UNESCO celebrates International Women's Day - March 2007 UNESCO’s constitution states that “since wars begin in the minds of men, it is in the minds of men that the defences of peace must be constructed.” This year, to celebrate International Women’s Day, we wish to pay tribute to the women around the world who are courageously, and often anonymously, constructing the defences of peace. See the video of the round table and read the final Declaration. For more information

 
Discover three of these women, invited to speak at UNESCO, through video interviews:

• Sylvie Kinigi, (in French only). Ms Sylvie Kinigi is former Prime Minister of the first democratically elected, ethnically mixed government of Burundi. She survived the violent 1993 coup, during which the President, Melchior Ndadaye, was assassinated, only to find herself in charge of a conflict-beleaguered nation. Ms Kinigi bravely went on to become a leader and outspoken proponent of peace and reconciliation. She is currently working as Senior Political Advisor and Coordinator of Programs to the Special Representative of the UN Secretary General to the Great Lakes Region in Africa.
• Luz Mendez, (in Spanish only). Ms Luz Mendez is President of the Advisory Council to the National Union of Guatemalan Women (UNAMG). Before this post, from 1991 to 1996, Ms Méndez participated in the Guatemalan peace negotiations which brought an end to 35 years of violent conflict. She was one of the few women at the negotiating table, and succeeded in seeing the inclusion of women’s rights into the historic Peace Accords. In 1996, Ms Mendez set out to rehabilitate the Union of Guatemalan Women, one of the country’s oldest women’s rights groups, which had been forced to operate in exile during the war. As part of her work with the Global Fund for Women, and UNIFEM, she has contributed to peace processes in Burundi, Iraq, Israel, Palestinian Territories and Colombia among others.
• Swanee Hunt, (in English only). Ambassador Swanee Hunt is the founding director of the Women and Public Policy Program at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. She is also the founder of the Initiative for Inclusive Security which advocates for the full participation of all stakeholders, especially women, in formal and informal peace processes. During her service as U.S. Ambassador to Austria, in the 1990s, Ambassador Hunt hosted negotiations and several international symposia aimed at securing peace in the Balkans. Today, through her work with the Initiative for Inclusive Security, Ambassador Hunt works to connect women peacemakers from around the world through her Women Waging Peace Network, and has trained women leaders and peace builders in almost 40 countries, most recently in Sudan.