25th March 2014

Women on the Move Awards: celebrating the contribution of migrant and refugee women

Every year we are inspired by the stories of courage, perseverance and leadership of the Woman and Young Woman of the Year. We are encouraged by the exemplary media coverage of the media award winners. And this year we were privileged to run a new awards category – the Champion award – for organisations or individuals whose work goes above and beyond to promote and support the protection, rights and/or integration needs of UK based migrant and refugee women.
Our winners this year were:
•Woman of the Year: Lilian Seenoi, a refugee from Kenya and founder of the the North West Migrant Forum (NWMF) in Derry/Londonderry, Northern Ireland.
•Young Woman of the Year: Tatiana Garavito left Colombia at the age of 18 and since has been advocating for exploited workers from the Latin American community in London. She is currently the Director of Latin American Women’s Rights Service.
•Special Jury Award: Diana Nammi, Director of the Iranian Kurdish Women’s Rights Organisation, for her ongoing work to protect women from ‘honour’ killing.
•Champion Award: the AIRE Centre, which for twenty years has helped ensure that individuals and families benefit from the rights they are entitled to under European law.
•Media Award (Print): A.A. Gill for his series of articles on refugees in DRC, Jordan and Lampedusa published in The Sunday Times Magazine.
•Media Award (Broadcast): Sue Lloyd-Roberts for her BBC Newsnight film on women fleeing female genital mutilation.
•Special Recognition: London Evening Standard for its series of articles and campaigning work on female genital mutilation.
Women on the Move Awards are organised by Migrant Rights Network, the Forum and UNHCR.
Complete report and video at http://www.migrantsrights.org.uk/blog/2014/03/focus-migrant-women-celebrating-their-outstanding-contributions