It's International Day for the elimination of Violence Against Women, and that means that we're once again at the start of the 16 Days of Activism.
And to mark this important observance the Women's Commission held a special launch this afternoon at Belize City's House Of Culture.
Speaker of the house Valarie Woods, and Women's Commission President Thea Garcia Ramirez told us why it's important:
Valerie Woods, Speaker Of the House of Representatives
"It's two weeks out of the year, it starts on an international Day for the elimination of Violence against women and girls. Which is the 25th and then it culminates on the December 10th which is the human rights day, which is fitting because violence against women and girls, gender-based violence is one of the most perpetuated breeches and acts against our individual human rights, so it is fitting that it should end on that and it is the two weeks, is just the intense aggressive campaign for if you will call to action, call to arms, call of awareness the world over and Belize is not immune to it because I believe as recent as last week, we continued to get the reports, um, and we continue to see on the news whether it's a stain whether it's a killing from some other form of means, where our women and girls are under attack but more importantly the Belize crime observatory has demonstrated that this remains a scourge 710 cases, cases, 33% increase for the period of July to August 2022 compared to the same period last year. There was also an increase in domestic reports. You can look at the perspective that more. Of our domestic violence cases and incidents are being reported but are also getting to the case level. So, that's good, what isn't good is the number of incidents. And so the campaign every year 16 days of activism is to let all of us not forget how far we need to go."
Thea Garcia Ramirez, President, National Women's Comission
"We are trying to raise awareness, we are trying to educate not just women and girls but the public in general and especially, there are few programs targeting men and young boys as well, trying to raise awareness about first of all what gender based violence is, I think there is a huge misconception of what that is in Belize, it entails all the way from cat calling, you know we have a huge problem and there is a program that the national Women's commission hosts which is a round table for girls and we travel from district to district from community to community and that's where it starts you know, rape culture and the way we in our society demean women, when you go on social media as well, for example and you re-victimize a victim of gender based violence or of rape or abuse that is also, it's a violence, it's violence and so we ramp it up for 16 days in the year and it's tied into human rights and so really gender based violence is just one of the ways in which you can violate a persons human rights and human rights. Are something that we have intrinsically, they can only be recognized you can't take away a right, you can't give a right, we have them so we have to recognize them and we have to respect rights and this is really what 16 days is."
Between January and July 2022, reports of on gender based violence increased by 20% compared to the same period last year.
Orange Walk has the highest number of cases recorded, while Corozal had the lowest.
