The 2nd Women Genocide Survivors Retreat was held in August 2018 in Kabgayi, in the Southern Province of Rwanda. It built on the successful inaugural retreat of last year. The three-day retreat brought together 40 women survivors of the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. It was organised by Liliane Pari Umuhoza, a Trustee of Survivors Fund (SURF) who is a survivor herself, with the support of Survivors Fund (SURF), Genocide Survivors Foundation and Right Seats. A new short film of the retreat has just been published, which you can view here:
Many of the attendees were women who had experienced rape during the genocide and as a consequence are HIV positive and have children born from that atrocious experience. Others are women who live in extreme poverty, and have chronic diseases like Hepatitis and many other detrimental and incurable diseases, all as consequences of the genocide. The main purpose of the retreat was to give psychological support to these women by giving them time and space for self-expression, and to empower them so that they can be more resilient and move forward on the path of healing.