International Day for the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict –June 19, 2026

“I was only a girl when the war came. I lost my home, my childhood, and my sense of safety. But I refused to lose my speech.”
— A Liberian Survivor

These words reflect the experiences of numerous women and girls whose lives were changed by conflict. Every survivor’s story represents loss and disruption—of violence that leaves deep emotional scars such as trauma, stigma, exclusion, and painful memories. Sexual violence in conflict is a weapon with persistent consequences.

As the world commemorates the International Day for the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict, the Natural Resource Women Platform (NRWP) stands in solidarity with survivors in Liberia and across the globe. We honor their fortitude, raise their voices, and renew our devotion to ending all forms of sexual and gender-based violence in conflict and post-conflict settings.

For NRWP, this day calls us to honor survivors and demand lasting change. Justice, healing, protection, and women’s collective power are central. We must ensure survivors are heard, supported, and empowered to regain their lives.

Liberia’s Painful Legacy and Women’s Courage to Rise

Liberia’s civil conflict left deep scars. Women and girls bore the burden, facing rape, exploitation, forced marriage, displacement, and gender-based violence. Families were separated, livelihoods lost, and survivors left to rebuild amid trauma and silence.

For rural and marginalized women, the conflict’s impact was even more severe. Many lost access to land, education, health services, and local support systems. For rural and marginalized women, the conflict’s impact was even more severe. They claimed their rights with dignity.

Amid devastation, Liberian women showed courage. They organized for peace, protected their families, and drove change. Their steadfastness paved the way for national recovery.

However, years after the conflict ended, many survivors continue to face serious challenges, including:

• Unresolved trauma and psychological distress;
• Social stigma, shame, and discrimination;
• Limited access to justice, accountability, and reparations;
• Economic hardship and exclusion from opportunities;
• Limited access to land, livelihood support, and social protection;
• Persistent gender inequalities and violence against women and girls.

For many women, even after conflict ends, their pursuit of healing, justice, and security continues. The struggle is ongoing.

Conflict-Related Sexual Violence and the Wider Struggle for Justice

Sexual violence in conflict is not an inevitable consequence of war. It is a deliberate act used to terrorize communities, destroy social structures, displace populations, and assert power and control. It violates human rights, undermines peace and development, weakens communities, and leaves lasting intergenerational consequences.

But conflict-related sexual violence does not only harm women’s bodies. It additionally disrupts families, livelihoods, land access, leadership, community participation, and women’s ability to shape decisions that affect their lives.

Survivors are not to be pitied. They are leaders, mothers, farmers, entrepreneurs, caregivers, and advocates. They deserve recognition, protection, justice, and opportunities to thrive.

Ending sexual violence in conflict means more than remembering. It requires survivor-centered justice, secure communities, economic empowerment, psychosocial support, and committed leadership at every level.

Why This Matters to NRWP’s Movement-Building Work

The Natural Resource Women Platform elevates the voices of marginalized and rural women whose lives are deeply connected to land, resources, food security, climate justice, and development. Many NRWP partners continue to face the effects of conflict, poverty, exclusion, land insecurity, limited justice, and gender-based violence.

NRWP believes that ending sexual violence in conflict is essential to women’s dignity, justice, and leadership. Survivors must have access to healing, justice, safe spaces, livelihoods, and decision-making power.

NRWP’s commemoration is an appeal to end conflict-related sexual violence and strengthen women’s collective voice, build solidarity, challenge harmful norms, and promote lasting change where women and girls are free from violence and exclusion.

Through community participation, women’s leadership development, advocacy, awareness-raising, and economic empowerment initiatives, NRWP continues to create environments where rural women, survivors, young women, and marginalized women can share their experiences, build solidarity, understand their rights, and take collective action for fairness and accountability.

Our movement-building approach is based on the belief that women are not only beneficiaries of protection and development, but leaders of change. By strengthening women’s voices at the community level and connecting those voices to national advocacy, NRWP works to challenge harmful norms, promote gender justice, and build safer, increasingly inclusive communities where women and girls can live free from violence and fear.

Sustainable peace and development can only be achieved when women and girls are safe and empowered. Protecting their rights and leadership is central to progress in governance, land rights, and justice.

The Call to Duty

As we commemorate this important day, NRWP calls upon:

The Government of Liberia is to strengthen and enforce survivor-centered policies, guarantee accessible justice, and provide comprehensive services for survivors, including psychosocial care, medical and legal support, reparations, livelihood programs, and economic opportunities.

Communities and traditional leaders are to actively reject stigma, foster safe environments for survivors, champion gender equality, and safeguard the honor and rights of all women and girls.

Civil society organizations and development partners should invest in sustained prevention, awareness, survivor support, women’s leadership, and recovery initiatives that meaningfully reach rural and underserved women and girls.

Young people are to become strong advocates for peace, gender justice, and the full protection and advancement of women’s and girls’ rights within their communities.

Women’s groups, community networks, and grassroots leaders to grow solidarity, increase awareness, support survivors, challenge harmful practices, and lead common efforts for justice, accountability, and real, lasting change.

Every citizen must challenge harmful norms, reject violence, and support survivors on the road to justice and empowerment.

NRWP’s Commitment

The Natural Resource Women Platform continues to be committed to strengthening the voices of disadvantaged and underserved women, including survivors of violence and conflict. We believe that sustainable peace, gender justice, and integrative development can only be achieved when women and girls live free from violence, fear, stigma, and discrimination.

Through advocacy, community participation, leadership development, women’s rights awareness, grassroots mobilization, and economic empowerment initiatives, NRWP continues to support women in recovering their dignity, strengthening their resilience, and becoming active participants in building peaceful, inclusive communities.

NRWP will continue to stand with survivors, promote women’s leadership, challenge harmful social norms, build solidarity among women, and advocate for systems that protect women and girls before, during, and after conflict.

A Message of Promise

We remember every survivor, honor their courage, and renew our pledge to fight for justice, healing, and dignity. Their stories drive us to keep this work.

The muteness surrounding sexual violence in conflict must end.

Let us ensure survivors are empowered and included in peacebuilding. Together, we can create a Liberia where all women and girls live in dignity, security, and are part of building a future free from violence.

On this International Day for the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict, NRWP stands with survivors.

We remember. We advocate. We organize. We act.

Because every survivor deserves justice, each opinion deserves to be heard. And every woman and girl deserves to live free from violence.