2003 Annual report
Program Highlights
In 2003, Inter Pares collaborated with counterpart organizations in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. The following are some examples of our work.
Citizen Organizing and the Promotion of Alternatives
Citizens' groups around the world are developing alternative visions of life and livelihoods and demonstrating that there are better ways of organizing societies and economies. Citizens' groups are sharing these visions, across regions and continents, and working to create the space for alternatives to flourish.
- Third World Network-Africa, based in Ghana, brought together organizations from 15 African countries to analyze the implications of international trade proposals for African economies. Prior to the World Trade Organization meeting in Mexico, these organizations engaged with their own governments to promote alternative economic development strategies based on justice and equity.
- In Guinea Bissau, in West Africa, fisherfolk developed a strategy to preserve fish stocks upon which their livelihoods depend. With the assistance of the organization Tiniguena, fishing communities created a protocol to identify which areas and seasons are appropriate for sustainable fishing. This protocol is being observed by local communities as well as fisherfolk from neighbouring countries.
- With the decline of rural economies, more and more people re-locate to marginal urban areas, posing challenges for services and livelihoods. In squatter areas of Manila, the Philippines, the women's health organization Likhaan demonstrated a viable approach to health care by organizing communities and training women as health workers. Likhaan's leadership led to important policy gains on women's reproductive rights.
- In the urban shanty towns of Managua, Nicaragua, community groups pressed municipal authorities for the provision of services such as health care, clean water, sanitation, housing and responsible policing. Young people took a leadership role in educating their communities on health and environmental standards.
Reclaiming Rights and Civil Liberties
Citizens are organizing to demand respect for basic human rights, an end to arbitrary arrest and detention, and legal protection. This work has assumed a new urgency in recent years with the rapid erosion of civil liberties in many countries.
- In Colombia, Inter Pares supported human rights organizations, women's groups, and peasant and indigenous peoples' associations to address violence and forced displacement. This work includes human rights protection, negotiation and advocacy to assist in preventing displacement, and support to people who have been displaced to urban areas.
- In Burma, the civil war has displaced an estimated one million people who have no access to services such as health. Inter Pares supported mobile teams to travel into these conflict regions to reach 155,000 internally-displaced people with basic health services.
- In Mindanao, an island in the southern Philippines, indigenous people have been dislocated from their traditional lands and deprived of their livelihoods. Inter Pares supported TriCom to assist indigenous people in filing ancestral domain claims to regain legal control of land and to develop plans for sustainable livelihoods.
- Migrant workers are afforded few rights and protections. Inter Pares supported the December 18 network which contributed to the ratification in 2003 of the International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of Migrants and Members of their Families.
- In Canada, Inter Pares is a co-founder and member of the International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group (ICLMG), a coalition of human rights and faith organizations, unions and refugee and immigrant groups. The coalition monitored Canada's security (anti-terrorist) laws and their impact and issued the report "In the Shadow of the Law," available here.
Women's Activism for Freedom from Violence
Women are mobilizing to confront and challenge the violence carried out by military and para military forces.
- In the ethnic regions of Burma, the Burmese military has carried out a systematic campaign of rape against women. Inter Pares supported women's organizations to document testimonies related to rape as a weapon of war, and has helped bring international attention to these atrocities.
- In Peru, more than 70,000 people, mostly poor and indigenous, died or disappeared in the 1980s and 1990s. Inter Pares accompanied Peruvian women in their participation in the national Truth Commission dialogue to press for restitution, reparations, and an end to impunity for those responsible for the violence.
- In Guatemala, Inter Pares worked with women who suffered rape and torture by the military, supporting them to organize for mutual support, gain access to trauma services, and explore legal avenues for justice, both in the national courts and through the Inter-American Criminal Court system.
| Reviewed June 1, 2004 |  |
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