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Meet our new members!

welcome

 

Women Human Rights Defenders International Coalition is honored to welcome four new members: FEMENA, Women Human Rights Defenders Hub, SEMA Network and WHRD Network Uganda!

Femena works with partners to promote gender equality, inclusion and peace; expand civic space; strengthen civil society and WHRD resilience; visibilize the work of WHRDs and progressive feminist movements; and foster solidarity and south-south cooperation in the Southwest Asia and North Africa (SWANA) regions. 

Women Human Rights Defenders Hub operates across Kenya, with programs and activities currently implemented in eight counties: Bomet, Kisumu, Kitui, Marsabit, Meru, Mombasa, Nakuru, and Nairobi. The Hub also collaborates with the sister organisations in Uganda and Tanzania under the consortium of East Africa protection networks of WHRDs thus giving it a regional outlook. 

SEMA Network is a global network of victims and survivors working to end wartime sexual violence. Through its 70+ members, the network is active in 29 countries worldwide. SEMA members mobilise collectively to speak out about the realities of sexual violence in conflict and act in solidarity to advocate for justice, accountability, and an end to wartime sexual violence and impunity. 

WHRD Network Uganda works to ensure a safe and secure work environment for WHRDs to increase the quality and quantity of their work through capacity building for protection, self-protection and safety, advocacy and networking, and provide holistic feminist protection and emergency response services to tackle violence faced by WHRDs.

Femena joined the WHRDIC to:

  • Amplify the voices, perspectives, and concerns of WHRDs across the SWANA region, with a particular focus on those working in the most challenging contexts affected by crisis, repression, shrinking and closed civic space, and conflict.
  • Strengthen protection mechanisms for WHRDs in the SWANA region and expand civic space through advocacy, awareness-raising, and support for informal and formal organizations and feminist movements.
  • Challenge double standards in the application of human rights and advocate for the consistent implementation of international human rights law to protect and support human rights defenders and the marginalized communities they serve.

The Women Human Rights Defenders Hub's membership in WHRDIC presents significant opportunities to deepen protection, advocacy, and movement-building efforts by connecting Kenyan WHRDs to a global network of solidarity, influence, and rapid response. The value of this engagement has already been demonstrated through collective actions such as the East Africa protection network Consortium's joint statement on transborder reprisals against WHRDs of Kenya,Uganda and Tanzania, which amplified regional concerns on an international platform in 2025. Continued participation in WHRDIC is expected to strengthen the Hub's ability to mobilize global solidarity, influence policy processes, access strategic partnerships and resources, and ensure that the experiences and priorities of East African WHRDs shape regional and global human rights agendas.

SEMA Network joined WHRDIC to help ensure the visibility, recognition, and protection of conflict-related sexual violence survivor advocates, whose voices are too often excluded from decision-making spaces. By standing together, they will be able to amplify the experiences and demands of survivors and women’s human rights defenders, protect those at risk, and build a stronger global movement for justice, equality, and lasting change.

WHRD Network Uganda joined the WHRDIC to connect local struggles in Uganda with a stronger global movement that can amplify protection, visibility, and advocacy for women human rights defenders. Their hope is that transnational solidarity will strengthen collective resilience, open safer spaces for organizing, and ensure that WHRDs facing shrinking civic space are not isolated but backed by a united international voice.

Together, these four organisations bring invaluable expertise, experience, and perspectives from their communities, regions, and movements. We look forward to learning from one another, strengthening our collective solidarity, and advancing our shared vision of a world where all women human rights defenders exercise their agency without fear or violence, and where their movements thrive in building a more just, sustainable and equitable world.

We wish them a powerful journey with the Coalition, and are excited to build this next chapter together.