💫Just six weeks to go!
By October 2023, three girls under the age of ten, the youngest being seven-year-old Melissa from the suburb of La Campanera, were among 38 femicides committed in El Salvador in ten months.
El Salvador's femicide law, introduced in 2012, requires prosecutors to prove that the motive for a woman's death was hatred or contempt based on her gender and carries a prison sentence of 20 to 50 years.
Despite the success of the nationwide crackdown on gang violence in El Salvador over the last two years, the number of femicides in the country is increasing. In 2023, fourteen more femicides were reported than the previous year.
Sadly, this meant that El Salvador once again ended another year ranked as the number one country, not only in Latin America but in the world, with the highest rates of gender-based homicides (BMJ Global Health, 2023).
Femicide across Latin America is at crisis levels. It is the deadliest region for women and girls. Latin America has eight of the top ten countries with the highest femicides in the world.
Prevention is key - Arise and Shine 2024!
Research strongly indicates that prevention is one of the best strategies to tackle this serious issue and the many root causes ingrained in El Salvador's society that perpetuate violence against women.
This week marks our six-week countdown to our Arise and Shine Girls conference in El Salvador, to be held in the city of Mejicanos!
Our venue for this year. The local church 'Iglesia la Obra de Dios' in Mejicanos has kindly offered us their venue for this year's Arise and Shine girls conference.
We will be transporting girls in several buses from vulnerable and high-risk communities to empower them with enough practical skills and knowledge to prevent them from becoming another statistic.
The ministry given to the girls last year was incredibly impactful, with many girls responding to the message of the love and hope of God that was delivered.
This year, we have another incredible opportunity across the March International Women’s Day celebrations to raise awareness of the pressing situation for girls in El Salvador. It's an opportunity for us to shine a light on the lives of many girls and women who deserve to live free from abuse and violence!
Here is the impactful video of our very first Arise and Shine conference in March last year. (**Video link not available on Salvador’s HOPE website due to privacy)
Watch and see how your donations have made a powerful impact on girls' lives.
✨Thank you to those who donated towards the girls' registrations for Arise and Shine 2024 over the Christmas season. We have raised just over half the funds needed to cover the registration for our adolescent girls to attend the conference✨
In case you didn’t have the opportunity to donate at Christmas, it's not too late. You can make a donation today. Thank you for partnering with us to carry out some of the most important work we have ever done!
Together, we can work towards reducing the alarming rates of sexual violence and domestic abuse targeting adolescent girls and teenagers in El Salvador.
A donation of $30 AUD today will support our efforts to reach a vulnerable adolescent girl living in a high-risk community.
Your $30 Donation will help us to:
✨Enrol her in our Violence Prevention Program.
✨Empower her with knowledge about her rights.
✨Ensure ongoing mentorship
and
✨Cover her Arise and Shine Registration conference registration for March 2024!
In partnership with Ordinary Heroes, all donations of $2 or more are Tax- Deductible.
