Ukrainian peacebuilder Nina Potarska sails to challenge illegal blockade of Gaza
Nina Potarska, a member of the ICAN-spearheaded Women’s Alliance for Security Leadership, is currently at sea with the Global Sumud Flotilla, a civilian-led mission organized with the Freedom Flotilla Coalition, en route to Gaza.
The Odd Couple: Women Peacebuilders and Security Actors Bridging Positions, Building Trust
The WPS agenda has proven a vital entry point for women peacebuilders to engage with the security sector and build trust within affected communities. These efforts—often invisible—are contributing to the reform of the sector, reshaping local security environments and mitigating violence.
The War Against Ourselves: Afghan Women Peacebuilders’ Response to the Mental Health Crisis in Afghanistan
This case study describes the drivers of the mental health crisis in Afghanistan, its gendered and cultural dimensions, and the strategies used by Afghan women-led peacebuilding organizations to provide solutions. The authors conducted interviews with representatives of Afghan women-led peacebuilding organizations and thematic experts, which were complemented by a desk review of project documentation and […]
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We are a coalition of NGOs, academics, activists, women’s rights defenders, journalists, artists, filmmakers and peacebuilders. We are working to get our Afghan colleagues and families, who are under direct threat from the Taliban, to safety. They have worked to bring peace to Afghanistan over the last 20 years, have fought for the rights of all Afghans, and especially women, girls and minority groups in direct opposition to the Taliban. They now come to us for help because nobody came for them.
Our colleagues are growing increasingly desperate and anxious about their safety due to their highly visible work on sensitive projects. Some are targeted due to the nature of their work, including the promotion of women’s rights and gender equality, some due to their work being funded by Western governments and many simply because of their gender, sexual orientation or ethnicity.
We are also working to support Afghans that have been able to flee or have arrived in host or transit countries. They are in unfamiliar places, may not speak the local language, and have few if any resources. Many of them have young families and are struggling to process the events over the past weeks and the uncertainty of what lies ahead.
Your donation will help us facilitate:
Secure transport to a location of safety. This will be in the form of security, travel costs, covid tests, access to safe houses and emergency medical support.
Emergency funds to support personal security measures as well as prepare and mitigate against humanitarian disaster as food prices in Afghanistan have sky-rocketed and goods are increasingly scarce.
Practical and financial support for people in transit or living under precarious conditions and whose livelihoods have been impacted. This includes food, medical care, clothes, communication devices, interpretation services and counselling at this difficult time.
Legal and administrative support to access, understand and submit the necessary paperwork to secure their stays both in a final host country and temporary transit countries. These processes are often slow and arduous.
Please donate and share in solidarity with Afghanistan,your support provides options when it feels like there are none and inspires hope to be able to get through this devastation. 100% of funds raised will go towards these efforts. We urge you to recognise your power and ability to help those who the world seems to want to leave behind.
You can help.You can do something.Please donate!
More about our coalition
Most of us are working through small NGOs, academic centres, universities or in an individual capacity, and have been called to this work because of our direct connections with Afghan friends and colleagues and the dreams they had for their country. We may not be one formal institution, but we are a collective of small committed networks. Powerful countries and leaders have left the responsibility to protect ordinary citizens and civilians to us, and together we have been able to use the strength of our network and connections to get people to safety and the support they need. But there are still many of our colleagues who need help and are at high levels of risk, and we won’t stop until they are safe.
We are a transnational, collaborative and equitable coalition, and make sure to centre Afghans in our work – no matter their age, gender, ethnicity or sexual orientation. We listen to what they need, and mobilise to share information, strategize on complex details of physical and mental safety, and tap our vast social capital to demand accountability from the relevant powerholders.
If you would like to find out more about the work we are doing to urgently help Afghans, and to find out about other ways you can help, please contact the Gender, Justice and Security Hub Communications Manager Nicky Armstrong: n.armstrong@lse.ac.uk or the Women’s Alliance for Security Leadership (WASL) Program Director Melinda Holmes: Melinda.Holmes@icanpeacework.org
All donations received are being managed and distributed by the International Civil Society Action Network (ICAN). If you have any questions on the financial management of the Afghanistan Emergency Relief Fund please contact: info@icanpeacework.org.
Women peacebuilders often operate in some of the world’s most dangerous contexts—yet the security support available to them is frequently fragmented, repetitive, and short-term. Recognizing the need for a fundamentally different approach, ICAN conducted a holistic security assessment of its Afghan partners, including members of the Women’s Alliance for Security Leadership (WASL). The result is the Holistic Security Menu: a co-designed, partner-driven model that provides practical and sustainable security support—on women peacebuilders’ […]
ICAN’s Mission Five Steps for Sustainable Prevention of Sexual Violence in Conflict ICAN Partner AWAPSA: A Catalyst for Kenya’s First SGBV Court The War Against Ourselves: Afghan Women Peacebuilders’ Response to the Mental Health Crisis in Afghanistan Protecting Women Peacebuilders: The Front Lines of Sustainable Peace
Thank you for your donation to ICAN. Your contribution strengthens women peacebuilders who are preventing violence, protecting communities, and rebuilding trust in some of the world’s most fragile contexts. By supporting ICAN and the Women’s Alliance for Security Leadership (WASL), you help women-led organizations in more than 40 countries mediate conflicts, assist families in crisis, and drive […]
On October 6, 2025, the U.N. Security Council holds its annual open debate on Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace, and Security. Today, we are not issuing a new statement. Instead, we are honoring our community of women peacebuilders—who appeared before the Security Council throughout these 25 years, speaking for the millions they represent—by echoing their messages.
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On behalf of the International Civil Society Action Network (ICAN) and members of the global Women’s Alliance for Security Leadership (WASL), we are honored to nominate Francesca Albanese, United Nations Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, for the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize.
در عرصه صحت روانی، افغانستان با بحران پیچیدهای مواجه است که این بحران به طور جدایی ناپذیر با ناامنی شدید فیزیکی، سیاسی و اقتصادی در کشور گره خورده و این نا امنی ها بحران را تشدید میکند. برای رسیدگی به آسیب های روانی، صحت و بهداشت جامعه به شیوه های پاسخگو به جنسیت و با مد نظر گرفتن حساسیت های فرهنگی، سازمانهای فعال در عرصه صلح سازی به رهبری زنان افغان در موقعیتی منحصربه فرد قرار دارند. این سازمان ها خدمات ابتدایی ارائه میدهند، مهارتها را توسعه میبخشند و در شکلدهی هنجارهای فرهنگی و جنسیتی نقش مؤثر ایفا میکنند.
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In a world increasingly divided by polarization, fear, and misinformation, building trust at the community level has never been more urgent. Religious and faith leaders—often seen as voices of moral authority and guidance—wield significant influence over the social and political attitudes of their communities. As locally rooted, trusted community leaders themselves, the women peacebuilders who make up the Women’s Alliance for Security Leadership (WASL) recognize the value of engaging with religious actors to advance inclusive peace and gender equality
In a powerful departure from traditional advocacy, ICAN—guided by our Afghan partners and women peacebuilders—hosted the event “Watan e Ma – وطن ما – Our Homeland: Women of Afghanistan Keeping the Flame of Freedom Alive” on March 17, 2025 at Blue Gallery in New York City. Held during the 69th Commission on the Status of Women (CSW69), the event celebrated Afghan cultural heritage and the resilience of Afghan women peacebuilders, who persist in their leadership for peace, justice, and equality under the Taliban’s regime of gender apartheid.
On May 5, 2025, ICAN's Sanam Naraghi Anderlini delivered the keynote speech at the two-day international conference "25th Anniversary Conference of UNSCR 1325 Women, Peace and Security."
