celebrating new heroes of the human rights movement from
the United States and the Americas." The Mesoamerican Women Human Rights Defenders Initiative is
thankful for this honor and commits its efforts to continue to protect and empower women defenders through
our own collective action and the support of the international human rights community represented by this
award.

For more information please contact us: imdefensoras@gmail.com



Red Nacional de
Defensoras de Derechos
Humanos Guatemala