While advocacy on the domestic level is vital, it is important to recognize that violence against Native American women also has implications in the international arena.  The United States government's failure to respond to the epidemic of violence against Native American women is a human rights violation under international law.  Advocacy at the international level can compliment and strengthen advocacy efforts on the domestic level. 

Palais de Naciones, United Nations, Geneva, Switzerland.

International advocacy can:
  
•  raise awareness of and inform the
   international community about the
   epidemic of violence against Native
   women;
•  educate legislators and policy makers in
   the United States about their
   international human rights obligations
   to Native women;
•  provide new legal arguments for
   increasing protection of Native women
   from violence;
•  mobilize other human rights groups to
   engage with the United States on this
   issue;
•  allow international human rights bodies
   to comment on United States' actions
   and whether they meet the United
   States' international obligations; and
•  increase pressure on the United States 
   by shaming it in the international
   arena. 

 

How Can International Human Rights Law be Used to Reduce Violence Against Native Women?
 
       If you can write a letter or email your member of Congress, you can use
  international human rights to end violence against Native women.  It is really that simple.
  Here are a few examples of how Native women's organizations and tribes have engaged
  in advocacy at the international level to reduce violence against Native women.

	Native Women Testify Before UN Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination
	Advocating for Native Women in the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights
	Educating Special Rapporteurs about Violence Against Native Women

 

For information on how you can get involved, see here.