WOMEN FOR WOMEN INTERNATIONAL RECEIVES
2006 HILTON HUMANITARIAN PRIZE

September 14, 2006, WASHINGTON, DC - Women for Women International is the recipient of the 2006 Conrad N. Hilton Humanitarian Prize, the world’s largest humanitarian prize of $1.5 million. The Conrad N. Hilton Foundation presents the annual award to an organization that “significantly alleviates human suffering.”

“Women and children bear the major burdens of the unprecedented number of wars and civil conflicts raging worldwide and are often left to rebuild their lives without the basic necessities for survival or a viable means to earn a living and take care of their families,” said Steven M. Hilton, chairman and CEO of the Hilton Foundation. “Women for Women International has demonstrated that it can create change and stability within a society by providing women survivors with the tools and resources to rebuild their lives. The organization also gives women the training and confidence to engage in their communities’, and ultimately their nation’s economic, political and social structures,” he added.

“We are incredibly proud and grateful to receive the Hilton Humanitarian Prize, and to be the first women’s organization recognized with this honor,” said Zainab Salbi, President and CEO of Women for Women International. “It reinforces our vision that stronger women build stronger nations and encourages us to work harder to bring the voices and concerns of the women we serve to the forefront.”

Commenting on the Hilton Prize Jury’s selection of Women for Women International as this year’s Prize recipient, Amartya Sen, Nobel Laureate in Economics, Harvard professor and Hilton Prize juror, said, “Women for Women International has sharply identified the nature and complexities of a much neglected need associated with wars—the urgency of providing rehabilitation to people, particularly women, left destitute, impoverished or displaced by the hostilities.” He added, “The organization is already protecting millions of lives from short-term agony and long-term ruination.”

Women for Women International currently operates in Afghanistan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Iraq, Kosovo, Nigeria, Rwanda and Sudan. 30,000 women access its programs every day, benefiting 5.3 million family and community members. Since its founding in 1993, Women for Women International has distributed more than $28 million in direct aid and microcredit loans. Salbi’s second book, The Other Side of War: Women’s Stories of Survival and Hope (National Geographic) will be released on September 19, 2006.

Based in Los Angeles, the Hilton Foundation was created in 1944 by the late hotel entrepreneur and business leader, Conrad N. Hilton, who left his fortune to the foundation with instructions to help the most disadvantaged and vulnerable people throughout the world without regard to religion, ethnicity or geography. The foundation is an independent nonprofit organization and is not part of the Hilton Hotels Corporation.

For more information about Women for Women International’s programs and the prize, please visit www.womenforwomen.org or www.hiltonfoundation.org.

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