Recognizing that the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence Campaign provides an opportunity to bring global activism around women’s rights to the forefront of the celebration of UDHR 60 on December 10th 2008, EVAW Alliance is launching a 16-day campaign to celebrate the anniversary of the Declaration and to honor decades of landmark women’s rights advocacy.

Keeping in line with the theme for this year:

“Human Rights for Women: Human Rights for All”, the objectives of the campaign are to:

· Highlight the human rights challenges facing women in Pakistan

· Celebrate the leadership of women in defending human rights

Background

The 16 Days Campaign has been used as an organizing strategy by individuals and groups around the world to call for the elimination of all forms of violence against women by:

• raising awareness about gender-based violence as a human rights issue at the local, national, regional and international levels
• strengthening local work around violence against women
• establishing a clear link between local and international work to end violence against women
• providing a forum in which organizers can develop and share new and effective strategies
• demonstrating the solidarity of women around the world organizing against violence against women
• creating tools to pressure governments to implement promises made to eliminate violence against women

The 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence is an international campaign originating from the first Women's Global Leadership Institute sponsored by the Center for Women's Global Leadership in 1991. The 16 Days of Activism campaign is commemorated each year from 25 November to 10 December across the world. This also marks the following days:

- 25th November (International Day for elimination of Violence Against Women)

- 1st December (International AIDS Day)

- 3rd December (International Day for the Disabled)

- 10th December (International Human Rights Day)

The dates November 25, International Day against Violence Against Women and December 10, International Human Rights Day, were chosen in order to symbolically link violence against women and the human rights.