Safe Around the World

This section of the OBRUK campaign covers how campaigners in the UK can help support an end to violence against women and girls internationally.

Campaigns on this theme:

2.4 Million Victims: Act to End Trafficking

 

OBRUK is part of a mass international campaign led by women and men across the world all seeking an end to violence against women and girls.  Campaigns have ranged from calling for better reproductive rights for women in the Philippines and challenging Republican lawmakers who wish to stop female politicians using the term vagina in Michigan to supporting women organising street marches in Afghanistan and Croatian equality campaigners. Already over 1,800 colleges have committed to holding fundraising benefits to support projects working with women and girls affected by violence.

Did you know?

According to UN Women:

• Worldwide, up to 50 percent of sexual assaults are committed against girls under 16.
• An estimated 150 million girls under the age of 18 suffered some form of sexual violence in 2002 alone.
• The first sexual experience of some 30 percent of women was forced. The percentage is even higher among those who were under 15 at the time of their sexual initiation, with up to 45 percent reporting that the experience was forced.
• Between 40 and 50 percent of women in European Union countries experience unwanted sexual advances, physical contact or other forms of sexual harassment at work.
• Across Asia, studies in Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines and South Korea show that 30 to 40 percent of women suffer workplace sexual harassment.
• In Nairobi, 20 percent of women have been sexually harassed at work or school.
• In the United States, 83 percent of girls aged 12 to 16 experienced some form of sexual harassment in public schools.

Find out more about why to rise by looking at this project at Portsmouth University, where students blog about gender issues and the developing world. One student, Helen Cooke, blogs about domestic violence as a barrier to economic development in Latin America.