The UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center, in co-sponsorship with Amnesty International, will host an international conference from Friday, Oct. 31, through Sunday, Nov. 2, on the unsolved, 10-year crime wave of kidnappings and murders of more than 300 women in Ciudad Juárez, across the border from El Paso, Texas.

“The Maquiladora Murders, or, Who Is Killing the Women of Juárez?� will take place on the Mexican Days of the Dead and will mark a decade since the murders started.

“We must continue to raise public awareness about these brutal murders and pressure both the Mexican and United States authorities, as well as the maquiladora industry, to find out who is responsible for these devastating crimes,� said Alicia Gaspar de Alba, associate director of UCLA’s Chicano Studies Research Center, organizer of the conference and an El Paso native. “We are joining efforts with activists worldwide who demand that these crimes be thoroughly investigated and stopped.�

Eve Ensler, founder and artistic director of V-Day, an international movement to end violence against women and girls, is scheduled to be the keynote speaker from 4:30–5:30 p.m., on Friday, Oct. 31, on the UCLA campus. The conference also will include an inaugural keynote by Rep. Hilda Solis, and a screening of Lourdes Portillo’s award-winning documentary “Senorita Extraviada,� followed by a dialogue with the director. Scholars, journalists, students, artists, activists, writers and policy specialists from the United States, Mexico and Europe and families of the victims will participate in a series of roundtable discussions and presentations.

Conference speakers include Victoria Caraveo, director of the Women’s Institute in the Mexican state of Chihuahua; Esther Chávez Cano, director of Casa Amiga, a rape crisis center in Juárez; and mothers of the victims.

Veronica Castillo Hernández, of the famed Castillo family of ceramists from Izúcar de Matamoros, Mexico, and artist-in-residence at the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center in San Antonio, Texas, and other artists have created a memorial altar for the slain women of Juárez. The “Lamento por las mujeres de Juárez/Elegy for the Women of Juárez,� featuring Castillo’s
“Tree of Death,� will be unveiled during a private reception on Saturday, Nov. 1., to be held at the Fowler Museum of Cultural History at UCLA.

Conference panels will focus on the crimes; theories about why the crimes are taking place; the social, political, economic and cultural infrastructure in which the crimes continue unabated; the use of art as a tool of social consciousness; and other topics related to the crimes. The conference is the first of its kind to take place at a major research university in the United States.

A recent study by the Women’s Institute found that 321 women have been murdered in Juárez since 1993, including 90 who were raped, killed and left in the desert, according to a recent El Paso Times article. The article stated that 28 percent of the killings — the largest percentage — were sexual killings.

The conference will be held in the Ackerman Grand Ballroom, and is free and open to the public, but registration is required for admittance. There is a $7 parking fee. For public registration, visit the conference Web site at chavez.ucla.edu/maqui_murders.

A conference schedule also is available at the Web site.

In addition, the Web site provides information on the conference and a chronology of actions being taken around the world to protest the lack of resolution to the murders. There is also an updated comprehensive bibliography of related online and print documents.