Gender, conflict, and environmental justice: The role of women human rights defenders

The climate crisis and conflicts are often addressed as separate global issues, however, these crises are deeply interconnected, as both are driven by the same extractive and political dynamics. Climate change compounds existing social and economic inequalities, including gender inequalities, intensifying pressures on natural resources and communities, and contributing to displacement, poverty and insecurity. At the same time, conflicts can destroy ecosystems and livelihoods, and leave communities less able to endure climate change impacts. Human rights defenders often work in contexts where environmental degradation, resource extraction, land dispossession and violence are deeply intertwined, shaped by political and economic interests that determine who controls resources, who benefits from their exploitation, and who bears the costs. In these contexts, violence and conflict become tools for maintaining unequal systems of power and access to land and natural resources, placing those who challenge them at particular risk.

Despite the accumulated risks, women defenders continue to organise and protect their communities and the environment in the face of extreme violence, war and State and non-State armed groups. 

On the occasion of the WHRD Advocacy Week organised by ISHR and partners, women human rights defenders whose stories embody these struggles - from defending the rights of fisherwomen in West Papua, to protecting the rivers of Serbia, or the wetlands in Mexico - have gathered in Geneva. These women live at the intersections of gender, climate and conflict and show us they cannot be tackled separately.

With more armed conflicts raging worldwide than ever, and the climate crisis churning out natural disasters and extreme weather events with increasing frequency, learning the lessons from the work of these women human rights defenders has never been more urgent.

Speakers:

• Astrid Puentes Riaño, Special Rapporteur on the human right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment
• Women human rights defenders from Latin America, Africa and Asia-Pacific

Moderation: International Service for Human Rights

Interpretation in English, French and Spanish.