{"id":38076,"date":"2020-08-20T18:55:20","date_gmt":"2020-08-20T18:55:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.jww.org\/?p=38076"},"modified":"2020-08-20T18:55:20","modified_gmt":"2020-08-20T18:55:20","slug":"protect-dr-denis-mukwege","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/protect-dr-denis-mukwege\/","title":{"rendered":"Jewish World Watch demands the immediate protection of Dr. Denis Mukwege"},"content":{"rendered":"

Jewish World Watch, a genocide prevention organization that brings hope and healing to survivors of mass atrocities worldwide, urgently appeals for immediate action to protect our long-time partner Dr. Denis Mukwege from recent threats of violence and death.<\/span><\/p>\n

Dr. Mukwege \u2014 2018 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Congolese gynecological surgeon, and trailblazing advocate for women\u2019s rights \u2014 has been the <\/span>target of multiple threats<\/span><\/a>, both online and offline, since speaking out against recent spikes in violence in his homeland.\u00a0 The lives of Dr. Mukwege, his family members, dedicated staff, and patients at his Panzi Hospital complex in Bukavu are at risk, and the international community must urgently mobilize to protect them from imminent danger.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Sign our petition calling for the immediate protection of Dr. Denis Mukwege, his family and his staff at the Panzi Hospital in the Congo<\/strong><\/p>\n

[maxbutton id=”93″]<\/p>\n

\n

On July 26, Dr. Mukwege<\/span> publicly condemned<\/span><\/a> a massacre in<\/span> Kipupu<\/span><\/a>, attributing the atrocities to the same bad actors that have been wreaking havoc in eastern Congo since 1996 and calling for justice to be served.\u00a0 In response, General James Kabarebe, former Minister of Defense of Rwanda and a long-time security advisor to Rwandan President Paul Kagame,<\/span> denounced Dr. Mukwege<\/span><\/a> on Rwandan state television. Since then, Dr. Mukwege and his family have been the targets of multiple threats of violence and death, including via social media posts and text messages to his personal cell phone.<\/span><\/p>\n

Dr. Mukwege\u2019s life has been threatened numerous times in the past because of his commitment to dismantling the scourge of gender-based violence as a weapon of war in the Congo and his demand for accountability and justice.\u00a0 He has tirelessly called for implementation of the recommendations of the<\/span> United Nations Mapping Report<\/span><\/a>, which exposed the dynamics of atrocities in the Congo that continue to this day. In October 2012, Dr. Mukwege was violently attacked and his family was held at gunpoint in an assassination attempt that resulted in the murder of his trusted friend and security guard.<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

\u201cWe cannot stand idly by and allow him to be silenced.\u00a0 We are using all possible advocacy channels to draw attention to this threat and secure his safety.\u201d<\/span><\/em><\/h3>\n

\u2013 <\/strong>Vaughan Meyer,<\/strong> Jewish World Watch Board Member and Advocacy Committee Chair<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

\n

Jewish World Watch has worked with Dr. Mukwege for nearly 10 years on various interventions designed to heal and empower female survivors of gender-based violence and their children.\u00a0 The most recent incarnation of our partnership is our Rapid Response Missions \u2014 an innovative new project that brings Dr. Mukwege\u2019s holistic model of medical care, counseling, and legal aid to the most vulnerable last-mile communities in the Congo, unreachable by traditional aid mechanisms.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Jewish World Watch calls upon the United Nations Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO) to immediately ramp up security for Dr. Mukwege, his family and his staff at the Panzi Hospital complex in Bukavu, South Kivu.<\/span><\/p>\n

We demand that governments refrain from inciting violence through messaging that threatens the dignity and safety of fearless human rights defenders like Dr. Mukwege.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Finally, we call upon the Congolese government, the United Nations and civil society organizations to investigate the recent spike in violence in the Ituri and South Kivu provinces of the Congo.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\n

Sign our petition now<\/strong><\/p>\n

[maxbutton id=”93″]<\/p>\n

\n

\u201cDr. Mukwege has long been a powerful voice for change in the Congo,\u201d said Jewish World Watch Board Member and Advocacy Committee Chair Vaughan Meyer, who traveled to the Congo to meet Dr. Mukwege at Panzi Hospital in 2014.\u00a0 \u201cWe cannot stand idly by and allow him to be silenced.\u00a0 We are using all possible advocacy channels to draw attention to this threat and secure his safety.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Click here<\/span><\/a> to learn more about Jewish World Watch\u2019s Rapid Response Missions and our work with Dr. Mukwege and his Panzi Hospital.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Jewish World Watch, a genocide prevention organization that brings hope and healing to survivors of mass atrocities worldwide, urgently appeals for immediate action to protect our long-time partner Dr. Denis Mukwege from recent threats of violence and death. Dr. Mukwege \u2014 2018 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Congolese gynecological surgeon, and trailblazing advocate for women\u2019s rights…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":22015,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[188,163],"tags":[128,177,129,130,507,143,160,573,333,454,223,574],"class_list":["post-38076","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-features","category-spotlight-article","tag-drc","tag-jww","tag-congo","tag-democratic-republic-of-the-congo","tag-dr-denis-mukwege","tag-jewish","tag-jewish-world-watch","tag-monusco","tag-panzi-hospital","tag-paul-kagame","tag-united-nations","tag-vaughan-meyer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38076","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38076"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/38076\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38076"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=38076"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jww.org\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=38076"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}