through Tiktok, Facebook, dating apps such as Badoo, Tinder, Filipina Dating (Filipino2Meet), Foreigners Dating Filipina, as well as through cellphone. After technologyfacilitated contact, they are physically/sexually exploited. Exploiters go to their house or pick them up (during lockdowns) or arrange for meet up. Rape or other forms of sexual violence follows. The victims-survivors are also harassed or blackmailed by abusers to continue to succumb to their pressure for continued sexual exploitation, such as by threatening to post their nude photos or videos. Impact to Victims-Survivors: Twenty-five of the victims-survivors are HIV positive. All of them contracted the infection during sexual exploitation. Many suffer from complications including tuberculosis and cancer. At least two of them had children who are also HIV positive. Others were diagnosed with various sexually transmitted infections. The women tell their peer facilitators of their worries, fears, and other difficulties. The comprehensive response program of CATW-AP and partner organizations, including direct interventions on safety, health, education of themselves and their children, livelihood, and most especially the continuing support group healing conversations address these needs as the victims-survivors feedback are documented. Comprehensive Empowerment Program: Interventions As we know, victims of violence, especially sexual violence are still silenced by the stigma they suffer from coming out with their experience. The peer facilitators, however, prove to be accessible to the victims-survivors, as they exude trust and respect, other than being strategically located in the three major islands of the Philippines: Buklod in Luzon, Empowered Women Survivors Collective and Bagong Kamalayan as nationwide organizations, Sowing Legacy Movement in the Visayas, Lawig Bubai in Mindanao. 63

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