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16 December 2025
ICAN Resources

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

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Resource Library
12 May 2025
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.

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21 April 2025
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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News & Media
6 October 2025
Open Statement to the United Nations Security Council on behalf of Women Peacebuilders Marking 25 Years of the Women, Peace, and Security Agenda

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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Country - Sri Lanka

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About the Organization

The Association of War Affected Women (AWAW) is an organization based in Sri Lanka that was established in 2000 to create a space for war affected women, specifically mothers and wives, and relatives of those who are missing to come together to work for peace.

AWAW is committed to safeguarding democracy and the rights of all, particularly women’s rights, in order to ensure a peaceful Sri Lanka, where all its peoples can live with dignity and enjoy equal rights.

AWAW leads a network of peer committees, composed of diverse groups of women, who collaborate on community projects such as women’s livelihood support and economic empowerment, promoting women’s roles as community leaders and peacebuilders, social cohesion initiatives, prevention of violent extremism, and conflict mediation and resolution training. They also engage other civil society activists, including academics, religious leaders, and youth to conduct research and promote equality, pluralism, and diversity.

ICAN’s Innovative Peace Fund has supported AWAW since 2013, in such ways as providing project development and financial management capacity building. Funded by the Innovative Peace Fund, AWAW created a civil society group called the Sri Lankan Collective for Consensus, which directly engages prominent government leaders.

Core Areas of Work:

  • Peacemaking
  • PVE, deradicalization, and reintegration
  • Economic empowerment and livelihood support

Stories & Features

Our Strategies, Our Peace: ICAN’s Writers’ Workshop  

ICAN convened 20 members of WASL in Lisbon for the “Our Strategies, Our Peace” Writers’ Workshop. This unique gathering provided a secure and creative space for women peacebuilders to share their strategies, experience, expertise, and stories from conflict and crisis contexts.

Addu Women's Association Allamin Foundation AWAW CAGEAD CIASE COEC ICAN Featured Mobaderoon PAIMAN Rescue Me WCDCA Wi'am Women's Alliance for Security Leadership WPSO
October 29, 2025
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The Odd Couple: Women Peacebuilders and Security Actors Bridging Positions, Building Trust

Trust between communities and the security sector is critical for effective governance and peace. So is a vibrant civil society. When women peacebuilders are recognized and engaged as independent, strategic partners and security actors—in their own right—the results are transformative. Twenty-five years on from the launch of the WPS agenda, women peacebuilders’ creativity and contributions to societal peace and security are not only timely, they are even more essential.

Allamin Foundation AWAPSA AWAW Better Peace Initiative CIASE CoACT GEN Myanmar Gender and Extremisms ICAN Featured ICAN Latest ICAN Updates PAIMAN PCID WASL Updates Women's Alliance for Security Leadership
May 12, 2025
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Bridging Positions, Building Trust:  Women Peacebuilders & Security Actors

ICAN, in partnership with the Permanent Missions of Norway, Sweden, and Canada, the United Kingdom Foreign Commonwealth & Development Office (UKFCDO), the Ministry of Gender, Child and Welfare of South Sudan, the Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict (GPPAC), and the National Transformational Leadership Institute (NTLI), convened a 1.5-day workshop to discuss how to strengthen community security as a localized, transformative approach for sustainable peace.

Allamin Foundation AWAPSA AWAW CIASE CoACT Exclude from RSS GEN Myanmar ICAN Featured ICAN Updates Mobaderoon PAIMAN PCID Policy Advocacy Women's Alliance for Security Leadership
April 9, 2024
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Flexible Funding and the Road to Reconciliation in Sri Lanka

Through ICAN’s Innovative Peace Fund (IPF), we have supported the Association of War Affected Women (AWAW) in Sri Lanka since 2013. Visaka Dharmadasa, Founder and Chair of AWAW, spoke to our IPF Program Director, France Bognon, about how flexible funding in their project yielded unexpected results.

AWAW Exclude from RSS ICAN Updates Innovative Peace Fund Our Stories
October 13, 2022
Read Post Flexible Funding and the Road to Reconciliation in Sri Lanka
She Builds Peace in Sri Lanka: AWAW

The She Builds Peace campaign launched in Kandy, Sri Lanka with a one-day meeting facilitated by AWAW.

AWAW Exclude from RSS She Builds Peace Countries
July 25, 2020
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Visaka Dharmadasa Responds to ICPPG’s Letter

On March 8, Visaka Dharmadasa, Founder and Chair of the Association of War Affected Women (AWAW) was invited to speak at Buckingham Palace on the topic of WPS. Two weeks later, the International Center for Prevention and Prosecution Genocide (ICPPG) published an open letter attacking Ms. Dharmadasa. Read her response to the false allegations of ICPPG.

AWAW ICAN Latest ICAN Updates
April 16, 2019
Read Post Visaka Dharmadasa Responds to ICPPG’s Letter
WASL Partner Visaka Dharmadasa’s Efforts to Include More Women in Sri Lanka’s Peacekeeping

WASL partner Visaka Dharmadasa, founder of the Association of War Affected Women (AWAW) was featured in an article reporting on Sri Lanka’s efforts to include more women in its military. ICAN, in partnership with the Permanent mission of Sri Lanka to the UN, the Permanent Mission of Canada to the UN and AWAW, hosted a panel on “Increasing Women in UN Peacekeeping” in October 2017, and Visaka played a key role in highlighting the need to hold a follow up seminar in Colombo discussing setting a quota of women in the Sri Lankan military and in peacekeeping missions.

AWAW ICAN Featured ICAN Updates WASL Updates
March 30, 2018
Read Post WASL Partner Visaka Dharmadasa’s Efforts to Include More Women in Sri Lanka’s Peacekeeping
How Visaka Dharmadasa’s Tragedy Led to a Rise in Sri Lankan Peace Activism

Visaka Dharmadasa led a delegation of mothers of missing servicemen into the jungles to meet with the guerillas who were responsible for their sons’ fate. She talked to us about her experience walking into the lion’s den—literally.

AWAW ICAN Featured ICAN Latest Our Stories Stories
August 10, 2017
Read Post How Visaka Dharmadasa’s Tragedy Led to a Rise in Sri Lankan Peace Activism

I have always believed that the women bring a whole new perspective to the negotiation tables and that is why we are saying that we want to be there. For a mother, the lives of their husbands, sons and daughters are much more important than borders.

– Visaka Dharmadasa Founder, AWAW, Sri Lanka

More Countries & Partners

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Women Relief Aid (WRA) South Sudan

Women Relief Aid (WRA) is a women-led, non-governmental, nonprofit, non-political, and non-religious organization based in South Sudan.

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Madaniya Sudan

Madaniya is a nonprofit, non-governmental organization that was established in 2018 by a group of women activists in Sudan.

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Kareemat Center Syria

Kareemat Center is an organization that supports conflict-affected Syrian women and children who sought refuge in Turkey.

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Mobaderoon Syria

Mobaderoon is a Syrian organization that works to promote active citizenship and build trust to support and sustain peaceful coexistence.

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