In Port-au-Prince, not too far from the collapsed presidential palace, there is a camp called Mosolee. It sits on the grounds in front of the National Museum, in a large space surrounded by concrete walls. This morning, we arrived at one of the entrances and were met by a woman who works with a women's group active in that camp, FAVILEK. She led us through the camp, where we also met with one of the camp leaders.
We had already heard positive things about that camp, and we got more detail from our conversations there. Comprised of some 600 families, the camp is divided into four segments, each of which elects two representatives to an overall camp committee. In three of the four segments, one of the leaders elected is a woman. Together, they have been working to organize better security for the camps, and they have been able to fight to keep sexual violence against women at bay. Even so, when we arrived, they told us that two women had been raped in the camp in the past week. The priority in the conversation was organizing themselves to provide their own security, for instance through night watches and patrols.
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