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NETWORK OF LESBIAN AND BISEXUAL WOMEN'S ORGANIZATIONS IN LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN
The LESLAC NETWORK is a feminist and intersectional network, active throughout Latin America and the Caribbean since 2018, with activities developed since 2019 with the aim of creating spaces for reflection, dialogue and work to articulate actions that address the effects of discrimination and violence in the public and private spheres against adolescents, young women, adults and older adults who identify, or name themselves, or are visible as lesbians in Latin America and the Caribbean.”
LESLAC is a non-profit network, constituted de facto on November 30, 2018 in Mexico City during the 3rd Meeting Venir al Sur, with remote and virtual work during 2019, self-convened and regrouped in person in November 2019 in Bogota (Colombia) during the VIII Regional Conference of ILGALAC, reactivated virtually on April 26, 2020 (at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic), with hard and verifiable work of five founding organizations from Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, Mexico and Colombia between 2020 and 2023, and formalized in its existence, operation, scope, responsibilities, and representation through a notarized document, Agreement of Wills signed in Bogota, Colombia on March 17, 2023 at Notary 38. This agreement was signed after the First Annual Ordinary General Assembly -AGOA of LESLAC held from March 13 to 16, 2023 in the city of Villavicencio, Colombia.
At the first ANNUAL ORDINARY GENERAL ASSEMBLY - AGOA - LESLAC
Held from March 13 to 16, 2023 in the City of Villavicencio, Colombia, in Villavicencio (Colombia), the following declarations were adopted:
For LESLAC the The term “lesbian” transcends the description of a sexual orientation.. It is, above all: (i) a political position and consciousness; (ii) a critical positioning against heterosexuality understood as a social, political and economic regime that organizes hierarchies and produces inequalities; and (iii) a broad and inclusive category that names lesbian women, bisexual women and other political identities that recognize themselves in lesbian/sapphic affective and/or erotic experiences, position themselves politically as lesbians and place at the center of their activism the full realization of rights and the emancipation of LBQTNB AFAN people who dissent from heterosexuality.
Our Mission
CORPORACIÓN RED LESLAC is a feminist, associative, regional and intersectional platform that articulates and strengthens lesbian and LBQTNB AFAN organizations and collectives in Latin America and the Caribbean, and individuals who identify themselves as lesbians and/or LBQTNB AFAN persons, to confront inequalities, discrimination and violence and to defend human rights. We promote regional articulation, technical and political capacity building, leadership, political coordination, strategic advocacy in national, regional and international Human Rights Mechanisms and in multilateral spaces, to transform the conditions that reproduce discrimination and violence, and to sustain, affirm and protect intersectional lesbian activisms and strengthen community power in the region.
Our Vision
In five years, CORPORACIÓN RED LESLAC will be a consolidated regional platform, with participatory governance, institutional sustainability and technical and political capacity to effectively influence national, regional and international human rights frameworks. It will be a reference in the defense and positioning of intersectional lesbian agendas, in the protection of activism and in the strengthening of the community power of lesbians and LBQTNB AFAN people in Latin America and the Caribbean.
Our Principles
Inclusion
Honesty
Respect
Social commitment
Political independence
Professionalism
Transparency
Strategic Objectives
a) Promote and position lesbian agendas to prevent, address and eradicate discrimination and violence against women. lesbians and LBQTNB people AFAN in the public and private sectors in Latin America and the Caribbean, by means of cross-cutting advocacy in public policies.
b) Promote advocacy before national and regional mechanisms, and multilateral spaces, to ensure the recognition, protection and enforceability of the rights of children and adolescents. lesbians and LBQTNB AFAN.
c) Strengthening regional articulation and governance of the LESLAC NETWORK CORPORATION, guaranteeing participation, democratic representation and the holding of regional meetings and spaces for dialogue, reflection, political coordination and collective action.
d) Produce knowledge, collective memory and strengthen capacities: recover and preserve stories, knowledge and evidence of discrimination and violence; develop technical, operational and management capacities of member organizations; and promote actions of resistance, leadership and counter-narratives in the face of the threat of anti-gender movements and the defunding of lesbian activism in the region.