Christine Schuler Deschryver

Christine Schuler Deschryver has fought for human rights since her childhood. The daughter of a Congolese mother and a Belgian father, she attended school in Belgium and was active in the movement against racism. Later, she returned to Congo with her husband and child and worked as a teacher with CARE Canada, an anti-poverty and emergency-relief organisation. In 2000, after witnessing the rape and murder of her best friend, and after an infant victim of sexual violence died in her arms, Christine Schuler Deschryver decided to devote her life to alerting the world to the femicide and mass rape of women and children in the DRC. This year, she was honoured in the DRC and Geneva for her human rights work and has featured in a film by French journalist, Patrick Forestier. Christine is currently V-Day’s Congo Director and the Director of City of Joy, a revolutionary center for survivors of rape and torture conceived by women in Congo.