Throughout the world, the pandemic has pushed people further away from access to justice. In Morocco, ASF has been relying for several years on legal clinics, set up in universities, to promote access to justice, particularly for people in vulnerable situations. Under the supervision of teachers and legal professionals, students provide legal services to the population.

In Uganda, access to justice is limited by the financial resources of local populations but also by the geographical distance to the courts of law. In this context, ASF focuses on the training of community-based mediators to promote access to justice and enable local populations to claim their rights.

Each week this summer, we will publish an article from our annual report on our website. This week, find out more about ASF’s work in Indonesia to improve access to justice for women victims of violence.

Annie Masengo speaks to us about her struggles within the Congolese League against Corruption (LICOCO). She tells us about the observations that led her to engage in the fight against corruption, an endemic phenomenon in the natural resource sector, and of the importance of all community members, regardless of gender, being able to make their voices heard.

Avocats Sans Frontières, active in the Democratic Republic of Congo since 2002, would not be able to act without its partners. It is for this reason that, today, we wanted to give voice to them. These men and women told us about their everyday life, their realities and their convictions. Speaking today is Marceline Nzati, a sister at the Diocesan Commission for Justice and Peace in Boma (DCJP). She told us about herself, and about the importance for local populations to regain control over the management of natural resources and of the role that women can play in reclaiming these questions.

Joining in the celebration of women across the world today, ASF releases its analysis of the progresses and shortcomings in achieving women’s rights in Uganda’s extractive industry context.

Begin May, the European Union officially renewed its support for Avocats Sans Frontières’ work in Chad, allowing the organisation to continue its efforts to protect human rights in the country. This provides an opportunity to look back over some results achieved to date and look toward the challenges to come.

ASF has come a long way since it started up its activities in Congo 15 years ago. Its aim, from the very beginning, has been to ensure that people become more aware of their rights and can enforce them. We opened our first office in Kinshasa on 12 March 2002. Since then, we’ve developed a wide range of projects. Our network has grown nationwide, thanks to all those we have met who supported us, offering their advice and expertise, working with us in circumstances that were not always easy.

On this 8 March, International Women’s Day, ASF is focusing on the project it has been running in Zambia for the past year in partnership with the organisation Young Women’s Christian Association. The aim of making women the authors of their own emancipation is central to the activities of both organisations. The first results are very positive.

On International Women’s Day, ASF presents its new project for Zambia. In this country, like many others, women are particularly vulnerable. In partnership with the Zambian Young Women’s Christian Association, ASF aims to help women to claim and exercise their rights, and promote gender equality.