The Lima declaration.

In January 1998, 38 women from women's and feminist movements, the media, and research/academic institutions in 11 Latin American countries attended a conference on gender, communication, and citizenship in Latin America. The participants noted that women constitute more than 50% of the region's population, the mass media plays an important social role, the rights of Latin American women continue to be violated, and women's right to communicate must become a reality in order to construct civil processes and strengthen democracy. Conference participants defined their right to communicate as including freedom of expression, the free circulation of ideas, the right to information, the right to access communication channels, the right to women's channels and the production of communication messages, the right to have appropriate legal frameworks and economic/technological conditions for development, and the right to participate at decision-making levels in public and private communication organizations. The participants called for development of appropriate legislation, governmental policies, and codes of medical ethics; acknowledgement of the right of citizens to participate in the creation of regulations; and observation of relevant UN treaties and conventions. The women also condemned the increasing amount of violence suffered by journalists and asked governments not to place a statute of limitations on such crimes.