Mexico and Resilience | The Index Podcast

Mexico has long had a relationship with organized crime. The cartels and the war on drugs have been the subject of countless documentaries and popular dramatized television series. The images of extreme violence have been broadcast all over the world and the journalists that report on these events are often targeted for the work they do.But there is a counter balance to the violence and that's the brave and courageous civil society actors that battle extreme odds in an attempt to make life better. Sinaloa in Mexico was the birthplace of The Resilience Fund, which identifies civil society actors that do important work in their communities and helps them with building their capacity and financial support.Presenter: Thin Lei WinSpeakers:Siria Gastelum Félix, Director of Resilience at the Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized CrimeGriselda Triana, journalist, activist and human-rights defender. She is the founder of the Javier Valdez library in Mexico City and host of the radio programme Siempre Vivas, in which she interviews female journalists. She works to strengthen support networks for victims of violence against journalists in Mexico, and in 2019 she was a grantee of the GI-TOC’s Resilience Fund.Vania Pigeonutt, the co-founder of AMAPOLA PERIODISMO, an organisation that works to prevent extortion and also offers support to victims.  2021 Resilience Fund Grantee.Marlene León, Director of Iniciativa Sinaloa, a civil society group who managed to develop, campaign for and finally get an approval on a law for the protection of human rights defenders and journalists in Sinaloa.Additional Links:OCIndex.netMexico Country ProfileThe Resilience FundGriselda Triana - The forgotten ones, Relatives of murdered and disappeared journalists in Mexico (paper available in English and Spanish)Global Initiative Against Transnational Organized Crime