The escalating violence in Ukraine has put millions of women’s and girl’s lives at risk and threatens to displace over a million innocent civilians. There are already more than 2.9 million people in need of assistance in the region, and most refugees fleeing Ukraine are women and children.
One in three women experience physical or sexual violence in their lifetime.
All the time... everywhere.
We are confronting one of the world's oldest and most widespread human rights abuses: violence against women and girls. Although such violence is a global epidemic, it is especially prevalent in areas of crisis and displacement.
VOICE is a feminist organization working towards a world where girls and women are respected leaders in designing and implementing solutions to eradicate violence -- both in their communities and within the halls of power.
We are working to help meet the needs of women- and girl-led organizations in a growing number of countries, including Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Colombia, Hungary, Iraq, Moldova, Myanmar, Pakistan, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, South Sudan, Syria, Ukraine, the United States, Venezuela, and Yemen. Many of our team members come from the places that we work, meaning that deep local knowledge, expertise and lived experiences underlie our approaches.
Our team includes humanitarian practitioners, researchers, and human rights defenders with over 100 years of experience in feminist movement-building and violence prevention and response.
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In 2021, the world passed a solemn threshold, with 1 in 88 people forcibly displaced by conflict or ecological disaster, continuing the upward trend we’ve seen over the last decade.Against this backdrop, VOICE was there to ensure the voices of women and girls were heard, and the leadership of the organizations they lead was respected and better integrated into the humanitarian response.
The global humanitarian community is failing Afghan women and girls, and it will continue to fail them until it starts backing up its empty statements with real action and working directly with Afghan women, girls and women-led organizations to implement solutions to the crisis they face. After Afghan women spent two decades thinking they were part of a partnership with the U.S. and international community, to then be betrayed and left behind, it’s past time for the global community to listen to Afghan women and girls and empower them to drive solutions to this crisis.
One-Year Since Kabul Fell: VOICE Urges Humanitarian Community to Listen to Local, Women-Led Organizations to Address the Crisis Facing Afghan Women and Girls. To mark one year since the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan was cemented with the fall of Kabul on August 15, 2021, Mendy Marsh, Co-Founder and Executive Director at VOICE, a feminist organization dedicated to eradicating violence against women and girls and holding the humanitarian community accountable to women and girls in crisis settings, released the following statement:
The US Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe vs Wade is an act of violence against women and girls, which will serve to limit women’s access to education and employment, their freedom of movement, their economic well being, their voice in civic and political life, and their autonomy over their own bodies.
VOICE Report: Download a comprehensive list of all Taliban policies restricting women’s rights since August 2021. [Updated August 9, 2022]
The global humanitarian community is failing to meet the needs of women and girls displaced by the Russian invasion of Ukraine and adequately support women- and girl-led organizations on the frontlines of the emergency response, according to a new, seven-part regional assessment from VOICE, in partnership with HIAS. The reports were developed by VOICE’s 10-member assessment team, who spent four weeks speaking to women’s rights organizations, frontline workers, local NGOs, government workers, United Nations agency actors, and internally displaced and refugee populations
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How we work matters as much as what we do; our endeavors are led by women and girls’ realities, priorities, and expertise.
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