By Preeti Mangala Shekar

The Manipur Women Gun Survivors Network is based in the north-east Indian state of Manipur (bordering Burma) and empowers Manipuri women survivors of armed violence, and also works to eventually end the small arms trade in northeast India.

Global Fund grantee, the Chinese Lala Alliance, is a one-of-a-kind network based in mainland China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. The Alliance reflects the explosive growth over the years of the ‘lala’—or queer women—movement in China. One of its leaders, Amior, visited the Global Fund in 2009.

By Neida Lazo

More than 20 percent of women in Serbia – one in every five – is a victim of physical violence at some point during her lifetime. Women's rights activists in Serbia have diligently campaigned for years to address this staggering statistic. Since 1991, when the first SOS women's crisis hotline was established, women's groups have helped to secure a 2002 law criminalizing domestic violence, which was revised three years later to secure better legal protections and options for women survivors of abuse. These changes in the legal treatment of gender-based violence has encouraged greater public awareness of the issue. As a result, increasing numbers of women have summoned the courage to report abusive acts.

I look at an ant and I see myself…endowed by nature with a strength much greater than my size so I might cope with the weight of a racism that crushes my spirit. I look at a stream and I see myself… flowing irresistibly over hard obstacles until they become smooth and, one day, disappear.”
—Miriam Makeba (1932-2008), South African singer, songwriter and civil rights activist also known as Mama Afrika