Lefteris Arapakis, from a long line of fishers, witnessed first-hand the effects of overfishing and pollution on Greece&#8217;s fisheries. He founded Enaleia, Greece&#8217;s first professional fishing school, in 2016 with the aim of teaching fishers to ply their trade in a more eco-friendly manner and enlisting the help of the seafaring community to clean up the Mediterranean of plastic waste. Since its launch, Enaleia has collected more than 80 tonnes of plastic from the sea, and they work with 700 people on 145 boats from Greece and Italy, giving a monetary reward for the plastic they return to shore. This partnership with Healthy Seas, an organization based in the Netherlands, up-cycles fishing nets, the most common “catch,” into carpets, socks, masks, and other consumer products.



As a result of his efforts, Arapakis was named Europe&#8217;s Young Champion of the Earth by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The award provides seed funding and mentorship to promising environmentalists. Arapakis and his team continue to work towards their mission of making Greece&#8217;s fisheries more sustainable and reducing plastic waste in the Mediterranean.

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Lefteris Arapakis

Louise Little was a trailblazing activist and an important figure in the American Civil Rights Movement, and the mother of Malcolm X. Born in Grenada, she moved to the United States in the early 1920s, where she became involved in social and political activism. Louise was a member of the Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA), a black nationalist organization founded by Marcus Garvey that aimed to promote black pride and self-reliance. She actively advocated for the rights of black people in the United States and worked to challenge the systemic oppression and racism that pervaded society at the time. Despite facing significant challenges and adversity, including the murder of her husband, Louise remained dedicated to her activism and continued to fight for justice and equality.



One of Louise&#8217;s most significant contributions was the strong sense of pride she instilled in her children about their African heritage. She taught them to embrace their identity and to be proud of their blackness, despite living in a society that often denigrated and discriminated against black people. Her teachings played a significant role in shaping Malcolm X&#8217;s worldview and his approach to advocating for black empowerment and civil rights. He later credited his mother with giving him a strong foundation of self-respect and self-esteem, which he built upon as he became a prominent leader in the Civil Rights Movement. Louise&#8217;s legacy as an activist and a proud black woman live on today, inspiring generations of activists and advocates who continue to fight for social justice and equality.



In addition to her activism, Louise faced significant personal challenges throughout her life. She was committed to a mental institution for several years, where she endured inhumane treatment and abuse. Despite these challenges, Louise remained committed to her beliefs and continued to fight for justice and equality for black people. Her resilience and dedication to the cause of social justice continue to inspire people around the world today. Louise Little was a true trailblazer and a hero of the Civil Rights Movement, and her legacy will continue to inspire generations of activists and advocates for years to come.

Louise Little

Rigoberta Menchú is a prominent figure in human rights activism and is well known for her advocacy of Indigenous rights. She has spent her life fighting for the rights of Indigenous peoples in Guatemala, particularly during and after the Guatemalan Civil War. Menchú has received numerous awards for her activism, including the Nobel Peace Prize and the Prince of Asturias Award, and is a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador. In addition to her advocacy work, she also founded Guatemala&#8217;s first Indigenous political party, Winaq, and ran for president of Guatemala twice.



Menchú&#8217;s book, I, Rigoberta Menchú, is a bestseller that sheds light on the atrocities committed during the Guatemalan Civil War. Her efforts have raised awareness of Indigenous Guatemalans&#8217; struggles, and she is considered one of the most prominent figures in Guatemala today. Her dedication to promoting peace and Indigenous rights has earned her the respect and admiration of people around the world.



Menchú&#8217;s impact on the world of human rights activism and Indigenous rights has been immense. Her work has not only brought attention to the struggles faced by Indigenous peoples in Guatemala and around the world but has also inspired countless others to take up the fight for justice and equality. Her legacy serves as a reminder of the power of grassroots activism and the importance of standing up for what is right, even in the face of adversity.

Rigoberta Menchú

Hadja Idrissa Bah is a child&#8217;s rights and women&#8217;s rights activist from Guinea who was born in 1999. She was elected as the President of the Guinean Children&#8217;s Parliament in 2016 when she was just 17 years old. During her tenure, Bah advocated for children&#8217;s rights and focused particularly on fighting against female genital mutilation (FGM). She founded the Guinea Girl Leaders Club in 2016 to educate young women about the harms of early marriage and to discourage parents from forcing their daughters into marriage at a young age. The club also campaigns against FGM, which is prevalent in Guinea, with an estimated 97% of Guinean women aged 15-49 having undergone the practice. Bah is outspoken on several other issues related to women&#8217;s rights, including domestic and sexual violence and the stigma around female sexuality.



In recognition of her efforts, Bah was selected as one of 57 young French-speaking people from around the world to participate in the LabCitoyen program in 2019 to discuss women&#8217;s rights and equality. She was also invited to meet with French President Emmanuel Macron in March 2020 to discuss women&#8217;s rights. Bah&#8217;s dedication to improving the lives of women and children in Guinea is a testament to her passion and commitment to social justice.

Hadja Idrissa Bah

Binhanquinhe Quimor, known as Binhan, is a Bissau-Guinean musician who has gained a reputation for denouncing the social and political situation in his country through his music. He discovered his musical talent at an early age and gained popularity in Guinea-Bissau by performing at local and regional festivals, winning several singing contests. In 2008, Binhan was named Cantor Revelation of the Year in Guinea-Bissau by critics. He has continued to use his music to bring attention to the challenges facing his country, earning him recognition such as the prize for outstanding modern music singer at the &#8220;1st Guiné n&#8217;dade National Gala&#8221; in December 2014.



Binhan&#8217;s debut album, &#8220;Lifanti Pupa,&#8221; showcases his talent for melody and features a mix of songs that address social and political issues, love, and country. The album includes songs like &#8220;Bolserus&#8221; and &#8220;Turpeça Dissabidu,&#8221; which criticize the behavior of the Guinean military and political class, as well as more positive tracks like &#8220;Mariana&#8221; and &#8220;Lifanti Kala,&#8221; which celebrate love. Binhan also sings about his country, with tracks like &#8220;Amor só Amor&#8221; and &#8220;Guiné Nha Terra,&#8221; and includes danceable themes such as &#8220;Sega&#8221; and &#8220;Tudo na Passa.&#8221; Binhan sings in Creole and other dialects of Guinea Bissau, making him a true ambassador of the culture and tradition of his country. His music is a powerful tool for bringing attention to the struggles and challenges facing Guinea Bissau.

Binhan

Dr. Walter Anthony Rodney was a prominent Guyanese historian, political activist, and preeminent scholar, who was assassinated in Guyana in 1980. He traveled widely and became very well known internationally as an activist, scholar, and formidable orator. He was sharply critical of the middle class for its role in the post-independence Caribbean. He was also a strong critic of capitalism and argued for a socialist development template.



On 15 October 1968 the government of Jamaica, led by prime minister Hugh Shearer, declared Rodney persona non grata. The decision to ban him from ever returning to Jamaica because of his advocacy for the working poor in that country caused riots to break out, eventually claiming the lives of several people and causing millions of dollars in damages. These riots, which started on 16 October 1968, are now known as the Rodney Riots, and they triggered an increase in political awareness across the Caribbean, especially among the Afrocentric Rastafarian sector of Jamaica.



Rodney became a prominent Pan-Africanist, and was important in the Black Power movement in the Caribbean and North America. While living in Dar es Salaam he was influential in developing a new center of African learning and discussion.



He became increasingly active in politics, founding the Working People&#8217;s Alliance, a party that provided the most effective and credible opposition to the PNC government. In 1979 he was arrested and charged with arson after two government offices were burned. On 13 June 1980, Walter Rodney at the age of 38 was killed by a bomb in his car, a month after returning from the independence celebrations in Zimbabwe and during a period of intense political activism.

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Walter Rodney

Loune Viaud is a Haitian human rights advocate who has made significant contributions to public health and children&#8217;s welfare in Haiti. In 2010, during a meeting to discuss the country&#8217;s recovery from devastating hurricanes, a powerful earthquake struck, and Loune rushed to Haiti&#8217;s General Hospital to find 38 orphaned children among the rubble. She immediately took them in and founded Zanmi Beni, a home for disadvantaged children just outside of Port-au-Prince. Loune&#8217;s dedication to helping Haiti has earned her the 2002 Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award.



Despite the ongoing challenges faced by Haiti, Loune&#8217;s advocacy and determination provide hope for the country&#8217;s future. In addition to her work at Zanmi Beni, Loune continues to work with Zanmi Lasante and Partners in Health, where she helped launch one of the world&#8217;s most effective AIDS treatment programs. Loune&#8217;s story highlights the resilience of the human spirit, showing that in times of crisis, there are always individuals willing to step up and make a difference, even when the odds are against them. Her work reminds us that while disasters can be devastating, they can also bring out the best in people and inspire us to create positive change in the world.

Loune Viaud

Berta Cáceres was an environmental activist and Lenca tribe representative who co-founded the National Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH). For over a decade, she led a campaign against the Agua Zarca Dam, a joint venture between a Chinese dam developer and a Honduran company. Cáceres filed complaints with the government and international funders, arguing that the dam would destroy the Lenca tribe&#8217;s way of life. She also organized a Lenca blockade of roads leading to the construction site for over a year. The Chinese withdrew from the project due to Indigenous opposition. For her work, Cáceres received the prestigious Goldman Environmental Prize in 2015, which she dedicated to the martyrs who had given their lives to protect Honduras&#8217; natural resources. Unfortunately, on March 3, 2016, two gunmen entered her home and shot her four times, shocking the global community.



Despite Cáceres&#8217; murder being a &#8220;crime against Honduras,&#8221; environmental activist killings have continued in Honduras and globally. Cáceres&#8217; activism inspired many, and she received numerous awards, including the Óscar Romero Human Rights Award. Her work brought attention to the plight of Indigenous peoples in Honduras, the impact of dam projects on the environment and the danger of speaking out against powerful interests. Cáceres&#8217; legacy lives on in the continued fight for justice for environmental and Indigenous rights.

Berta Cáceres

Dorottya Rédai is a Hungarian scholar, activist, and education specialist who focuses on gender and sexuality. In 2019, she published &#8220;Fairyland is for Everyone,&#8221; a children&#8217;s book that aims to address social issues such as gender stereotypes and difficult topics like child neglect and poverty in a digestible way for children aged 6 to 12. The book features disabled children, Roma people, LGBT protagonists, and other minority groups as characters. However, its publication sparked a backlash in Hungary, with some politicians labeling it as &#8220;homosexual propaganda&#8221; and the government imposing restrictions on its sale.



Despite the opposition, the book became a bestseller, selling around 30,000 copies by January 2021 and being translated into ten languages. Rédai sees the book&#8217;s popularity as a sign of protest against the government and against sexism, homophobia, and exclusion in Hungary. The controversy highlights the ongoing struggles for gender and LGBT rights in the country, but Rédai&#8217;s work has helped to raise awareness and create an important conversation about these issues.

Dorottya Redai

Katrin Jakobsdottir is an Icelandic politician who has been serving as the prime minister of Iceland since 2017 and a member of the Althing for the Reykjavík North constituency since 2007. On 19 February 2020, she was named Chair of the Council of Women World Leaders. A popular and fervent feminist who has become a unifying force after years of political upheaval, Jakobsdottir has won over Icelanders with her integrity, sincerity, and consensual management style. A former education minister, from 2009 to 2013, she has remained down-to-Earth and avoided scandal during her years in power, earning the people&#8217;s trust, according to analysts. As head of government, Katrín made taxes more progressive, invested in social housing, extended parental leave, and reduced gender pay inequality.&nbsp;



Born into a family of academics and lawmakers, Jakobsdottir is the second woman to head Iceland&#8217;s government. Her concern for the environment was awakened in the 2000s by a controversial project to build a hydroelectric dam in eastern Iceland. A graduate of the University of Iceland, she joined the youth wing of the Left Green Movement in 2002, before becoming deputy leader a year later. She has been the head of the party since 2013.



In September 2021, almost four years after her inauguration, Katrín remains highly popular, and leaves an image of integrity and sincerity. Her good management of the COVID-19 pandemic has been praised, with the country having one of the best health records in Europe.

Katrín Jakobsdóttir

Kailash Satyarthi is an Indian social reformer who campaigned against child labor in India and advocated the universal right to education. In 2014, he was the co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, along with Malala Yousafzai, &#8220;for their struggle against the suppression of children and young people and for the right of all children to education.&#8221; The Peace Prize laureate was born to a high-caste family. He completed a degree in electrical engineering, but soon gave up his career and his high-caste name, Sharma. Instead, he called himself Satyarthi, which means “seeker of truth”. He is the founder of multiple social activist organizations, including Bachpan Bachao Andolan, Global March Against Child Labour, Global Campaign for Education, Kailash Satyarthi Children&#8217;s Foundation, and Bal Ashram Trust. He has served on the board and committee of several international organizations including the Center for Victims of Torture (USA), the International Labor Rights Fund (USA), and the Cocoa Initiative. Satyarthi was among Fortune magazine&#8217;s &#8220;World&#8217;s Greatest Leaders&#8221;. 



Kailash Satyarthi and his team at Bachpan Bachao Andolan have liberated more than 86,000 children in India from child labor, slavery, and trafficking. In 1998, Satyarthi conceived and led one of the largest social movements against child labor ever called the Global March against Child Labour, a 49,710-mile-long march across 103 countries. The marchers&#8217; demands were unanimously adopted the following year at the ILO Conference in Geneva. Satyarthi also led a nationwide march, Bharat Yatra, in India covering 12,000 miles in 35 days, to demand legislation against child rape and child sexual abuse.

Kailash Satyarthi

Aleta Baun is an award-winning Indonesian environmental activist who has been described as the Indonesian Avatar. She won the 2013 Goldman Environmental Prize for organizing hundreds of local villagers to peacefully occupy marble mining sites conducting “weaving protests” to stop the destruction of sacred forest land on Mutis Mountain on the island of Timor.



Baun was born to a family of farmers and was raised by other women and elders in the village to respect the environment as the source of their spiritual identity and livelihood. Growing to become a community leader who shared her traditional knowledge, she became known as “Mama Aleta.” Her work made her a target for the mining interests and local authorities, who put a price on her head. After surviving an assassination attempt, Mama Aleta went into hiding in the forest with her baby. Despite intimidation, Mama Aleta grew the movement to include hundreds of villagers, culminating in a weaving occupation of the mines where 150 women spent a year quietly weaving their traditional cloth in protest. In the face of the village protester’s peaceful and sustained presence, marble mining became an increasingly untenable endeavor for the companies involved. By 2010 the mining companies, reacting to the pressure, halted mining at all four sites within the Mollo territories and abandoned their operations.&nbsp;



Mama Aleta obtained a law degree in 2011 from Universitas Tritunggal Surabaya to help communities across West Timor to map their traditional forests. Her work focuses on supporting water security, natural resource management, and land rights for indigenous people.&nbsp;

Aleta Baun

On 16 September 2022, the 22-year-old Iranian woman Mahsa Amini, also known as Jina Amini died in a hospital in Tehran, Iran, under suspicious circumstances. The Guidance Patrol, the religious morality police of Iran&#8217;s government, arrested Amini for allegedly not wearing the hijab in accordance with government standards.



According to eyewitnesses, Amini was severely beaten by Guidance Patrol officers—an assertion denied by Iranian authorities. The accounts of police brutality, in addition to leaked medical scans, led some observers to believe Amini had a cerebral hemorrhage or stroke due to head injuries received after her arrest.



Amini&#8217;s death resulted in a series of ongoing international protests. Some female demonstrators removed their hijab or publicly cut their hair as acts of protest. The protests began hours after Amini&#8217;s death, starting at the hospital in Tehran where she was treated and quickly spreading to other parts of the country, and the world.



Iran Human Rights reported that by the beginning of November 2022, at least 304 people had been killed by security forces attacking protests across the country, involving tear gas and live rounds, making the protests the deadliest since the 2019–2020 protests that resulted in more than 1,500 fatalities. Iran’s Attorney General has indicated that the law requiring women to wear a hijab in public is under review, although changes have been made as of the time of this posting.

Mahsa Amini

Nadia Murad is a human rights activist who identifies as part of the Yazidi community which embraces a mixture of Islamic, Christian, and ancient Iranian religious beliefs. At 19 years old, the Islamic State attacked her village and killed hundreds of Yazidi people with the intent of ethnic cleansing. Murad and others were taken prisoner and endured unthinkable harm. After escaping captivity and making her way to Germany in 2015, Nadia told her story with the intention that it would result in her abusers being brought to justice.



Murad now aims to help victims of abuse as the founder of Nadia&#8217;s Initiative, an organization dedicated to &#8220;helping women and children victimized by genocide, mass atrocities, and human trafficking to heal and rebuild their lives and communities.” Nadia’s Initiative partners with local communities and local and international organizations to design, support, and implement projects that promote the restoration of education, healthcare, livelihoods, WASH (water, sanitation, and hygiene), culture, and women’s empowerment in the region. All of Nadia’s Initiative programs are community-driven, survivor-centric, and designed to promote long-term peacebuilding. The Initiative advocates for governments and international organizations to support efforts to rebuild Sinjar, seek justice for Yazidis, improve security in the region, and support survivors of sexual violence worldwide. 



In 2016, she was appointed the United Nations’ first Goodwill Ambassador for the Dignity of Survivors of Human Trafficking. In 2018, she and Denis Mukwege were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for &#8220;their efforts to end the use of sexual violence as a weapon of war and armed conflict.” She is the first Iraqi and Yazidi to be awarded a Nobel Prize. More of Murad’s story can be found in her autobiography, “The Last Girl”.

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Nadia Murad

Ailbhe Smyth is an Irish feminist and LGBT activist who spearheaded political campaigns to legalize divorce, same-sex marriage and abortion over the course of many decades. After receiving an M.A. from University College Dublin, she began following the global women’s movement. In the ‘90s, Ailbhe founded and served as director of the Women’s Education, Research and Resource Center at University College Dublin, heading the Women’s Studies department.



In 2013, Smyth co-founded the Coalition to Repeal the 8th Amendment, an alliance of more than 70 organizations, to fight the ban on abortion found in the Irish Constitution. The Coalition became one of the forces for the successful repeal of the 8th Amendment 2018, having one of the highest-ever referendum turnouts in Ireland. Smyth has also forged political campaigns and was instrumental in achieving lesbian and gay marriage equality in 2015.&nbsp;



Among all of these achievements, Ailbhe was also the convenor of the Feminist Open Forum, a board member of the Equality and Rights Alliance, an organizer for Action for Choice and the Chair of the National Lesbian and Gay Federation, for which she received the Lifetime Achievement Award at Ireland&#8217;s LGBTQ Awards Ceremony, GALAS. Ailbhe has also been published widely on her political ideas and feminism. In 2019, Smyth was named one of Time’s 100 most influential people.

Ailbhe Smyth

Shula Keshet is a Mizrahi feminist, activist, artist, writer and curator living in South Tel Aviv-Jaffa. She is a leader involved in many social movements, constantly seeking justice for the underprivileged in Israel. Keshet is specifically working against the deportation of asylum seekers, fighting against gentrification, and battling environmental hazards caused by the second largest bus station in the world. Shula has organized numerous demonstrations and protests for these causes, as well as public meetings and cultural events to encourage dialogue and action planning. 



Keshet was a founding member of the Mizrahi feminist group “Achoti – For Women in Israel”, establishing Southern Tel Aviv-Jaffa’s first community center in the area. She has also served as editor-in-chief of Achoti Press, writing and reporting on social issues. Keshet’s identity as a Mizrahi feminist informs her work as an activist and an artist. She has initiated several art exhibitions, such as “Black Labor”, which was based on meetings and events between Mizrahi, Ethiopian, Palestinian, and Bedouin women artists. Keshet is also behind the exhibition “Women Creating Change”, which contained the portraits of feminist activists. Keshet utilizes art as empowerment, curating art shows that inherently speak to the audience about oppression and inequality. 



Shula also founded the Libi BaMizrach festival, celebrating Mizrahi culture and continuing her work in connecting women from diverse communities, and she continues to serve her community as a city council member. Keshet has won several awards for her significant contributions, such as the Bellush Israeli Feminist Award&nbsp; in 2011, the Yeshayahu Leibowitz Award in 2014, and the Emile Greenzwieg Human Rights Award in 2019.

Shula Keshet

Danilo Dolci was an Italian human rights activist, grassroots organizer, and author who dedicated his life to addressing social injustice within Sicily’s poorest communities through nonviolent activism in accordance with Gandhi’s theories. Dolci developed the reverse strike, utilizing unpaid workers to improve conditions and local infrastructure by skirting the traditionally-held government and Mafia control of resources and labor. 



As a young man, Dolci joined a commune in Tuscany to care for orphans, and it was there that he witnessed WWII and its effect on Europe. Dolci openly opposed the Nazi reign, and at the age of 28 he moved to rural Sicily where he learned the local dialect to communicate with and understand the people he intended to serve. He began by surveying the poverty-stricken families and recorded their treatment by police. Dolci fasted in protest of the poor conditions in the town and demanded emergency funds from authorities for an irrigation project, and after staying vigilant, authorities came to offer Dolci and the citizens the costs for irrigation. Over the next few years, Dolci’s strike yielded a pharmacy, paved streets, and a sewage system. Dolci organized hundreds of individuals using hunger strikes, sit-down protests and non-violent demonstrations to force the government to take notice and make changes. 



Danilo Dolci was a published author who wrote over 50 books, many of them translated into multiple languages. He was nominated twice for the Nobel Peace Prize, in 1965 and 1982, for his nonviolent activism in support of jobs and the transfer of water rights from the Mafia to Sicilian farmers. He was an influential educator and scholar, with many other scholars and writers visiting his research center in Italy to learn from him. Dolci continues to be known as the “Gandhi of Sicily.”

Danilo Dolci

Aya Virginie Touré is a peace activist and politician in Ivory Coast (Côte D’Ivoire). Touré was the organizer of many political demonstrations and peaceful protests, specifically during the Second Ivorian Civil War in opposition to former President Laurent Gbagbo’s reign. Gbagbo lost the December 2010 presidential election to Alasanne Outtarra, but weaponized violent tactics to stay in power.&nbsp;



Touré was the president of a women&#8217;s group in support of Alassane Ouattara, and in March 2011, a women’s march was organized in part by Aya to advocate for the removal of Gbagbo. There were thousands of women gathered in the streets, dressed in natural materials like clay and sticks with black clothing, peacefully protesting. Upon the arrival of military troops, they opened fire on the crowd and killed seven women, with many more injured. In a show of resilience, many women turned out a week later for a march on International Women’s Day to protest the violence.



Historically, the women of Côte D’Ivoire have had crucial roles in protests and advocacy for political causes. The women are highly involved in pro-democracy activism and calling for justice. Despite these facts, there is little information regarding female activists in Ivory Coast, and just as little information covering the injustices they protest. Aya told BBC, “The international community has forgotten about us… I have actually been thinking about organizing another women’s march to call for international community involvement.” Toure has continued to speak out against government corruption, greed, and dismissal by the outside world.

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Aya Virginie Touré

Robert Nesta Marley was a Jamaican musician and activist who believed in uniting Black culture and fighting oppression through the power of music. Though he struggled with poverty as a child, Bob found inspiration in music and formed the Wailing Wailers with his friends as practicing Rastafaris; the religious movement combines tenets of Christianity, Pan Africanism, and spirituality. As Marley’s popularity and star power grew, he continued writing songs about pervasive social issues in Jamaica, such as unemployment, food rationing, oppression, and political violence.



Despite an assassination attempt on his life, Marley never shied away from his musical mission and would go on to hold several large concerts in an attempt to bridge peace during times of racial and political strife. Returning to Jamaica in 1978 to perform his One Love Peace Concert in the midst of a political civil war, Marley brought together two opposing political candidates to unite and shake hands on stage in front of a crowd of 32,000 people. Proceeds from the concert were used to provide needed sanitary facilities and housing in West Kingston, though unfortunately, politically motivated violence remained persistent in the nation.



Bob passed away from cancer in 1981 at the age of 36. Nearly 40,000 people paid their respects during his memorial service in Jamaica. Marley received the Order of Merit from the Jamaican government and was awarded the Medal of Peace from the United Nations. Today, The Bob Marley Foundation continues to honor his legacy by helping people and organizations in developing nations. Bob’s albums still sell by the thousands weekly and call on his listeners to aim for peace.

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Bob Marley

Hiratsuka Raichō, a writer, activist, and pioneering feminist, was born Hiratsuka Haru on February 10th, 1886 in Tokyo, Japan. She became one of the first women educated in Japan at the new Japan Women’s University in 1903. Due to her upbringing and education, she was influenced greatly by both Western ideology and Zen Buddhism. After graduation, she entered the Narumi Women’s English School where she and five friends published Seitō, the first magazine in Japan “by women, for women.” Hiratsuka used the pen name “Raichō” after a bird, the snow grouse, to write feminist work. Her publications include spirituality, sexuality and nonconformism &#8211; all being taboo subject matters at the time. In 1913, after clashing with both societal norms and the government, Seitō was banned in stores. The censorship and other scandals led to its demise after four years. 



Hiratsuka viewed feminism as a route to achieve world peace. Her anti-war movements started with women’s liberation, a significant use of intersectional politics. After the changes that World War I brought, Hiratsuka assisted in founding the New Women’s Association in 1920. This group pioneered the overturning of a law that forbade women from joining political organizations or attending political meetings. Furthermore, the association was an integral part of Japan’s women’s suffrage movement. In 1953, she formed the Japan Federation of Women’s Organizations and became its first president. To further her anti-war activism and opposition to the rise of nuclear weapons, she then joined the Committee of Seven for World Peace. 



Hiratsuka continued to help expand women’s movements and grassroots organizations, and she formed the New Japan Women’s Association in 1962. They later helped oppose the Vietnam War, bridging anti-war with feminism once again by establishing ties with Vietnamese women. Hiratsuka died of cancer on May 24, 1971, after a long life of journalism, activism, protest and creation. A documentary detailing her life was shown in 2001, a lasting account of her triumphs.

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Hiratsuka Raichō

Eva Abus Halaweh, an accomplished lawyer and human rights activist, was born in 1974 in Jordan. Eva joined the Arab Organization for Human Rights in 1993 where she met Asma Khader, a fellow Jordanian member who is also a lawyer and activist. Some years later, Halaweh received a bachelor’s degree in law and then a master’s degree in diplomacy, working as a legal advisor for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees thereafter. She spent an immense amount of time in her career defending clients in vulnerable states as a member of human rights organizations, including the Mizan Law Group for Human Rights as Executive Director. Halaweh and Khader founded the group together, intending to advocate for human rights and democracy in Jordan. Much of this work has surrounded women who are victims of honor killings and the abuse that occurs in Jordanian prisons.  



The U.S. Department of State awarded Halaweh with the International Women of Courage Award in 2011, citing her dedication to advocacy. Halaweh has continued to propose legislative reforms on human rights in Jordan and has been a proponent for human rights through private practice, campaigns, and Mizan, as she forges onward in her nearly thirty year history of advocating for marginalized communities.

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Eva Abu Halaweh

Serikzhan Bilash, an ethnic Kazakh from Xinjiang, China, is a prominent human rights activist who has endured many tribulations in his awareness campaign against Chinese “reeducation camps.” Tens of thousands of Kazakh people in the Xinjiang region have been sent to these camps, along with hundreds of thousands of other Muslims. Bilash founded the human rights group Atajurt Eriktileri (Volunteers of the Fatherland) to keep record of and advocate for the release of detainees, as well as give support to family members. Atajurt has created one of the most important and extensive accounts of the camps to date, compiling first-hand interviews and data from released individuals. 



Due to political backlash, Bilash was arrested by Kazakh officials and charged in March 2019. He was released after a plea bargain was settled, barring him from partaking in activism against China for seven years. The pressure did not stop there, so Bilash and his family moved to Turkey where they now reside. Bilash’s group, Atajurt, is at risk, and is trying to register in Turkey to gain recognition as a human rights group. Bilash plans to return to Kazakhstan when pressure subsides so he, his family and organization can live freely.

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Serikzhan Bilash

Wangari Maathai was a social, environmental and political activist known for her conservation efforts and push for women’s liberation. Maathai was born in rural Nyeri, Kenya in 1940. After attending school in the United States on scholarship and becoming the first woman in East and Central Africa to earn a doctorate degree, she became a professor. Maathai was an active member of the National Council of Women of Kenya from 1976 to 1987 and where she served as chair beginning in 1981.&nbsp; 



In her early days at the council, Wangari envisioned the idea of Kenyan people planting trees in their native country to enrich the environment and create jobs for women, subsequently cultivating it into a grassroots organization known as the Green Belt Movement. The movement allowed for the planting of over 20 million trees, and thus won dozens of awards, including the Nobel Peace Prize, for which Maathai was the first Black African woman to be awarded. She was then appointed Assistant Minister for Environment, Natural Resources and Wildlife for the Parliament of Kenya.&nbsp; 



During her life as multifarious activist fighting for democracy, human rights and conservation, Maathai endured police brutality and political rebuff in order to become the lauded role model known today. After countless awards, publications, honorary degrees and authoring several books, including a memoir, Wangari died on September 25th, 2011 at the age of 71.

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Wangari Maathai

Claire Anterea is a climate activist who has been trying to help her community and government understand the growing threats of climate change and how it affects their remote Pacific Island nation of Kiribati. During her time as a nun, Anterea began to see the effects of climate change on Kiribati and its people as she travelled between the nations thirty-two atolls on missions. Feeling the need to do more in the secular space, she left her convent to co-found the Kiribati Climate Action Network (KiriCAN) which became the nation’s first climate change advocacy group.  



Claire and her KIRICAN team visits local communities and invites them to learn more about caring for their environment and the looming threat of climate change through education and entertainment. Despite facing some faith-based resistance to the message, Anterea is encouraged that her work is being accepted and is a call to action for her people to fight for their future and their survival. Beyond her work inside Kiribati, Anterea also travels globally to represent her country and speak about climate issues at UN conferences and other forums on the topic.

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Oceania

Claire Anterea

Fatmire Feka is an Albanian peace activist based in Kosovo. She is the founder of Kids Club For Peace movement, a program created to promote conflict resolution, reconciliation, and peace among the children and young adults of Kosovo. 



As a child, Fatmire was directly impacted by the growing violence against the Serbian-inflicted violence against the nation’s population of Muslim Albanians during the Kosovo War. In the spring of 1999, Serbian troops began to round up Muslim Albanian in Fatmire’s village for execution. Fatmire and her family fled into the woods as their house burned and gunshots rang out in the distance. She would then lose her brother and sister soon after while trying to escape north. While the war ended later that year, Fatmire, just 11 years old, found herself living in a camp&nbsp; with other families who had been displaced by the war. Fatmire became interested in peace-building thanks to the reconciliation projects at the camp run by the staff of a humanitarian group called World Vision. Just after turning 12 and with World Vision’s support, Feka founded &#8220;Kids Clubs for Peace&#8221;, a club that uses meetings, skits and songs to bring youth from all of the different ethnicities in Kosovo together. Feka&#8217;s message of reconciliation was difficult for some of her fellow Muslims to hear and she often faced harsh criticism from her own people. Nevertheless, Fatmire persisted in her efforts.



 Feka and her younger sisters would eventually emigrate to Toronto, Canada though she continues her peace work for her homeland in Kosovo and has expanded the Kids Club for Peace movement to 14 multi-ethnic clubs in English, Albanian, and Serbian languages to promote tolerance and understanding of ethnicity, race, and religion in conflict zones. Among her accolades, Fatmire has been selected as an Angel of Hope by the World Vision Canada, and in 2015, Feka was named one of the “1000 women of peace across the Globe”, a group collectively nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.&nbsp;

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Europe

Fatmire Feka

Azimzhan Askarov is a Kyrgyzstani reporter and activist fighting for ethnic Uzbek human rights in his home country.



Working as an independent journalist, he reported on corruption and police brutality in the country, eventually forming Vozdukh, a human rights group. In June of 2010, Askarov was covering the rising conflict between ethnic Uzbek and Kyrgyz people in the Jalal-Abad region of Kyrgyzstan. While documenting the events he was arrested and accused of inciting the crowd that killed a Kyrgyz police officer and sentenced to life in prison for his supposed crime.



Askarov has described inhumane conditions during his imprisonment including being denied medical care, frequent physical assault, and threats against his family by the police. Despite the severity of the sentence and numerous retrials, no evidence of Askarov&#8217;s involvement in his accused crimes has ever been provided. In 2016, the UN Human Rights Committee described the charges as unfounded with several other human rights organizations denouncing the charges against Askarov. The Kyrgyz government has remained unmoved on their stance, upholding Askarov’s sentence on several occasions. The country has even gone so far as to terminate cooperative agreements with the U.S. after the latter bestowed the Human Rights Defender Award on Askarov.

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Azimzhan Askarov

Channapha Khamvongsa is a Lao-American activist and founder of Legacies of War, a non-profit aiming to spread awareness of the enduring impact of the Vietnam War in Laos. 



Khamvongsa&#8217;s childhood was surrounded by conflict. She was born in Laos near the ending of the country&#8217;s civil war which overlapped with the Vietnam War. At the age of six, her family was able to escape the war-torn region to start life all over again in the United States. While attending college in the United States, Channapha Khamvongsa began researching U.S. involvement in the Laotian Civil War, known as the Secret War within the CIA. Inspired by drawings and stories of the Laotian people who experienced the U.S. bombings, Khamvongsa began Legacies of War in 2004. Channapha envisioned the non-profit as a way to educate people, as well as, direct resources towards the clearance of undetonated explosives and victim assistance. 



Throughout the organization&#8217;s existence, Channapha Khamvongsa has grown Legacies of War with diplomacy rather than resentment. She has enlisted the help of former ambassadors, lobbying groups, and even veterans who participated in the bombings to contribute to the healing process. In 2016, President Obama acknowledged the work of Khamvongsa while announcing a massive increase in US spending on explosives clearance in Laos.

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Channapha Khamvongsa

Janis Lipke was a Latvian humanitarian who risked his life countless times to save the lives of Jews facing persecution in Latvia. 



Working on the docks in the Latvian capital of Riga, Lipke joined the underground leftist movement. Because of his work in the country&#8217;s main port, he was able to harbor and transport fleeing social democrats and communists following the coup d&#8217;etat of Kārlis Ulmanis in 1934. His willingness and ability to help political prisoners would foreshadow Lipke&#8217;s most noteworthy humanitarian effort. 



After the Nazi occupation of Riga during World War II Janis Lipke trained and found work in a &#8220;Luftwaffe” (Nazi air force) warehouse. Gaining the trust of his superiors, Lipke began to manage the transportation of the Jews from the Riga Ghetto in and out of the factory to work. Through forgery and bribery he was able to extract people from the factory who could then escape via a system of underground tunnels and shelters built by Lipke and his wife, as well as other supporters in Riga. Later in the war Lipke, operating under the cover of darkness, would begin to rescue Jews from the local concentration camp, taking only a few at a time so they could go undetected.&nbsp; Because of Janis Lipke&#8217;s bravery, he managed to help save roughly one fifth of the Latvian Jewish population that survived the Holocaust. Lipke has been memorialized in Riga for his efforts and his life was the subject of the 2018 film The Mover.

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Jānis Lipke

Lydia Canaan is a Lebanese activist and UN delegate, but to millions around the world she is better known as &#8220;the first rock star of the Middle East.&#8221; 



Canaan was the first Middle Eastern artist to sing solely in English and her musical career was marked by her rebuking of tradition and breaking through gender barriers that had been present in the region for centuries. Many of Lydia’s early performances in the 1980s occurred adjacent to bombing sites in an effort to protest the raging conflict of the Lebanese Civil War. Despite death threats and the proximity of violence, she continued to perform in an effort to spread her message of unity in a time of war and uncertainty.&nbsp; Following her musical success, Canaan would go on to deliver many speeches at humanitarian conferences, including several at the United Nations Human Rights Council. Canaan received media attention for one address in particular in which she criticized many nations for the lack of implementation of human rights initiatives outlined by the United Nations and sang an a cappella verse of her activist anthem &#8220;Humanity Wake Up and Fight&#8221;. Never afraid to use her platform, Lydia Canaan has more recently been vocal in speaking out against the terrorist actions of groups like ISIS, which have mirrored the violence she once experienced in the civil war of her home country.

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Lydia Canaan

Senate Masupha is a Lesothan activist combating the gender bias present in her country’s political system. 



Masupha is the daughter of two chiefs from the village of Ha Mamathe. Her father, a descendant of the founder of Lesotho, held the chieftain position which was assumed by his widow after his passing. Despite such a robust lineage of leadership, Senate Masupha, who is an only child, is unable to inherit the chieftain role because she is a &#8220;girl-child.&#8221; Upon filing a case challenging the law in 2013, she was immediately met with resistance. This institutionalized sexism had never been questioned and is even supported by some Lesothan women who have been led to believe men are the only ones capable of running the country.&nbsp; 



Despite constant adversity and setbacks, Senate Masupha continues to challenge her country&#8217;s outdated system. The regressive nature of the ruling is magnified by the overturning of the same laws in neighboring countries like South Africa, Botswana, and Namibia. To promote her cause and gain support, she has traveled across the country educating her fellow Lesothans on the truth behind the gender bias. Masupha continues to fight for gender equality in Lesotho, in hopes that one day women will receive true equality in her country.

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Senate Masupha

Leymah Gbowee is a Liberian social worker, peace activist, and advocate for women’s rights. In 2011, Gbowee along with her associate Ellen Johnson Sirleaf and Yemen’s Tawakkul Karman, were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize &#8220;for their non-violent struggle for the safety of women and for women&#8217;s rights to full participation in peace-building work.&#8221; 



Born in 1972 in central Liberia, Leymah’s young life was interrupted by the outbreak of the First Liberian Civil War. “All of a sudden one July morning I wake up at 17, going to the university to fulfill my dream of becoming a medical doctor, and fighting erupted,” said Gbowee. Experiencing and bearing witness to the brutal effects of the war on the Liberian people led Leymah to train and work as a trauma counselor for former child soldiers.&nbsp; 



Gbowee is best known for her role in helping bring an end to the Second Liberian Civil War in 2003 by leading a non-violent movement that brought Christian and Muslim women together to demand peace talks between warring factions. As part of the Women of Liberia Mass Action for Peace movement, women dressed in white T-shirts and held daily demonstrations for months in Monrovia until a successful peace agreement was reached. The women’s movement also served as a catalyst resulting in the election of Africa’s first female of state, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, one of Gbowee’s collaborators. After the end of the civil war, Leymah would eventually go on to become the founder and president of the Liberian-based Gbowee Peace Foundation Africa, which focuses on providing opportunities for girls and women in education and leadership sectors in Liberia and throughout western Africa. She is also a founding member and former coordinator of the Women in Peacebuilding Program/West African Network for Peacebuilding and has served as a commissioner-designated for the Liberian Truth and Reconciliation Commission, as well as, sitting on the board of several other peace organizations.



 Working tirelessly, the mother of six children, has completed her doctorate and received honorary degrees from several universities around the world. Additionally, Gbowee has been a contributor to the Daily Beast, the subject of an award-winning documentary film, and was even honored as a flag-bearer for the opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympic Games in London. As her star has continued to rise, Leymah has asserted that women and mothers remain at the forefront of peace efforts. In an interview for the International Women&#8217;s Day, the Nobel Laureate stated, “The Liberian women peace movement demonstrated to the world that grassroots movements are essential to sustaining peace; that women in leadership positions are effective brokers for peace; and the importance of culturally relevant social justice movements. Liberia&#8217;s experience is a good example to the world that women—especially African women—can be drivers of peace.”

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Leymah Gbowee

Asma Khalifa is a Libyan advocate for peace, women, and the rights of Amazighs, one of the ethnic indigenous linguistic minority groups of Libya and North Africa.&nbsp; 



Khalifa grew up under the rule of Colonel Muammar Qaddafi, who was widely regarded as an unpredictable and radical despot. The Libya of Asma&#8217;s childhood was often in turmoil due to Qaddafi&#8217;s chaotic and questionable leadership. She was raised with the looming threat of assault for being a woman or for being a non-Arab. With the death of Qaddafi and the start of the civil war, Asma Khalifa has been focusing on ending the war and establishing a strong civil society in Libya as the struggle for leadership continues. 



As the conflict for control of the country continues, Khalifa is working to ensure the rights and freedoms of those who were underrepresented before the revolution. In 2015 she co-founded the Tamazight Women Movement, an organization attempting to establish gender equality and share information on the indigenous women of Libya and North Africa. Khalifa believes achieving peace and prosperity in Libya can be done by first making changes on a local level. She was recognized for her work to establish peace in 2016 when she received the Luxembourg Peace Prize.

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Asma Khalifa

Melitta Marxer was an activist and suffragist who played a crucial role in women gaining the right to vote in Liechtenstein, making it the last European country to do so. 



The mother of three daughters, Marxer began her involvement in women&#8217;s rights to provide a better life for her children. During the 1960’s she joined a successful effort that would allow for Liechtensteiner girls to attend high school. After this victory, Marxer and other feminists turned their focus to granting women the right to vote but were immediately met with resistance. Following multiple failed referendums, Marxer and her colleagues formed the activist group Aktion Dornröschen which means “thorny rose” and was a play on words for the German name of the fairy tale Sleeping Beauty. The group produced informative literature, held lectures, and lobbied the government to enact the change.&nbsp;



 After years of opposition within Liechtenstein, Marxer and her fellow Aktion Dornröschen activists began a campaign across Europe to spread awareness of their cause, eventually appealing to the Council of Europe in 1983. With international attention on Liechtenstein&#8217;s antiquated laws a new referendum was introduced and on July 2, 1984, male voters voted in favor of women&#8217;s suffrage. Melitta and the story of the Liechtensteiner suffragist movement was the subject of a Swiss documentary titled Die andere Hälfte (The Other Half) released in 2002. Marxer passed in 2015 at the age of 91. 



 Special thanks to Veronika Marxer for contributing and helping us with our Liechtenstein&#8217;s peace post. Photo credit for the images of Melitta Marxer: Die Andere Hälfte. Der Weg zum Frauenstimmrecht in Liechtenstein, a film by Isolde Marxer, 2002 and the Liechtensteinisches Frauenarchiv.

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Melitta Marxer

Marija Aušrinė Pavilionienė is a politician, educator, feminist writer and one of the most well-known Lithuanian advocates for LGBT rights. Pavilionienė co-founded the Gender Studies Centre at her alma mater, Vilnius State University before going on to receive her PhD in Philology from Taras Shevchenko National University. She has since authored many published works regarding gender and inequality. 



Despite &#8220;same-sex sexual activity&#8221; being made legal in Lithuania in 1993, just two years after the fall of the Soviet Union, homophobia is still openly practiced and generally accepted throughout the country. Same-sex unions remain unrecognized by the state and efforts to change the law face vehement and widespread opposition. Beginning in 2004 through 2016, Marija served multiple terms as a member of Lithuania’s governing body known as the Seimas where she acted as chairperson of the Ad Hoc Group of Seimas Members for Equality. Pavilionienė&#8217;s advocacy and her actions in the Seimas have been instrumental in upholding anti-discrimination laws and protections for the LGBT community of Lithuania in the face of great struggle.

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Marija Aušrinė Pavilionienė

Norry Schneider is a Luxembourgish environmental activist and a member of the Luxembourg High Council for Sustainable Development (CSDD). 



Schneider has over a decade of experience working in natural sciences and systems analysis for a multitude of social and environmental NGOs. In 2011 he co-founded Transition Minett, a sustainability and urban gardening initiative in Luxembourg. With a focus on eliminating dependency on fossil fuels, this organization promotes sustainable living and helps the people of Luxembourg learn how to reduce their environmental impact. 



Appointed to the CSDD in 2016, Norry has been a leading voice in the fight against climate change in his home country. With the aid of the government he has been able to further spread the importance of sustainability. Working on a local level, Schneider has informed local authorities and continues to encourage citizens to participate in the pressing issues of climate action.

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Norry Schneider

Afrodita Musliu is a Macedonian human rights activist and the president of Nexus Civil Concept, a non-profit that aims to prevent the spread of violent extremism by promoting inter-ethnic tolerance in her home country. 



With conflicts raging on in nearby Syria and Iraq, it has become all too common for the youths of Macedonia and neighboring Albania to get swept up in propaganda and the desire to leave Macedonia to go fight. In order to protect people from the manipulation, Musliu has been working against this radicalization by spreading her own messages online. Conducting a set of several focus groups, Nexus Civil Concept determined that there was little being done to combat this rampant wave of radicalization, convincing Musliu of the necessity for a larger campaign. 



Through a series of interviews with Macedonians who have entered these conflicts and returned, Nexus Civil Concept is able to reveal the harsh truths about the war through first hand experience. The issue became so pressing that Nexus Civil Concept would go on to partner with the government of Macedonia to further distribute these recorded stories to help educate the nation.

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Afrodita Musliu

Jenipher Sanni is a Malawian women&#8217;s rights activist and one of the leading voices calling out to bring an end to child marriage in Malawi. 



At the age of fourteen, Jenipher married a man nearly twice her age who already had two children from a previous marriage. Like many young girls in Malawi, she believed that dropping out of school for marriage was the only way to escape a life of poverty and that her new husband would be able to provide food and other basic necessities. The relationship quickly became abusive, but with intervention and support from a local NGO Malawi Girl Guides, Jenipher was able to escape her husband and get back to school.&nbsp; 



Jenipher’s return to school originally required her to walk two hours each way which had a detrimental effect on her studies. Thankfully the United Nations Population Fund Malawi came in to provide bikes to the school, cutting the student’s commute time down drastically. With more time to focus on her studies Jenipher began to excel and set her sights on attending university. Understanding the positive benefits of education, Jenipher has been a vocal advocate encouraging girls in similar positions as herself to stay in school and continue getting an education. Taking inspiration from her own experience, Jenipher launched a campaign to buy a thousand bicycles for girls living in rural areas to make their arduous commutes to class easier. In 2017, Jenipher travelled to Washington D.C. to speak at the UN organized Girl-Up Leadership Summit about the importance of education and the efforts to end child marriage.

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Jenipher Sanni

Clovis Razafimalala is a Malagasy environmental activist who combats the illegal trafficking of Madagascar&#8217;s natural resources, as well as the political corruption that allows for it to continue. 



As the coordinator of the Lampogno Network, Clovis has made it his mission to end the trafficking of rosewood in Madagascar. Despite being made illegal in 1975, the exportation of rosewood runs rampant as the bright red bark is highly sought after for luxury products. In order to protect the fragile ecosystems of Madagascar&#8217;s forests, Clovis has advocated for an end to this illegal industry. 



In 2016, Clovis was accused of organizing a riot and committing arson following the arrest of a fellow timber advocate. Although he was not present at the violent protest, Clovis was jailed for these crimes. Following an outpouring of support and a surprise trial, he was released from prison. Unfortunately for the many activists who support this cause, it has become the norm to falsely imprison people who speak out against the illegal trafficking of rosewood. Despite the intimidation they face, Clovis Razafimalala and his supporters remain vocal about protecting the unique beauty of Madagascar.

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Clovis Razafimalala

Mohd Nasarudin Mohd Yusof became the first Malaysian recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2013 for his team&#8217;s “extensive work to eliminate chemical weapons&#8221; at the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW). A former member of the Malaysian Armed Forces, the retired lieutenant-colonel joined the organization in 2011. 



The OPCW is an intergovernmental organization established in 1997 in the Hague, Netherlands. It is comprised of 193 sovereign states and serves to oversee the elimination of chemical weapons of its member states. The Nobel Peace Prize was awarded months after the Ghouta chemical attack in Syria, which was as an unfortunate reminder of the power and presence of these types of weapons. Mohd Yusof and his team at the OPCW were instrumental in aiding the UN investigation which led to United Nations Security Council Resolution 2118. Adopted unanimously, the resolution laid the framework for the elimination of Syrian chemical weapons during the Syrian civil war.&nbsp; 



Mohd Nasarudin Mohd Yusof has used the recognition he received from the award to encourage young Malaysians to pursue their goals and aspirations. Throughout his time abroad, Mohd Yusof has served as a proud representative of Malaysia stating, “When you work overseas, no matter how small it (your work) is, you are carrying your country’s flag”.

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Mohd Nasarudin Mohd Yusof

Shahindha Ismail is a Maldivian activist working to protect human rights in the still developing and tumultuous democracy being established in the Maldives.&nbsp; 



Ismail is the founder and Executive Director of the Maldivian Democracy Network, the first and longest running NGO in the country. This non-profit aims to protect the rights and freedoms of Maldivians, who have witnessed decades of political turmoil as the country has transitioned from a British colony to an independent republic. Through her organization, Shahindaha campaigns for government transparency, free speech, and upholding the Constitution of the Maldives. 



In December of 2017 Ismail tweeted a statement in response to then President Yameen Abdul Gayoom who made public comments ensuring that Islam would be the only practiced religion in the Maldives. In her tweet, she supported Maldivians’ right to practice the religion of their choice. As a result, Ismail was publicly denounced by several local news outlets, many of which labeled her an apostate. Shortly after, the police began an investigation of Ismail as a form of intimidation, keen on derailing her humanitarian pursuits. Despite the persecution she has faced, Ismail has stood by her comments and continues to advocate for freedom of religion in the face of fundamentalism along with democratic and basic human rights for all Maldivians.

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Shahindha Ismail

Mariam Diallo Dramé is a Malian human rights activist focused not only on standing up for the rights of underrepresented people, but also the rights of fellow advocates to continue their work in the face of oppression. She has received global notoriety for establishing several organizations dedicated to helping protect the rights of women and children.&nbsp; 



At the age of thirteen Mariam founded the Children&#8217;s Parliament of Mali after seeing the suffering of children living in the streets of Mali&#8217;s capital, Bamako. Establishing this organization would serve as the starting point for Mariam’s lifelong commitment to bettering the world. After fifteen years of humanitarian efforts Diallo Dramé would go on to become the founder and president of the Association of Women’s Leadership and Sustainable Development, an organization that advocates for women&#8217;s health and reproductive rights, as well as, advancing opportunities for education and leadership.  



Despite her attempts to protect basic human rights in Mali, Mariam has faced intense adversity in her pursuits. Due to the volatile, militarized political state of Mali, her efforts have resulted in attacks on her character and threats against her life, a reality all too common for many human rights defenders. For this reason, Diallo Dramé has joined other advocates to form the Front Line Defenders, a collective&nbsp; dedicated to the creation and implementation of legal policy to ensure proper protections for human rights defenders in Mali to be able to safely conduct their work.

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Mariam Diallo Dramé

Sara Ezabe Malliue is a Maltese activist and one of the co-founders of the #RedefiningUs movement. Focused on dispelling racial and religious prejudice, the movement was established after Ezabe Malliue was discriminated against for wearing a headscarf in her predominantly Catholic home country.&nbsp; 



In 2016, Sara was the recipient of the Queens Young Leader Award for her work promoting inclusivity. Given an international platform, Ezabe Malliue called on world leaders to promote more open discussion of race and religion as a way to fight inequality. She believes that her negative experiences growing up Muslim in Malta are a result of fear and a lack of understanding for her culture and religion. 



Ezabe Malliue was later featured on Forbes Magazine&#8217;s 30 Under 30 for Law &amp; Policy list in 2018 for her contributions to combating hate speech. Sadly, as a result of this recognition, Ezabe Malliue was further subjected to the same hate filled rhetoric that inspired the creation of the #RedefiningUs movement. Despite this cycle of xenophobia and hate, Sara has been undeterred in her work and remains committed to her belief that sharing ideas and understanding one another is the path to peace.

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Sara Ezabe Malliue

Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner is a Marshallese poet, educator, and environmental activist who received global notoriety for her speech and performance at the 2014 UN Climate Summit.  



At the summit, she received a standing ovation from world leaders after performing her poem &#8220;Dear Matafele Peinem&#8221;. The poem, addressed to her daughter, serves as a moving call to action to protect island nations, like the Marshall Islands, who are greatly impacted by climate change and are the most at risk for further environmental destruction. In 2017 Jetnil-Kijiner published her first book, &#8220;Iep Jaltok: Poems from a Marshallese Daughter&#8221;. This collection of poems provides insight into the daily life and traditions of the Marshallese people who live in the ever-present threat of climate change. 



In addition to her writing, Kathy is one of the co-founders of Jo-Jikum, a non-profit that encourages Marshallese youth participation in combating climate change. Through her work with Jo-Jikum, Jetnil-Kijner remains dedicated to creating and sharing solutions to protect the Marshall Islands from looming environmental threats.

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Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner

Aminetou Mint El Moctar is a Mauritian feminist and human rights activist who has been recognized for her work defending women&#8217;s rights and combating slavery in Africa. In 2006 she received the Human Rights Prize of the French Republic and was shortlisted for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2015. 



At the age of thirteen, like many young people in Mauritania, Aminetou was forced into an early marriage. Rather than accept the situation, she chose to speak out against the practice which she has called &#8220;a barrier to enhancing women’s leadership and development.&#8221; Labeled a rebel at a young age, El Moctar would go on to dissent against human rights violations such as human trafficking and slavery. 



As the president of the Association of Association of Women Heads of Family, Mint El Moctar has used her platform to give a voice to those who have none. Because of her activism Aminetou has been targeted and attacked numerous times by her opposition. In addition to being wrongfully arrested and tortured, a fatwa was issued against her in 2014. Despite this declaration, threats against her family, and the physical abuse she has endured, Mint El Moctar continues to campaign for legislative reform ensuring that laws and rights are within the reach of all people, particularly women and children.

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Aminetou Mint El Moctar

Karuna Rana is a Mauritian environmental activist, social entrepreneur, and community organizer. In 2018 she began pursuing a Masters Degree in Environmental and Energy Policy from Michigan Tech through the Fulbright Scholarship Program. 



Rana entered the program following a background overseeing and managing the environmental impact of various local corporations. In addition to her work in Mauritius, she has influenced global change through her work with organizations like One Young World and the United Nations Environment Programme. In her pursuit of environmental protection, Rana has lobbied multiple governments and allowed for the inclusion of youths within UN negotiations. 



A crucial aspect of Karuna&#8217;s work is the connecting, inspiring, and involvement of young people around the world to help drive and affect change. Karuna is one of the founders and current leaders of the non-profit SYAH. This youth-led organization spreads environmentally sustainable practices and awareness in Small Island Developing States (SIDS) throughout Africa and Asia. SYAH has been able to spread awareness of climate change and ways to combat it in these nations with limited resources and infrastructure. 



Looking toward the future, Rana has demonstrated an interest in policy making, a career she is familiar with through her lobbying work. By getting more directly involved, she hopes to create future environmental protection policies vital to the well-being of Mauritius.

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Karuna Rana

Alfonso García Robles was a Mexican diplomat and foreign minister who was posthumously awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1982, alongside Sweden&#8217;s Alva Myrdal, for his work in the field of nuclear disarmament.&nbsp; 



García Robles was born in Zamora, Michoacán, and as a young man considered the priesthood before pursuing studies in law via the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), the Institute of Higher International Studies in Paris, France and the Hague Academy of International Law in the Netherlands. Upon completion of his studies, Alfonso would embark on a lengthy career within Mexico’s civil and foreign service in the role of delegate, ambassador, state secretary to the ministry of foreign affairs, UN representative and eventually Mexico’s foreign minister. 



The Cuban missile crisis of 1962 had a profound impact on García Robles who responded by taking up nuclear disarmament in Latin America and the Caribbean as his personal mission. His initial campaign for a nuclear-free zone was met with indifference from the region, however Alfonso’s persistence eventually won out when when 22 nations signed the Treaty of Tlatelolco agreeing to disarm in 1967. García Robles was later appointed as Mexico&#8217;s permanent representative to the Committee on Disarmament of the UN where he became known as “Mr. Disarmament”.&nbsp; 



García Robles’ legacy and influence continued to extended well beyond his passing in 1991, when just four years later Cuba, a perpetual opponent to the treaty, finally signed and in doing so completed the signature and ratification by all 33 nations of Latin America and the Caribbean.

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Alfonso García Robles

Oleg Brega is a journalist, activist and filmmaker from Chişinău, the Republic of Moldova. He has been the president of the Moldovan public activism group “Hyde Park” since 2003.



Moldova, Europe’s poorest nation, struggles with freedom of expression and access to information and has been identified as a potential powder keg due to its ties with the European Union and it’s heavily saturated media influences from Russia. Oleg Breg graduated from the Music, Theater and Fine Arts Academy, Chişinău and later the Academy for Theater and Film in Bucharest to pursue a career in media before becoming involved in political activism in 2001. A few years later, Brega launched his radio show called “Hyde Park” following a Communist political victory that sparked massive public protests due to it’s suspicious activity surrounding the election. Brega’s radio show opened the airwaves to the public, allowing everyday citizens to have public debates and discussions about the Moldovan state. The radio show was quickly shut down by the Interior Ministry, a catalyst for Brega to then start his activist group under the same name. 



Hyde Park’s mission is aimed at promoting free expression, freedom of assembly, access to information, and human rights by organizing protests and demonstrations, though the group has had to go underground at various times to avoid persecution and arrest by the state. In 2004, Brega launched an online broadcast channel, Curaj.tv, in an act of citizen journalism. Brega gets candid about the reality in Moldova, whether it is questioning the police about illegal parking, lavish political lifestyles, or people waiting in long lines to collect holy water from a frayed hose. In 2008, Oleg Brega was assaulted by the Prime Minister&#8217;s bodyguards in the hallway of the Moldova National Opera Ballet protesting a meeting held by Prime Minister Zinaida Greceanîi. Later that year Oleg was again arrested for peacefully protesting in front of the National Palace where a celebration was held to mark the 50th anniversary of the foundation of Moldova. After Hyde Park helped organize the Moldovan civil unrest in 2009, Brega was forced to go into hiding. Reemerging later, Brega now hosts the show &#8220;Inamicul Public&#8221; (The Public Enemy), on Jurnal TV and continues to create and publish content via Curaj.tv and YouTube in his continued push for Moldovan civil and human rights.

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Oleg Brega

Prince Albert II is the current monarch of the Principality of Monaco and a staunch environmentalist. The son of Prince Rainier III and American actress, Grace Kelly, Albert II has used his fortunate position to bring attention and aid to an array of environmental issues. The prince follows in the footsteps of his great great grandfather, Prince Albert I, who was a pioneering oceanographer that helped pave the way for the implementation of many environmental protections. Prince Albert II has himself journeyed to both the North and South Poles to assess the effects of global warming on the weakening ice and bring raise awareness to climate change. 



In June 2006, as a result of his expeditions, &nbsp;Albert II decided to create a foundation dedicated to environmental protection. The Prince Albert II of Monaco Foundation is committed to the protection of the environment and the promotion of sustainable development on a global scale. The Foundation supports initiatives of public and private organizations, in the fields of research and studies, technological innovation and socially-aware practices. The Foundation’s projects focus on three main geographical zones: The Mediterranean basin, due to the geographic position of the Principality of Monaco; the Polar Regions, as privileged indicators of climate change evolutions; and the Least Developed Countries (as defined by the United Nations official list), such as the countries in Sahelian Africa, which are severely impacted by the effects of climate change, the loss of biodiversity and water shortage. Within these areas the Foundation has three principal domains of action: limiting the effects of climate change and promoting renewable energies; safeguarding biodiversity; and managing water resources along with combating desertification. 



Albert II’s long history of environmental action as monarch also includes hosting a global symposium on the health of the world&#8217;s oceans and establishing a partnership with the World Wildlife Foundation to protect the bluefin tuna from ecological extinction. He has recently called access to water a basic human right at the 5th World Water Forum. The prince has also been supportive of other advocates, backing Nobel Peace Prize winner Wangari Maathai&#8217;s Green Belt Movement to plant a billion trees. In light of his efforts, the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) recognized Prince Albert II one of their “Champions of the Earth” in 2008. This is the United Nations highest environmental honor.

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Albert II, Prince of Monaco

Gerelee Odonchimed is a Mongolian lawyer and gender equality advocate. Gerelee serves as the vice director of Women for Change, an organization she founded with three other women lawyers in the Mongolian capital of Ulaanbaatar that combats domestic violence. About one in five women in Mongolia are victims of sexual assault and one in three women are victims of domestic violence. Odonchimed explains this abuse is often excused as a “regular thing” in Mongolian culture. Gerlee and her organization work to put an end to the victim blaming and shaming that allows sexual harassment and abuse to go on unchallenged.



Odonchimed was raised in Gobi-Altai Province in the southwest region of Mongolia during the early 1990s after the collapse of communism. In this period of massive upheaval many families suffered in the economic and social chaos. Odonchimed recalls that her father, like many of the men in the community, drank and was abusive resulting in her being raised chiefly by her grandmother. Gerelee draws upon her own experience to connect with Mongolian women with similar stories prompting Women for Change to utilize the power of social media to address issues involving sexual abuse, domestic violence, body image and victim blaming.



One particular project launched by Women for Change was called “Behind Closed Doors” which set out to personalize domestic violence by setting up booths where people were isolated and listened to real incidents, including audio of a mother being struck while a child cried in the background . The experience elicited a powerful emotional response from many who were then prompted by the organization to advocate for parliament members to make a full legal framework against domestic violence. As a result of the ongoing efforts of Odonchimed and company, the Mongolian government officially adopted the Law to Combat Domestic Violence in 2016 though Gerlee continues to work to spread information and resources for Mongolian women to help battle the stigma that many victims feel in reporting their experiences.

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Gerelee Odonchimed

Fatima Naza is a Montenegrin women’s and children’s rights activist and the co-founder of the Center for Roma Initiatives (CRI). CRI is the only organization in Montenegro working to promote the rights of Romani (Roma) women. Roma women face many challenges and abuses due to the strong patriarchal culture within their own community as well as blatant racism from institutions of the state. Roma women are seldom allowed to leave their own homes and between 40% &#8211; 70% of Roma women in Montenegro contend that they were forced into marriage before the age of eighteen. Fatima Naza has been fighting against child marriage and violence against women for over 10 years. In 2004, Fatima and her colleagues, CRI co-founders Jovana Mrkaic and Fana Delija, began to lead discussion groups for Roma women on the importance of education and taking control of their own lives. The number of Roma children attending public schools and Roma women with university degrees has greatly increased over the years as a result of Naza and the CRI’s continuous efforts. The rise in educated Roma women has also led to them working outside the home which was almost unheard of as little as ten years ago. 



Fatima has also starred in the play &#8220;Sedam (Seven)&#8221;, a drama based on the life stories of seven women rights activists from various parts of the world. Naza played the role of Mukhtar Mai, the survivor of a brutal gang rape who has gone on to be a leading voice in the fight for women’s rights in Pakistan. In 2012, Naza, Mrkaic and Delija attended a ceremony in Stockholm where they were presented the Anna Lindh Award in the field of women&#8217;s participation and leadership. Naza and CRI have also been recognized by the European Commission for their role in the integration of Roma peoples in Montenegro.

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Fatima Naza

Aminatou Haidar is a human rights activist and advocate for the independence of Western Sahara, a disputed territory claimed by Morocco. Haidar is currently the president of the organization Defenders of the Sahrawi Human Rights (CODESA), a group committed to advocating for the rights of Sahrawi people through nonviolent means. Throughout her career, Haidar has been threatened, arrested, imprisoned, and violently tortured as a result of her activism. In 1987, Aminatou underwent a forced disappearance at the hands of the Moroccan government after participating in a demonstration against the occupation of Western Sahara. Haidar was held without trial until her release three years later in 1991. Haidar was jailed again in 2005 after she was attacked by Moroccan police during a protest. During her imprisonment Aminatou staged a hunger strike to demand improved conditions of detention and an investigation into torture allegations of her fellow Saharawi detainees.



In 2009 Haidar garnered international attention when, returning from a trip to Spain she was denied entry back into Morocco for refusing to state “Moroccan” as her nationality. She was stripped of her passport and sent back to Lanzarote Airport in Spain where she began a hunger strike that lasted more than three weeks. Her strike was pushed into the spotlight by Amnesty International and stable of supporters including many prominent Nobel Prize laureates, filmmakers, actors and musicians. Hospitalized and on the brink of death, Morocco finally relented in the face of international pressure from Spain, France and the United States. Upon her return Aminatou stated, &#8220;This is a triumph, a victory for human rights, for international justice and for the cause of Western Sahara &#8230; And it&#8217;s all thanks to your pressure.&#8221;



Since the Lanzarote strike Haidar has continued her courageous work and has become known as &#8220;Sahrawi Gandhi&#8221; or &#8220;Sahrawi Pasionaria&#8221; for her commitment to non-violent methods of resistance. She is the recipient of numerous honorary citizenships and awards including the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award in 2008 and the Train Foundation’s Civil Courage Prize in 2009.

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Aminatou Haidar

Alfiado Zunguza is a Mozambican peace advocate and founder of the JustaPaz peacebuilding organization. Zunguza grew up in the midst of Mozambique’s 15-year civil war between the Mozambique Liberation Front (FRELIMO) and the Mozambique Resistance Movement (RENAMO) political parties. The violent civil war was responsible for a million deaths and five million people displaced. Although the war officially ended in 1992 it has been a long road to reconciliation between the various sides in Mozambique. Alfiado was left without a mother at the age of six and he grew up bouncing between relatives in a search for in an effort to find security and continue his education. In 1996, Alfiado met some volunteers from the Mennonite Central Committee who were working with a local church to perform conflict resolution and reconciliation in the area. As a result of his contact with the volunteers, Alfiado would go on to attend the Eastern Mennonite University Summer Peacebuilding Institute later that year. 



Upon his return to Mozambique, Zunguza first set up JustaPaz as a department within his church to continue his efforts in peace work. The following year Alfiado was offered the chance to become a full-time master’s student in the field of conflict transformation back in the United States at EMU. The decision to pursue his education further meant that he would temporarily have to leave his wife and two young daughters at the time. Encouraged by his wife Carla to pursue the once in a lifetime opportunity, Alfiado followed through with his education. Upon completion of his studies, Zunguza once again returned to Mozambique and has since grown JustaPaz into one of the most influential and active peace organizations in Africa today. Zunguza has long believed that the recovery of Mozambique requires the participation of people from all levels of society and that conflict transformation requires specific areas such as ethnic relations, labor unrest, and crime among other areas. JustaPaz, under Zunguza’s direction, has seen its annual operating budget grow to roughly half a million dollars and continues to receive support from several other international organizations as well as maintaining close ties to the United Methodist Church.

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Alfiado Zunguza

Wai Wai Nu is a young peace and human rights activist from the Rakhine State in western Myanmar. Nu and her family are part of the Rohingya population, a stateless and predominantly Muslim Indo-Aryan speaking people who have no path to citizenship and have long suffered intense persecution by the state. In conditions that closely mirror apartheid policies, the Rohingya population is restricted from freedom of movement, state education, and civil service jobs. The United Nations and several human rights organizations have identified the Rohingya as one of the most persecuted minorities in the world today. Wai Wai Nu’s path to activism began when she and her entire family were jailed in the notorious Insein Prison in Rangoon by the ruling military government. In her own words:



“I was arrested when I was 18 years old because my father was a Member of Parliament for the political opposition in Burma. Eventually, my entire family was arrested. I spent 7 years in prison until I was released in 2012. Since I was a kid I have seen and lived a lot of injustice—I understand how it feels, the challenges faced by women and the poor people in my country. I realized the political system in Burma doesn’t benefit all of us, and since then I have tried to change the system to better the situation of women. We must see that all human beings are the same.&nbsp; We have to take care of each other to build a beautiful world.”



Fortunately, under a new government led by reformist President Thein Sein, Wai Wai and her family from prison along with hundreds of other political prisoners.&nbsp; Nu’s mission was crystallized as she set out to work working for women’s equality and to improve the lives of her fellow Rohingya people. Nu founded and serves as the director of the Women’s Peace Network Arakan –&nbsp;&nbsp;a NGO&nbsp;that conducts training to promote better understanding between the Rohingya and Rakhine peoples in western Myanmar.&nbsp; Wai Wai is also the co-founder of Justice for Women, a network of women lawyers providing legal aid to women across Myanmar. Nu’s work remains vital in brokering peace and understanding between the Rakhine Buddhists and the Rohingya people, as the current situation continues to escalate throughout the region.



In October 2016, the government of Myanmar began new violent crackdowns on the Rohingya population in what they claim is a response to attacks against the police and military in Rakhine. The military crackdown has resulted in over 150,000 displaced people along with sweeping arrests and widespread reports of state-sanctioned murder, gang rapes, torture, looting, and infanticide. The atrocities have mounted to the point of what many would deemed genocide or ethnic cleansing. During recent flooding in the region, it has also been reported that the government prevented international aid including food and medicine from reaching the Rohingya peoples for whom it was designated.



The continuing ethnic violence and human rights abuses present a significant challenge to Wu’s work, yet she continues to fight in hopes that she will eventually see Myanmar embrace democracy and offer equal rights to all. Nu has been recognized as one of the Top 100 Global Thinkers by Foreign Policy Magazine and participated in the inaugural class of a training program for young leaders held at the George W. Bush Presidential Center in 2015. In 2017, Nu was named one of the Next Generation Leaders by Time Magazine and in 2018, she received the Hillary Clinton Award from Georgetown University.

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Wai Wai Nu

Pauline Dempers is a Namibian human rights and anti-apartheid activist who has served as national coordinator for the organization Breaking the Wall of Silence (BWS) since 1999. BWS is a grassroots group that advocates for the rights of victims who were abducted, imprisoned and tortured without at the hands of South West Africa People’s Organization (SWAMPO) political party during the Namibian War of Independence against South Africa. Initially Pauline had worked with SWAMPO in the fight for independence, but SWAMPO began to suspect many of its own members were spies for the opposition movement. Pauline, along with hundreds of others, was arrested for espionage (though tribal and class motivations are likely the true reason) and abused without ever receiving a trial. She spent three years enduring imprisonment and torture-filled interrogations. SWAMPO denies that any serious abuses were ever committed and claims that incidents that did occur were all in the name of liberation. 



In addition to working with BWS, Pauline has worked closely with the Congress of Democrats and other political factions who have stood in opposition to SWAMPO and its institutionalized political corruption. Politically her work has remained centered on prompting the National Assembly to find final resolution for all the detainees and victims of SWAMPO’s liberation movement.

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Pauline Dempers

Fazileh Mansour Beigi is an Iranian refugee who was seeking asylum in Australia when she and her two sons were taken to an offshore immigration detention facility operated in Nauru. The Nauru Regional Processing Center is operated by a company called Broadspectrum on behalf of the Australian Department of Immigration and Border Protection which enforces a policy of mandatory and indefinite detention for immigrants trying to enter the country. The Nauruan government receives compensation for hosting the processing center on its shores. Media access to Nauru is extremely restrictive, but recently files have been leaked detailing the horrors of abuse and neglect that face the people who have been detained. 



Fazileh and her sons have been held at the processing center since 2013. In June of 2018 her eldest son, Fariborz Karami, committed suicide after years of asking for treatment for his failing mental health. Fariborz’s body was held in cold storage at the camp for weeks, while repeated requests from Fazileh to retrieve the remains and bury the body anywhere other than Nauru or Iran were ignored or denied. In the wake of her son’s death, Fazileh has written a letter to the Australian government which has been published in various media formats, thus bringing some much-needed attention to the dire situation that faces the refugees in Nauru. 



In her own words, Fazileh writes, “I am the same suffering and miserable mother who repeatedly begged you to help. Frequently, I implored you to assist me. An ill mother who could not stand to see her children in this situation anymore. Often, I told you and I wrote to you that my sons are depressed and exhausted ‘please help a sick and feeble mother’. But, instead of support, you replied that if I couldn’t tolerate it, I should return to my country. Again I made a complaint to you and I wrote that after five years facing torture, I am not able to go back to my country. For five years you incarcerated me and my innocent children in Nauru and ignored us. I know that your violence and cruelty is deeply rooted and against that I am a powerless woman. You even deprived me of having a mobile phone, lest I speak up? But I always told you if any harm befell my children, I wouldn’t remain silent&#8230;My 26-year-old son had his last breaths in your moldy tents and closed his beautiful eyes to your abomination, injustice, and disgusting policies.”

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Fazileh Mansour Beigi

Anuradha Koirala, known as Dijju (elder sister), is a Nepalese social activist who has helped rescue and rehabilitates more than 12,000 women and children who have been victims of sex trafficking between Nepal and India. Anuradha had been an educator for over 20 years in Kathmandu before she began her current work. In 1993 she established Maiti Nepal – a non-profit organization dedicated to providing refuge and health and social services to the victims of the region’s brothels and exploitive sex trade. Maiti Nepal (&#8220;maiti&#8221; means &#8220;mother&#8217;s home&#8221; in Nepali) has three prevention houses, eleven transit homes, two hospices and a formal academy. Upwards of 1000 children receive direct services from Koirala’s organization every single day. Maiti Nepal also works closely with Indian authorities to patrol and prevent trafficking along the border. 



In appreciation of her services, the Government of Nepal now annually recognizes September 5th as an anti-trafficking day. Anduradha was also appointed as a former Assistant State Minister of Women Children and Social Welfare. Koirala’s amazing work has been recognized not only within Nepal and India but by various organizations around the world. Among her many accolades, Anduradha received the Courage of Conscience Award from The Peace Abbey in Sherborn, Massachusetts in 2006 and in 2010 she won the CNN Hero of the Year award bringing great recognition to her cause. That same year the United States government provided a two-year grant of $500,000 to Maiti Nepal’s continued work. Anuradha, who cited Mother Teresa as her greatest inspiration, would go on to receive the Mother Teresa Awards in 2014. In 2017 Koirala was the recipient of the Padma Shri award, one of India’s highest civilian honors. Koirala joined Nepali Congress party in 2017 and has since been appointed as 1st Women Governor of Province No. 3 by the Nepalese government.

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Anuradha Koirala

Dr. Paul Jozef Crutzen is a Dutch astronomic scientist most known for assisting in the discovery in the 1970’s that chemical emission of nitrous oxide was causing the acceleration of ozone depletion. His dedication to his environmental work and exploring the effects of climate change helped him receive the 1995 Nobel Prize for Chemistry along with fellow scientists Mario Molina and Frank Sherwood.



Dr. Crutzen originally studied civil engineering until his education was cut short due to the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands. Upon resuming his studies, Dr. Crutzen began conducting research primarily in atmospheric chemistry, specifically Earth’s ozone layer. &nbsp;In 1974, Crutzen developed a model of the potential ozone depletion resulting from continued use of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), mostly used in aerosol spray cans and as refrigerants or cleaners, which at the time were being emitted by increased use of nitrogen-rich fertilizers and fossil fuel. Dr. Crutzen later began to campaign for the worldwide ban on harmful substances to protect the earth. His work resulted in The Montreal Protocol, the most successful environmental treaty to date to protect the ozone layer. This work on global warming also helped Crutzen to create the term for “Anthropocene” which he expanded upon in Geology of Mankind in 2002, defining the epoch relating to or denoting the current geological age where humans have had an impact on global climate and environmental change. 



Among his many professional associations, Dr. Crutzen currently works at the Department of Atmospheric Chemistry at the Max Planck Institute for Chemistry, in Mainz, Germany; the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego; and at Seoul National University, South Korea.

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Paul J. Crutzen

Alyn Ware is a New Zealand advocate who has lead key initiatives focused on nuclear abolition and peace education as well as international law, women’s rights, children’s rights, and the environment. Since the 1980’s, Ware has been actively campaigning against nuclear weapons in New Zealand and is the founder and international coordinator of the network Parliamentarians for Nuclear Non-proliferation and Disarmament (PNND). Alyn successfully leads a national campaign which saw nuclear weapons prohibited in 1987. After moving to New York in the late 80’s, Ware worked on a number of peace initiatives at the United Nations and also served as the Executive Director at the Lawyers Committee on Nuclear Policy. Ware’s extensive accomplishments in the field also include a role as UN Coordinator for a ground-breaking opinion by the International Court of Justice on the legality of the threat or use of nuclear weapons. He has also lead a number of initiatives such as the development a Model Nuclear Weapons Convention promoted by the UN Secretary-General and the establishment of the International Criminal Court (ICC). 



On top of all of his notable work in the field of nuclear proliferation, Alyn has been active in establishing peace education programs in New Zealand schools that were developed for the peace studies guidelines adopted by the Department of Education. Ware has been recognized for his outstanding work and is the recipient of numerous accolades including the Right Livelihood Award, United Nations International Year for Peace Award, World Peace Award, Winston Churchill Memorial Trust Award, Alliance for Nuclear Accountability Award, and Tom Perry Peace Award. Alyn was also nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2015.

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Alyn Ware

Francisca Ramirez is a Nicaraguan environmental, land and peasant’s rights activist from the community of La Fonseca, Nueva Guinea on the Caribbean coast. She has been named as one of the 60 most influential people in Central America by Forbes Mexico. Francisca founded the Consejo por la Defensa de la Tierra, Lago Soberania (Council for the Defense of the land, lake, and sovereignty). Nicaragua is regarded as one of the most dangerous and threatening countries with respect to land rights. Francisca and her family have received numerous death threats from the government in attempts to silence her activism. Ramirez has summarily declined several high-priced buyouts of her land and other hush money to cease her efforts in activism. 



Ramirez has been critical of government failings in infrastructure, such as roads, that have severe economic repercussions on poor farming communities. Francisca is a vital part of educating farming communities and other working-class groups of their rights across various regions of Nicaragua. In 2014 she began her fight against a controversial law that was signed by the government allowing HKND Group, a Chinese developer, to build a shipping canal through the country. The intercontinental shipping canal would displace a considerable amount of farming and peasant families, forcing them from to give up long-held lands and resettle elsewhere. 



On April 20, 2018, Ramírez and several other leaders of the peasant’s rights movement declared support for the grassroots protests taking place throughout the nation and called for a general strike. The strike and resulting protests became one of the deadliest scenes to affect the country since the Nicaraguan revolution. Following the violence, Ramirez went out for a second demonstration, stating &#8220;it is time for (President) Daniel Ortega to understand that he cannot continue doing whatever he wants with this country&#8230;It has been enough. We want peace but with justice for the murders&#8230;&#8221;

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Francisca Ramirez

Halimatou “Halima” Hima is an advocate for women and children’s rights who has worked with over 100 villages and youth across Niger to understand and find solutions for the many issues that face the nation. Born and raised in Arlit, a small town in the middle of the sub-Saharan desert in northern Niger, Halima grew up focused on her education and became the president of Niger’s Youth Parliament at the age of 15. During this time Halima worked on national campaigns focused on improving education for girls, especially in rural areas. She also spearheaded work targeting juvenile prison reforms, HIV aid for youths, as well as environmental and civic action. 



In 2004, Halima would go on to represent Niger at a Pan-African Youth Conference in Dakar, Senegal and by the age of 22, Halima was a consultant for UNICEF.



Always continuing to further her own education, Halima received her bachelor&#8217;s degree in Economics/International Relations &amp; Africana Studies at Wesley College and later became the first Nigerien to attend Harvard University, where she earned a master’s degree in Public Policy. 



Halima is currently a Ph.D. candidate in Developmental Studies at the University of Cambridge. In completing her dissertation, she has remained focused on trying to improve and assist the impoverished regions of Niger with an emphasis on motivation and empowerment to improve circumstances through continued education. In 2011, Hima was named one of &#8220;Africa&#8217;s 25 top emerging women leaders under 25 for their commitment to service&#8221;. Graciously, Halima often refers back to the notion of illimi, a concept passed on by her great-grandmother which translates to “Knowledge, Humility, Purpose” as her motivation to be a force for change in Niger.

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Halima Hima

Dr. Josephine “Joe” Obiajulu Okei-Odumakin is a women’s rights activist from Nigeria who serves as president for the group&nbsp;Women Arise for Change Initiative and Campaign for Democracy. Dr. Okei-Odumakin also serves as the Executive Director for the Institute of Human Rights &amp; Democratic Studies as well as being an integral member of several other activist organizations. She received her master&#8217;s in Guidance and Counseling followed by a doctorate in History and Policy of Education.



Nigeria was ruled by a series of oppressive military regimes between 1970 and 1999. Dr. Okie-Odumakin began to fight and challenge human rights abuses during the late 1980’s. Joe’s activism led to her being detained 17 times during the military rule of Ibrahim Babangida and his IBB regime. In 1994, Joe was accosted by the police and beaten nearly to death and detained for pasting posters protesting against one of the world’s most violent regimes. Later that same year, while addressing a rally, Joe sustained serious injuries as she was again violently seized by soldiers and imprisoned. 



Without giving in to fear, Joe has continued her activism and been an unshakeable voice in the Nigerian civil rights movement. She has helped with over 2,000 cases where the rights of women and children have been disregarded by police, schools and even hospitals. Some of the most extreme cases Josephine has worked on involve extrajudicial killings or women or their families by soldiers and police. The recipient of numerous awards, Dr. Okei-Odumakin was also the recipient of the International Women of Courage Award from the United States Department of State. The award was presented to her personally by Michelle Obama and John Kerry on International Women’s Day in 2013.

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Dr. Josephine “Joe” Obiajulu Okei-Odumakin

Inangaro Vakaafi is a member of the Niue Youth Council and also a board member and vice chair of the Pacific Youth Council. The Niue National Youth Council is an Incorporated Society established in 1982 to unify the various youth groups on the island. At present, its members consist of the 14 village youth groups as well as 5 youth groups from the different denominations present on the island. The Council represents and acts on behalf of youth and interests concerning youth development at a national, regional and international level. Vakaafi believes that the youth have a huge impact on the changes made for her South Pacific country and is actively advocates for youths to take on leadership roles. 



Inangaro identifies sexual and reproductive health and rights, non-communicable diseases, climate change, gender inequality and domestic violence as some of the biggest issues facing Niue. Vakaafi believes that the youth of the nation tend to be more open-minded to the processes of reform in these areas and cites education as the key to breaking down divisions within the country. &#8220;I think the key is educating people. &nbsp;Educating people to be more accepting. Because the reason that people don&#8217;t support certain issues is because they don&#8217;t know much about it, and if you don&#8217;t know much about it then there&#8217;s resistance. So if we could educate people to be more open-minded, accepting . . . and whether or not they come on board that is totally up to them, but we just want to make sure that the voices of the marginalized, those that are discriminated (against) are put out there. &nbsp;Because they&#8217;re part of our society.&#8221;

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Inangaro Vakaafi

Fridtjof Nansen, born in 1861, was a Norwegian humanitarian and explorer known for creating the “Nansen Passport”, a certificate that was recognized by more than 52 countries which helped thousands of refugees to resettle in other countries. A man of many talents, Nansen was a champion cross-country skier who also excelled in the sciences, particularly Zoology. Fridtjof once led a team on a four and half month expedition to Greenland where he conducted intensive scientific studies and documented the seals and bears. In the process of the expedition, Nansen and his team completed the first crossing of Greenland. His later expeditions and research focused on the polar ice currents. He published six volumes of research and contributed innovations for equipment, clothing and travel techniques of polar regions. 



In 1920, Nansen who had been Norwegian delegate was named as the president of the Norwegian Union for the League of Nations. The following year, the Council of the League of Nations in partnership with the International Red Cross established the High Commission for Refugees, asking Nansen to administer it for stateless refugees. Nansen then invented the “Nansen Passport” and utilized the methods of custodial care, repatriation, resettlement, emigration &amp; integration to aid refugees. Nansen directed the relief efforts for millions of Russians during the famine of 1921 and gathered enough supplies to save an estimate of between 7 to 22 million people. Nansen would go on to aid in the relief of hundreds of thousands of displaced Greeks following a defeat by the Turkish army. Nansens final great humanitarian effort occurred in 1925 when he worked to save the remaining Armenian people from extinction by drawing up political, industrial and financial plans which would later influence the United Nations Technical Assistance Board and the International Bank of Development and Reconstruction post-WWII. Nansen’s International Office settled about 50,000 people in Erivan, Syria, and Lebanon. In recognition of his humanitarian work, Nansen was ultimately awarded The Nobel Peace Prize in 1922.

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Fridtjof Nansen

Kang Chol-Hwan is a human rights activist who is also the founder and president of the North Korea Strategy Center, an NGO seeking to bring free press and media into North Korea. Originally from a family with strong ties to the Workers’ Party, he was imprisoned as a child and taken to a Yodok concentration camp for 10 years. 



In 1977, Chol-Hwan’s grandfather, who was the Vice President of the Commercial Management office in Pyongyang, was accused of treason and being an agent for the Japanese national police. His grandfather&#8217;s accusation meant the disgrace of his songbun and the entire family was to be sent to a concentration camp. In North Korea, songbun is used to determine whether an individual is trusted with responsibilities and given opportunities for success including food rations, education, social and political status. Kang’s mother divorced his father to save her own family’s songbun and Chol-Hwan along was sent to the Yodok concentration camp along with the other family members on his father’s side. At the time of his imprisonment, he was just nine years old. In his autobiography, The Aquariums of Pyongyang, Chol-hwan describes the terrible living conditions including exposure to the elements, routine beatings and being forced to watch public executions of other prisoners. 



At the age of 15, he was assigned to a work detail where he witnessed many people die from starvation, while others resorted to eating rats and worms to survive. A standing order by Kim Jong-il stated that prisoners with relatives in Japan were to be released after 10 years. Chol-hwan was fortunate to have this connection and upon his release from Yodok he took up residence with his uncle in a small village nearby. Chol-Hwan soon bought an illegal radio receiver and began listening to broadcasts from South Korea which sparked an interest in outside information and anti-government activity. He was eventually identified and watched by the North Korean government. Rather than putting his family at risk, Kang and a fellow Yodok internee escaped from North Korea by crossing the Yalu River into China in 1992. 



Chol-hwan made his way to South Korea, and in 2007 he established the North Korea Strategy Center. The NGO not only seeks to bring free press and media into North Korea by working with North and South Koreans but also raises awareness about North&#8217;s dire human rights conditions as well as advocating for freedom and a unified Korea. Since its inception, the NKSC has worked with over 150 North Korean defectors and sent over 40,000 DVDs, 400 radio sets, and 4,000 USBs into North Korea.

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Kang Chol-Hwan

Mohammed Alfazari is an Omani journalist, blogger, political activist and human rights defender Alfazari is also the founder and editor-in-chief of Mowatin (“Citizen”) Magazine, an independent electronic journal founded in June 2013 that discusses news and community events in Oman and the Arabian Gulf. The journal features the diversity of ideas and freedom of expression with a focus on human rights. The magazine serves as a journal for issues that have been silenced by the Omanian press, advocating for the protection of public freedoms in Oman.



Throughout Oman, security forces harass and prosecute activists and critics on vague charges such as insulting the sultan and undermining the prestige of the state. There is a law that penalizes any person who sends, by means of telecommunications system, a message that violates public order or public morals. As a journalist and blogger, Alfazari has been arrested numerous times for his activism. In 2011, he took part in the Arab Spring protest and advocated for democracy, a real parliament with legislative powers, a new contractual constitution, transparency and separation of powers. Throughout 2012 and 2013, al-Farazi faced numerous arbitrary arrests and interrogations, including charges of &#8220;insulting the sultan&#8221; and engaging in an &#8220;illegal gathering&#8221;. He was arrested during June 2012 during a roundup of bloggers and activist, holding him in solitary confinement for “gathering with the intent of rioting” and “insulting the Sultan”. He was freed in March 2013 following a royal pardon. Authorities arrested al-Fazari again in 2014 for six days and then released him without charges. Alfazari and his family were stripped of their passports and refused exit from Oman, which violated the Arab Charter on Human Rights of which Oman is a signatory and guarantees the right to freedom of movement. Mohammed is currently extradited to the United Kingdom. In January 2016, Mowatin published a statement in which it announced that it would stop publishing until further notice because of what it described as “circumstances beyond its control, the most important being the safety of writers and journalists of Mowatin.

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Mohammed Alfazari

Malala Yousafzai is Pakistani human rights advocate and activist for female education focusing primarily on the education of women and children from Swat Valley. She was inspired by her father, an educator, and advocate, who believed that his women should have every equal opportunity as men especially in regard to education. During the Taliban occupation of Swat, Malala began blogging for the BBC under the pseudonym, “Gul Makai”, where she described her experiences with the banning of girls from attending schools. Her blog made headlines the following year and Malala was featured in a documentary by The New York Times about her life during the reoccupation of the region by the Pakistani military. Her popularity and prominence following the documentary lead to Malala publicly campaigning for girls to go to school and ultimately winning Pakistan’s first National Youth Peace Prize.



Malala soon became a target due to speaking against the Taliban and on October 12, 2012, Malala and two other women were shot by a Taliban gunman while on a bus in the Swat District. Her assassination attempt led to an international support for Malala and female rights. After intensive rehabilitation and recovery, Malala began the Malala Fund, a non-profit organization continuing the fight for education. In recognition of her work United Nations declared July 12 “Malala Day” and in 2014, she received the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize, along with Indian activist, Kailash Satyarthi, for her fight against the oppression of children and women’s education rights. At 17, Malala was the youngest-ever Nobel Prize laureate. The following year she was featured in the Oscar-nominated documentary He Named Me Malala and was named by Time as one of the most globally influential people. Malala is the author of a memoir titled, I am Malala and in 2017, she created a children’s picture book titled Malala’s Magic Pencil.

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Malala Yousafzai

Gabriela Ngirmang was a peace and anti-nuclear activist from the Micronesia region of Palau.



Born in 1922, grew up during WWII, while Palau was under Japanese administration and was given a limited education. Both of Ngirmang’s parents held high positions within their clans in Airai and Koror. She received the title of the matriarch of Ikleau clan and held the title of ‘Mirar’, the second’ woman’s title in Koror, Palau’s capital, for over 12 years. 



Ngirmang is considered to have been instrumental in creating the world&#8217;s first nuclear-free constitution, banning the use, storage, and disposal of nuclear weaponry in Palau. The constitution came into effect in 1979 with 92% support from the people. Within the constitution, the document held a clause that there was a required 75% of votes before nuclear weapons could be brought into Palau. &nbsp;It was received favorably, so much so that between the years 1979 &#8211; 1994, the clause was voted on and upheld 11 times.



Ngirmang also lead Otil a Belaud (translates to ‘anchor of our land’), a women’s organization that defended the constitutional anti-nuclear clause. Her daughter Cita Morei, is a prominent member of the moment to this day. 



During 1987, the Palauan government attempted to amend the 75% voters clause. This caused &nbsp;Ngirmang to lead 50 women elders to take the government to court. The result brought threats to the elders and Ngmirmang’s house was bombed. &nbsp;The case was brought to the United States &amp; United nations and the constitution was amended to a 50% vote. In 1988, Otil a Belaud was nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize and in 2005 was individually nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize. In 1993, Otil A Belaud received the Global 500 Award from the United Nations Environment Programme for their group efforts for a nuclear-free Palau.



Ngmirang passed peacefully in 2007.

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Gabriela Ngirmang

Issa Amro a Palestinian activist based in Hebron, West Bank. He is the founder and director of Youth Against Settlements, a peaceful group that documents the alleged abuse by Israeli soldiers and settlers in addition to organizing protests against Israeli policies in Hebron. As a spokesman of the Palestinian resistance against the Israeli Occupation of the Palestinian Territories, Amro advocates the use of peaceful activism. Amro was declared “human rights defender of the year in Palestine” in 2010 by the office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. Amro has arrested numerous times for his non-violent human rights work and is being indicted by the Israeli military court with 18 charges against him. The United Nations Human Rights Council has expressed concern for Amro due to the harassment, intimidation, and reprisals he receives from Israeli soldiers and settlers. He has been charged with “causing division” among Palestinians and for speaking ill of the authority, based on the new law issued by the head of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas&#8217;, presidential decree. He is expected to face trial before the Israeli military court for his role in organizing against the policies. In May 2017, Bernie Sanders along with three U.S. Senators and 32 Congressmen wrote to Secretary of State Rex Tillerson to urge Israeli authorities to reconsider the charges against Amro. In 2017, he was arrested by the Palestinian Authority and charged with violating the new &#8220;electronic crimes&#8221; where he denounces the arrest of a journalist calling for the resignation of the Abbas. Released on bail, Amos continues to fight against the Palestine Authority.

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Issa Amro

Weni Bagama is a Panamanian environmental activist fighting for the human rights of the largest comarca indígena (indigenous region) in Panama, Ngöbe-Buglé. Since 1997, the communities have been going against the national economic expansions which rely on mining and recently hydropower. As of 2006, the Ngöbe- Buglé communities have been impacted by the Barro Blanco dam, a gravity dam located in the Tabasará River due to its violation of territorial rights for the Ngöbe. Bagama is the leader of the M10 Movement of the Tabasara River, a resistance movement trying to put an end to the Barro Blanco. The rising waters from the dam’s testing have created the destruction of homes, ceremonial and archaeological sites in addition to crops for the indigenous village. Other dam projects have caused devastation leading to entire villages being swept away by water. For the movement in the Ngöbe-Buglé community, women activists have been faced with violence including systematic assault, imprisonment, and riot squads. Bagama and other Panamanian environmentalists hope the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights would put pressure on the government to fix the situation and stop the repression of environmental activism in Panama.

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Weni Bagama

Joe Moses is a former Papau New Guinean university worker and a land activist from the community of Paga Hill in Port Moresby. The settlement, home to about 2,000 people for the past 70 years, became the site of conflict when the government granted a lease to the Paga Hill Development Company (PHDC), a joint venture between local and international investors, to build a luxury resort on Paga Hill in 2012. Joe led the charge in organizing the community in the fight to keep their homes and raising awareness of the struggle via the internet. Moses was forced to deal with concerns for his own safety, when armed police forced out the remaining residents from the Paga Hill settlement and their homes were bulldozed in 2014. With the assistance of international NGOs in late 2016, Moses was able to secure a flight from Papua New Guinea to Panama and then to Britain where he currently lives. Joe Moses continues to lead his fight from the UK attempting obtain compensation for the Paga Hill residents who were displaced. A newly released documentary titled “The Opposition“ tells the story of the fight to save Paga Hill. The film has featured in several international film festivals.