The Time magazine has named 'the silence breakers' its Person of the Year for 2017 referring to those individuals, mostly women, who came forward this year to publicly expose patterns of sexual harassment and assault by powerful public figures in America. <br/>'<br/>Those recognized by Time range from famous actresses who took on disgraced Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein to ordinary women who shared their stories of abuse using the hashtag #MeToo and its foreign language equivalents.<br/>'<br/>One of the figures singled out by Time, Ashley Judd was the first actress to come forward on the record to make accusations against the 65-year-old Weinstein. <br/>'<br/>Though Weinstein has denied the charges, investigations have been launched in London, Los Angeles and New York in the matter. US President Donald Trump was runner-up in the prestigious ranking, ahead of his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping.<br/>'''''''''''''''''<br/>