When Kadi entered the United States for the second time, she knew there would be no returning to her home country of Mali. An activist who fought for women’s rights and who defied her husband and community to protect her daughter from female genital mutilation, she knew that returning would cost her her life and leave her daughter without a protector.

The Goldman Sachs award goes to leaders in organizations across a wide spectrum of fields, from finance to philanthropy.

The two women met for the first time last week at a sleek Georgetown hotel, where they were speakers at a glittering charity dinner. They shook hands and hugged across a vast gulf of culture, geography and faith: one a devout Muslim from West Africa with her hair carefully hidden under a tight scarf, the other a gregarious South Asian in a stylish sari and costume earrings.

Although many Americans may think that phenomena such as forced marriages and so-called “honor killings” exist only overseas, social service agencies, educators, and a growing number of law enforcement personnel know differently.

In the past decade, several new laws have allowed abused foreign-born women, including those who entered the United States illegally and those whose immigration status depends on their spouse, to obtain legal residency on their own.

We were in the courtroom and I caught my client’s eyes. They filled with tears, and then she looked forward toward the judge and jury. She was a very small Ukrainian woman and very scared.

Forced marriage and honor violence are often viewed in the West as backward customs relegated to impoverished developing nations. But a spate of gruesome honor killings in the U.K., and new research about the prevalence of underage marriage in the U.S., for the first time show that this kind of violence against women is far more widespread.