Cross Cutting Initiatives

Consultation outputs:

Output 1: Challenges identified
On the 1st day of the Consultation there were country presentations from India, Indonesia, Thailand, Sri Lanka and Malaysia identifying post-tsunami challenges faced by women in these countries. These have been summarised in the Statement released after the meeting.

Output 2: Women’s rights violations in the tsunami aftermath documented and used in advocacy efforts
Testimonies of the tsunami survivors on women’s rights violations during the Aceh meeting were videotaped and compiled into a 30 minute documentary film entitled “Why are women more vulnerable during disasters?” The film was presented during the Asia Pacific NGO Consultation with the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women, Dr. Yakin Erturk, in Bangkok, October 5-6, 2005. There was a special session at the Consultation on the tsunami’s impact on women with Titi Soentoro, Fatima Burnad and Cholpon Akmatova as the panel speakers. The film received good feedback from the participants, including Yakin Erturk herself, who took a copy of the film to use in her work and suggested that the film is a valuable tool for raising gender awareness in disaster management and should be distributed to UN Divisions for disaster response and humanitarian affairs.

To mark 1 year after the tsunami, copies of the film and the publication “Why are women more vulnerable during disasters?” were sent to the President of Indonesia and the Primer Ministers of India and Sri Lanka along with the letters expressing the network’s concern with the lack of progress in the post-tsunami rebuilding process and marginalisation and exclusion of women from the reconstruction efforts.

Output 3: The survey framework, questionnaire and schedule developed and agreed
The Aceh Consultation was a starting point of the documentation project "Survey of Women’s Human Rights Violations in the Tsunami Aftermath and Guidelines for Gender Sensitive Disaster Management and Relief." Women’s groups who expressed commitment to conduct the survey had a separate workshop to discuss the methodology, the survey plan and framework.

Solidaritas Perempuan, the organisation coordinating the survey in Aceh, planned to use Feminist Participatory Action Research Approach (FPAR) as the basis for their research. They presented the FPAR principles to the Consultation participants. The researchers from other countries expressed interest in using the FPAR approach in the survey. The researchers from India, Indonesia and Thailand expressed the need for training in FPAR methods for researchers and documenters since using FPAR methodology implies involving women from the communities affected by the tsunami to collect and analyse the data.

The survey framework and questionnaire for the data collection were drafted and circulated before the Aceh Consultation. Although there are country-specific issues the researchers agreed to use the survey framework and the questionnaire as a guiding set of questions for collecting and analysing the survey data to ensure that the major areas of concern and overarching issues are covered by the survey and in the report. The questionnaire will be used for individual interviews and focus group discussions. Each research group will have to adapt the questionnaire to their country context and the focus group such as fisher women, migrants, Dalit, Irula etc. The participants also recommended using CEDAW and other human rights documents as the basis for the questionnaire. At least, 100 interviews with women-survivors, local women’s organisations, community leaders, humanitarian aid providers and government officials who have been involved in the post-tsunami relief and reconstruction process will be conducted in each country.

The agreement was reached among the research groups about the project timeline:

• The country research coordinators shall submit the 1st draft of the report on the survey findings to APWLD in the English language by March 1, 2006.
• The final draft of the report will be submitted to APWLD no later than March 31, 2006.
• The Guidelines will be completed by May 30, 2006
• At least, 1,000 copies of the Guidelines printed in the English language by June 30, 2006
• A Regional Forum organised in one of the research countries to present the survey findings and the Guidelines by July 31, 2006

Output 4: The need for Guidelines for Gender Sensitive Disaster Management discussed
General understanding was reached among the participants that there is a need for Guidelines for Gender Sensitive Disaster Management. The challenge is to ensure that the Guidelines are followed by state and non-state actors involved in the relief process. Therefore, it is important to link the research at all stages with advocacy efforts.

The researchers agreed:

• that the Guidelines will be based on recommendations from the country reports on the survey findings;
• to study existing guidelines/manuals such as Sphere Project Manual, Sri Lankan manual to identify gaps
• the Gender Sensitive Guidelines will address the identified gaps
• the Guidelines will be drafted by one writer who will be assisted and consulted by a team of advisers, at least one from each participating country.
• The Guidelines will be presented to representatives of the involved governments, aid agencies and community-based, national, regional and international NGOs and agencies at appropriate forums.

PHASE 2:  Survey to document women’s human rights violations
Training of researchers and documenters in FPAR methods

Phase 2 of the project started with the training for researchers in India, Indonesia and Thailand. As was mentioned above, the researchers from these countries expressed the need for training in FPAR methods for researchers and documenters since using FPAR methodology implies involving women from the communities affected by the tsunami to collect and analyse the data. The documenters need interviewing skills, especially related to sensitive questions about family members lost in the tsunami. The researchers noted during discussions in the Aceh meeting that the data collection process should be flexible: no “door to door” interviews, take into account “survey fatigue”, use cultural performances in the communities to facilitate group discussions.

As Fatima Burnad, the research coordinator from India, put it in the rationale for training of grass roots women: “We decided to do the study with more participation of the tsunami affected Dalit and other women. For the first step we felt that the tsunami affected women should also undergo the training like we did to understand the whole process of this study so there is more cooperation from the target group and we will have first hand information for more in depth study. For this we are planning to have a 3 day training workshop for tsunami affected grassroots women from 11th to 13th November in Chennai. This way the tsunami affected women will be more empowered to participate and will be involved in the research from start to end. We will bring 30 women from fifteen villages selected for the study from five districts, i.e. two from each village.”

In Thailand, Sustainable Development Foundations held a training workshop for 25 researchers from participating organisations and villagers on September 7-9. They have revised the survey framework and the questionnaire to reflect issues of the focus groups: migrant workers, fisherfolks, women widows and others.

In Indonesia, Solidaritas Perempuan conducted a training workshop on September 3-4 for 20 researchers from 6 participating organisations. They completed the data collection process and are at the stage of analysing the data.

In Sri Lanka, the research has commenced in the southern province, Galle District, led by Durga and her group, the Nirmana Sansadaya. Most of the researcher were themselves affected by the tsunami and have been working with young people and children affected by the tsunami. Sunika Perera of CATAW has conducted a training workshop on the methodology and the questionnaire was revised and adapted to the local context. There are five women carrying out the survey at present. They are initially looking into single women and women heads of household in the post-tsunami situation, with a special focus on identifying livelihood needs and potential skills and capacities for future livelihood options and opportunities. In the initial stage they have conducted interviews with 50 women and are planning to carry out another 100 interviews. INFORM is planning to conduct the survey in the east of Sri Lanka, in Batticaloa, in collaboration with Suriya Women's Development Centre and in Akkaraipattu with the Affected Women's Forum.

Organisations conducting the survey
The following are organisations conducting the survey in Indonesia, India, Sri Lanka and Thailand:

• Indonesia: Solidaritas Perempuan Aceh and Solidaritas Perempuan national; Flower Aceh; RPUK (Relawan Perempuan untuk Kemanusiaan); Paskah; Anisah; Serikat Inong Aceh; Kontras Aceh; Matahari; KKTGA (Kelompok Kerja Transformasi Gender); WCP; LBH-WK; JARI (Jaringan Advokasi Perempuan dan Anak Aceh)
• India: Society for Rural Education and Development
• Sri Lanka: INFORM, Suriya Women’s Development Centre, Nirmana Sansadaya, CATAW
• Thailand: Sustainable Development Foundation

In the initial proposal, the survey was to be carried out also in Malaysia by a local NGO, Pusat Jana Daya Berhad (Empower). Salbiah Ahmad of Empower Malaysia participated in the Aceh meeting. However, later they decided to withdraw from the project as they conducted research on the tsunami’s impact on women in February 2005 and given the comparatively small number of affected people in Malaysia they felt going back to the communities and interviewing affected women again would be inappropriate.

2.3 APWLD’s Women Human Rights Defenders Campaign

The WHR WG has coordinated APWLD’s cross-cutting campaigns on WHRDs and facilitated a number of activities on WHRDs in the region including trainings and giving visibility to specific campaign at international fora, including the UNCHR and the International Consultation on WHRDs.

The increasing attacks against Women Human rights Defenders at the hands of both state and non-state actors is an alarming trend in the region which is intricately entwined with the forces of fundamentalisms as well as globalisation and increasing militarism. As the political situation at national level becomes more volatile and more repressive in many countries, APWLD has undertaken activities to promote and protect the rights of WHRDs in specific countries of our members including: Philippines, Thailand, Nepal, Japan and Indonesia. The objectives of the campaign are to highlight specific cases from among our members around the region for the protection of WHRDs at risk and to raise awareness on the specific vulnerabilities faced by WHRD because of their gender and the specific issues they work on.

a. Philippines
APWLD supported the campaign advocacy project of one of our national partners, AMIHAN National Federation of Peasant Women in the Philippines. The objectives of the project were to resist political repression of human rights activists in the Philippines by: raising awareness and visibility of the issue inside the country through actions and distribution of materials; seeking justice for the relatives of human rights defenders who died; and increasing the capacity of human rights defenders to protect themselves and respond to abuses by the state against WHRDs.

Assistance was provided by the RIW TF to AMIHAN to raise funds to conduct a national training for WHRDs in the Philippines working on peasant issues.  The aim of the training was to equip WHRDs with knowledge and skills to use the HR framework and remedies available for the protection of WHRD and addressing abuses. This part of the training was conducted by a member of the WHR WG. The training focused on the specific vulnerabilities of WHRDs and their needs in framing response mechanisms. The training also provided a space for WHRDs to share their experiences as ‘women’ activists. As a result of the training participants stated that they felt better equipped to respond to attacks against them and their colleagues. The training helped create many new strategic alliances between AMIHAN and other organisations in Philippines.

b. Nepal
In conjunction with Forum Asia and Women’s Rehabilitation Centre (WOREC) and Inform, the VAW Task Force supported a ‘training for trainers’ (TOT) for Nepali WHRD’s from 28th July to 1 August 2005. 22 Nepali women activists participated in the TOT. The first three days of the training examined the background of VAW in conflict and conflict situations. The remaining days were utilised for learning effectual skills of documenting human rights violations against women activists including VAW. Relevant examples were given from different parts of the world. The objectives of the training were to: to understand conflict situation from the women's perspective; to know the effect and impact on women caused by conflict situations and explore strategies to deal with these; and to learn the skills of documenting human rights violations. A report was produced from this training which will be used to develop a training manual for further trainings in the region (WHR working Group will be working on this in 2006). In follow-up to this training, the 22 women who participated in this conducted trainings for over 120 WHRDs in Nepal. These defenders have since documented over 500 incidences of human rights abuses and violence against WHRDs in Nepal. APWLD will support WOREC to disseminate this information to strategic regional and international points including the UNCHR and Special Rapporteur and Representatives.

c. Japan
APWLD supported the on-going campaign of VAWW-NET Japan to highlight attacks against WHRDs in Japan working on the issue of Japan’s war-time sexual slavery during WWII. Following the Women’s International War Crimes Tribunal, members of VAWW-NET Japan have been facing harassment and threats for their on-going advocacy on the issue of sexual-slavery and their efforts to expose the alliance between right-wing members of parliament and the media through an on-going court case against a national broadcaster who incorrectly portrayed the purpose of the Tribunal and questioned whether war-time sexual slavery in fact happened. APWLD supported VAWW-NET Japan to publish a book clarifying the position of activists working on the war-time sexual slavery issue after debates about political interference in the TV programme which drew attention to the Tribunal and the issue of sexual slavery. WHRDs working with VAWW-Net Japan are receiving threatening phone calls, emails and faxes. The book aims to raise awareness of the issue at a national level.

d. Aceh, Indonesia
Three months after the Tsunami and the end of a long conflict, activities were organised by a member of the WHR WG in Indonesia under the WHRD campaign to assess the challenges that women activists in Aceh are facing. Meetings were held with women in Aceh which highlighted among other things: the cultural expectation on young married women; the lack of support from families; and the impact of Shariah law on their lives. The workshops were aimed at collective understanding and revealed that ‘recognition’ needs to be the most important focus of the WHRD campaign in Aceh because the challenge for WHRDs in Aceh is based on cultural and religious expectations and restrictions. The campaign will be launched by Komnas Perempuan in 2006 on 29th November which has been declared the International Day for WHRDs.

e. Thailand
For Thailand, a round table discussion was organised by the RIW TF on August 9 in Phuket, Thailand. There were 15 Thai WHRDs joined by the 8 RIW TF members from the region.   Most of the Thai WHRDs who shared their stories were women fighting for their rights to their land against development projects either by the government or corporations. The sharing and discussion between the Thai WHRDs and the members of the TF RIW was enriching and inspiring for all.  It provided an opportunity among the Thai WHRDs to share their strategies among themselves as some of them have been fighting for some years now, and have won tactical victories (eg. delayed the projects), while some, especially those from the tsunami-affected area, are just beginning to raise their issues.  Regional and international mechanisms and networks were introduced to the Thai WHRDs which they can tap into should they deem it necessary. 

f. Profiling and Responding to Cases
APWLD used the International Consultation on WHRD to profile some of APWLD members who are at risk as result of their activism through their participation in the Consultation, posters and press releases for those unable to attend and Zenaida Soriano from AMIHAN (RIW TF) represented a joint press statement on abuses against WHRDs in Thailand, Philippines and Indonesia as a result of economic globalisation, at the Press Conference on the last day of the Consultation. The participation of 12 APWLD members in the International Consultation supported members in skills learning and networking. Some members also scheduled interviews with the Special Rapporteur on Human Rights Defenders, Ms Hina Jilani at the Consultation where they were able to share the difficulties facing them.

Information gathered on situations for WHRDs in Nepal, Philippines and Thailand were collated and disseminated at the UN Commission on Human Rights (April 2005) by the APWLD team who went there. The cases were also brought to the attention of the UN Special Rapporteur of Human Rights Defenders for inclusion in her report.

Urgent action alerts have been written up and circulated to expose the current situation in these countries as well as to call for solidarity in appealing for the stopping of the killings as in the case of the Philippines, and for the release of ANWA leaders and other political leaders of the Nepalese movements for democracy.  These letters were endorsed by different groups within and outside the network.

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