The General Assembly,

Reaffirming the obligations of all States to promote and protect human rights and fundamental freedoms as stated in the Charter of the United Nations, and guided by the purposes and principles of human rights instruments,

Reaffirming also the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, 1 which states that everyone has the right to take part in the Government of his or her country directly, or through freely chosen representatives, and the right of equal access to public service,

Guided by the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, 2 which affirms human rights and fundamental freedoms and equality for women around the world, and which states, inter alia, that States parties shall take all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women in the political and public life of the country,

Reaffirming the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action3 and the outcome of the twenty-third special session of the General Assembly entitled “Women 2000: gender equality, development and peace for the twenty-first century”,

Recognizing the central role of the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN-Women) in leading and coordinating action to promote gender equality and the empowerment of women within the United Nations system, as well as in supporting all countries’ efforts to promote gender equality and the empowerment of women,

Recognizing also the important contributions that women have made towards the achievement of representative, transparent and accountable Governments in many countries,

Stressing the critical importance of women’s political participation in all contexts, including in times of peace and of conflict and at all stages of political transition, concerned that many obstacles still prevent women from participating in political life on equal terms with men, and noting in that regard that situations of political transition may provide a unique opportunity to address such obstacles,

Recognizing the essential contributions that women around the world continue to make to the achievement and maintenance of international peace and security and to the full realization of all human rights, to the promotion of sustainable development and economic growth, and to the eradication of poverty, hunger and disease,

Reaffirming that the active participation of women, on equal terms with men, at all levels of decision-making is essential to the achievement of equality, sustainable development, peace and democracy,

Highly concerned that women in every part of the world continue to be largely marginalized from the political sphere, often as a result of discriminatory laws, practices, attitudes and gender stereotypes, low levels of education, lack of access to health care and the disproportionate effect of poverty on women,

Recognizing the importance of empowering all women through education and training in government, public policy, economics, civics, information technology and science to ensure that they develop the knowledge and skills needed to make full contributions to society and the political process,

Reaffirming the important role of women in the prevention and resolution of conflicts and in peacebuilding and the need for Member States and the United Nations system to increase the role of women in decision-making with regard to conflict prevention and resolution and the rebuilding of post-conflict societies, in accordance with Security Council resolution 1325 (2000) of 31 October 2000 and its subsequent follow-up resolutions, as well as other relevant United Nations resolutions,

Noting with appreciation the establishment by the Human Rights Council of the Working Group on Discrimination against Women in Law and in Practice,

1. Reaffirms its resolution 58/142 of 22 December 2003 on women and political participation, and calls upon all States to implement it fully;

2. Calls upon all States to eliminate laws, regulations and practices that, in a discriminatory manner, prevent or restrict women’s participation in the political process;

3. Also calls upon all States to enhance the political participation of women, to accelerate the achievement of equality between men and women and, in all situations, including in situations of political transition, to promote and protect the human rights of women with respect to:
(a) Engaging in political activities;
(b) Taking part in the conduct of public affairs;
(c) Associating freely;
(d) Assembling peacefully;
(e) Expressing their opinions and seeking, receiving and imparting information and ideas freely;
(f) Voting in elections and public referendums and being eligible for election to publicly elected bodies on equal terms with men;
(g) Participating in the formulation of government policy and the implementation thereof, holding public office and performing public functions at all levels of government;

4. Calls upon States in situations of political transition to take effective steps to ensure the participation of women on equal terms with men in all phases of political reform, from decisions on whether to call for reforms in existing institutions to decisions regarding transitional governments, to the formulation of government policy, to the means of electing new democratic governments;

5. Urges all States to comply fully with their obligations under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women,2 urges States that have not yet ratified or acceded to the Convention to do so, and urges States parties to the Convention to consider signing, ratifying or acceding to the Optional Protocol thereto;5

6. Also urges all States to take, inter alia, the following actions to ensure women’s equal participation, and encourages the United Nations system and other international and regional organizations, within their existing mandates, to enhance their assistance to States in their national efforts:
(a) To review the differential impact of their electoral systems on the political participation of women and their representation in elected bodies and to adjust or reform those systems where appropriate;
(b) To take all appropriate measures to eliminate prejudices that are based on the idea of the inferiority or the superiority of either of the sexes or on stereotyped roles for men and women and that constitute a barrier to women’s access to and
participation in the political sphere, and to adopt inclusive approaches to their political participation;
(c) To strongly encourage political parties to remove all barriers that directly or indirectly discriminate against the participation of women, to develop their capacity to analyse issues from a gender perspective, and to adopt policies, as appropriate, to promote the ability of women to participate fully at all levels of decision-making within those political parties;
(d) To promote awareness and recognition of the importance of women’s participation in the political process at the community, local, national and international levels;
(e) To develop mechanisms and training to encourage women to participate in the electoral process, political activities and other leadership activities, and empower women to assume public responsibilities by developing and providing
appropriate tools and skills, in consultation with women;
(f) To implement appropriate measures within governmental bodies and public sector institutions to eliminate direct or indirect barriers to and enhance women’s participation in all levels of political decision-making;
(g) To accelerate the implementation of strategies, as appropriate, that promote gender balance in political decision-making, and take all appropriate measures to encourage political parties to ensure that women have a fair and equal opportunity to compete for all elective public positions;
(h) To improve and broaden women’s access to information and communications technologies, including e-government tools, in order to enable political participation and to promote engagement in broader democratic processes, while also improving the responsiveness of these technologies to women’s needs, including those of marginalized women;
(i) To investigate allegations of violence, assault or harassment of women elected officials and candidates for political office, create an environment of zero tolerance for such offences and, to ensure accountability, take all appropriate steps
to prosecute those responsible;
(j) To encourage greater involvement of women who may be marginalized, including indigenous women, women with disabilities, women from rural areas and women of any ethnic, cultural or religious minority, in decision-making at all levels, and address and counter the barriers faced by marginalized women in accessing and participating in politics and decision-making at all levels;
(k) To encourage the promotion of programmes geared towards the sensitization and orientation of youth and children, in particular young women and girls, on the importance of the political process and women’s participation in politics;
(l) To ensure that measures to reconcile family and professional life apply equally to women and men, bearing in mind that equitable sharing of family responsibilities between women and men and reduction of the double burden of paid and unpaid work can help to create an enabling environment for women’s political participation;
(m) To promote the granting of appropriate maternity and paternity leave in order to facilitate women’s political participation;
(n) To take proactive measures to address factors preventing or hindering women from participating in politics, such as violence, poverty, lack of access to quality education and health care, and gender stereotypes;
(o) To monitor and evaluate progress in the representation of women in decision-making positions;

7. Encourages States to ensure an expanded role for women in the prevention, management and resolution of conflict and in mediation and peacebuilding efforts, as called for in Security Council resolution 1325 (2000) and
subsequent relevant resolutions;

8. Also encourages States to appoint women to posts within all levels of their Governments, including, where applicable, bodies responsible for designing constitutional, electoral, political or institutional reforms;

9. Further encourages States to commit themselves to establishing the goal of gender balance in governmental bodies and committees, as well as in public administrative entities, and in the judiciary, including, inter alia and as appropriate, setting specific targets and implementing measures to substantially increase the number of women with a view to achieving equal representation of women and men, if necessary through positive action, in all governmental and public administration positions;

10. Encourages States and relevant civil society organizations to support programmes that facilitate women’s participation in political and other leadership activities, including peer support and capacity development for new office holders, and to promote public/private civil society partnerships for women’s empowerment;

11. Invites States to exchange experience and best practices on women’s political participation in all phases of the political process, including in times of political change and reform;

12. Notes with interest the focus, inter alia, on the political participation of women, including the issues raised in the present resolution, in the work of the Human Rights Council Working Group on Discrimination against Women in Law
and in Practice;

13. Encourages States to disseminate the present resolution among all relevant institutions, in particular national, regional and local authorities, as well as among political parties;

14. Requests the Secretary-General to submit to the General Assembly at its sixty-eighth session a report on the implementation of the present resolution, and encourages Governments to provide precise data on the political participation of women at all levels, including, where appropriate, information on the political participation of women in times of political transition.

89th plenary meeting
19 December 2011

To measure progress in the economic advancement of women, the Economist Intelligence Unit created the Women’s Economic Opportunity (WEO) Index. The Index aims to look beyond gender disparities to the underlying factors affecting women’s access to economic opportunity. It draws on data from a wide range of international organisations, including the UN, the International Monetary Fund, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Health Organisation, the Food and Agriculture Organisation, and many others. The result is a comprehensive assessment of the enabling environment for women’s economic participation in 128 countries.

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Reese Witherspoon & Andrea Jung Present 2012 Avon Global Communications Awards for Speaking Out About Violence Against Women.     Presented in Washington DC at the 2nd World Conference of Women’s Shelters

Women’s rights organisations, are saying NO to any re-opening of negotiations on the already established international agreements on women’s human rights and call on all governments to demonstrate their commitments to promote, protect and fulfill human rights and fundamental freedoms of women.

We have outlined our concerns in the statement below, which will be submitted to UN Member States, CSW and other relevant UN human rights and development entities.

Please give your support by adding your name to the endorsements.

Call to Action:  Take 30 seconds to endorse the statement  Click here Deadline: 5 April 2012

STATEMENT OF FEMINIST AND WOMEN’S ORGANISATIONS ON THE VERY LIMITED AND CONCERNING RESULTS OF THE 56TH SESSION OF THE UN COMMISSION ON THE STATUS OF WOMEN

We, the undersigned organisations and individuals across the globe, are alarmed and disappointed that the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) failed to adopt agreed conclusions at its 56th session. This failure has diminished the considerable work, energy, time and costs that women all over the world invested on the 56th session of the CSW.  The advancement of women’s human rights should not be put on hold because of political battles between states.  We say NO to any re-opening of negotiations on the already established international agreements on women’s human rights and call on all governments to demonstrate their commitments to promote, protect and fulfill human rights and fundamental freedoms of women.

We  are particularly concerned to learn that our governments failed to reach a consensus on the basis of safeguarding “traditional values” at the expense of human rights and fundamental freedoms of women. We remind governments that all Member States of the United Nations (UN) have accepted that “the human rights of women and of the girl-child are an inalienable, integral and individual part of universal human rights” as adopted by the 1993 World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna.   Governments must not condone any tradition, cultural or religious arguments which deny human rights and fundamental freedoms of any person.  After more than 60 years since the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) was embraced and adopted by the UN, the relationship between traditional values and human rights remains highly contested.  We affirm the UDHR as not only ‘a common standard of achievement for all peoples and all nations’ but a common standard of assessment for all traditional values.  The UDHR is an embodiment of positive traditional values that are universally held by this community of nations and are consistent with the inherent dignity of all human beings.  We remind governments that under the Charter of the United Nations, gender equality has been proclaimed as a fundamental human right.  States cannot contravene the UN Charter by enacting or enforcing discriminatory laws directly or through religious courts nor can allow any other private actors or groups imposing their religious fundamentalist agenda in violation of the UN Charter.

“No one may invoke cultural diversity to infringe upon human rights guaranteed by international law, nor limit their scope.  Not all cultural practices accord with international human rights law and, although it is not always easy to identify exactly which cultural practices may be contrary to human rights, the endeavour always must be to modify and/or discard all practices pursued in the name of culture that impede the enjoyment of human rights by any individual.” (Statement by Ms. Farida Shaheed, the Independent Expert in the field of cultural rights, to the Human Rights Council at its 14th session 31 May 2010)

Amongst other things, it is alarming that some governments have evoked so-called “moral” values to deny women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights. Sexual and reproductive rights are a crucial and fundamental part of women’s full enjoyment of all rights as well as integral to gender equality, development and social justice.  Social and religious morals and patriarchal values have  been employed to justify violations against women. Violence against women, coercion and deprivation of legal and other protections of women, marital rape, honour crimes, son preference, female genital mutilation, ‘dowry’ or ‘bride price’, forced and early marriages and ‘corrective rapes’ of lesbians, bisexuals, transgender and inter-sexed persons have all been justified by reference to ‘traditional values’.

We remind governments that the CSW is the principal global policy-making body dedicated exclusively to gender equality and advancement of women with the sole aim of promoting women’s rights in political, economic, civil, social and educational fields.  Its mandate is to ensure the full implementation of existing international agreements on women’s human rights and gender equality as enshrined in the Convention on  the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women, the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women, the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and the International Conference on Population and Development Programme of Action as well as other international humanitarian and human rights law.

We strongly demand all governments and the international community to reject any attempt to invoke traditional values or morals to infringe upon human rights guaranteed by international law, nor to limit their scope.  Customs, tradition or religious considerations must not be tolerated to justify discrimination and violence against women and girls whether committed by State authorities or by non-state actors.  In particular, we urge governments to ensure that the health and human rights of girls and women are secured and reaffirmed at the coming Commission on Population and Development and the International Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20).  Any future international negotiations must move forward implementation of policies and programmes that secure the human rights of girls and women.

We call upon the member states of the UN and the various UN human rights and development entities to recognise and support the important role of women’s groups and organisations working at the forefront of challenging traditional values and practices that are intolerant to fundamental human rights norms, standards and principles.

ASIA PACIFIC FORUM ON WOMEN, LAW AND DEVELOPMENT (APWLD)
ASSOCIATION FOR WOMEN’S RIGHTS IN DEVELOPMENT (AWID)
INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S HEALTH COALITION (IWHC)
INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S RIGHTS ACTION WATCH ASIA PACIFIC (IWRAW ASIA PACIFIC)
WOMEN LIVING UNDER MUSLIM LAWS (WLUML) / VIOLENCE IS NOT OUR CULTURE CAMPAIGN

Download the full statement here

Some issues that several speakers raised included economic recovery , particularly among the self employed and casual workers. Many women fall within these categories and they include many small businesses. After disaster, many women found that they lost entire client bases as people no longer have a dispensable income to afford certain services. However, it was very uplifting to hear about the ways women have adapted to these circumstances, the resilience of these women is truly inspiring.

That evening we went to the Asia Pacific caucus meeting to discuss the wording of the Asia Pacific submission. We broke into sub regions so that everyone could examine the draft statement and ensure that all concerns were addressed (as much as can be in a 3 minute submission!) Going through the submission line by line certainly displayed the importance of language in all submissions, and it also emphasised the different priorities of each sub region and the importance and responsibility each region has in ensuring that all views and issues are properly recognised.

All in all, Tuesday was a very busy, yet very educational and fulfilling day.

Gizela de Carvalho spoke about the young women in East Timor and the need for more sexual and reproductive health education and Neeha Sood spoke about sexual education in rural India.

Jayanthi Kuru-Utumpala’s speech however, was particularly touching. She spoke of the current situation in Sri Lanka for same sex couples and it was quite upsetting. She spoke of a number of double suicides from young girls who did not believe that their families and society could accept their relationship. However, as upsetting as the situation described was, it is encouraging to know that there are women out there as brave as Jayanthi who are willing to speak out and stand up and attempt to make a difference for the lives of all these young women. I am really in awe of the courage she, and other women who come from similar circumstances display.

Hearing the voices of all these young women was truly inspiring and is an experience that I will remember and will continue to motivate me into the future.

This morning we went to the NGO briefing at CCUN. There was a great buzz about the fact that the draft text of the commission was released and everyone was keen to get a copy. However, once again there was concern about the limited space for NGO’s. It was interesting to observe that many organisations felt that the limited space afforded to NGO’s was not sufficient, hopefully this will improve in future years. However, despite this criticism, I have found the morning NGO briefings to be quite positive and inspiring. To see so many women so motivated towards achieving the same goals was inspiring, the feeling of passion and determination in the room was contagious, after each morning briefing I have started the day with such enthusiasm that I believe I can achieve anything!

Today Shabina and myself went exploring around the UN to understand how it and CSW works.While it was disapointing to leanrn that each NGO only gets one secondary pass, as fortune would have it, as we were sitting down nervously trying to work it all out, the Australian NGO delegation walked through the door. It was so reassuring and quite a relief seeing some familiar friendly faces right when we were so disoriented. They took Shabina along with them and I headed outside. I realised that it may have been a stroke of luck missing out on the General Assembly as I had a bag full of flyers to hand out and a crowd full of eager women excited to plan their week ahead. I handed out as many flyers as I could for the next hour, advertising APWWs three events that week:

• Gender and Diaster in Asia and the Pacific

Tuesday 28^th February 2012 8.30-10am

CCUN Building 8^th floor Boss Room

• Joining the Dots: Exploring the exonomic empowerment of women in conflict affected areas by combing UNSCR 1325, CEDAW, BPFA and MDGs

Wednesday 29^th February 2012 12.30-2.00pm

CCUN building 1^st floor Church Centre Chapel

• Young Women’s Forum – young women from the Asia Pacific region speak out on Sexuality

Friday 2^nd March 2012 8.30-10am

CCUN Building Ground Floor Drew Room

That third event is the one I presented at, speaking about, “The Same Sex Marriage Debate in Australia.”

That afternoon I tried to attend a number of parallel events behing held at the Church Centre. Unfortunately, despite arriving on time, each room was at capacity. This issue was raised at the Australian Government debrief which was held at 6pm that evening. A number of women mentioned that it seems that there is not enough room allocated to NGOs, which is a shame, given that the number of NGOs in attendance is increasing each year. Hopefully next year more space will be allocated to NGOs, and larger rooms provided for the more popular events and topics.

The debrief that evening was a really valuable experience as all the women involved in NGOs were able to meet and discuss their experiences and continue to plan for the next two weeks. It really does feel like a little community within a larger one. Its satisfying to hear that people are experiencing the same frustrations but also the similar excitement that I am. We were also able to meet with a number of NGOs from the Asia Pacific. It was interesting to hear their particular experiences and made me realise, that while we work as hard as we can to improve the lives of women in the region, there is still so much that we could be doing, so many other areas that we could be looking in to. However, it is encouraging to know that there are other capable strong women working together in these areas to make change.

While today provided its share of frustrations, I think it was valuable in that I learnt something about adapting to changing circumstances and thinking on the run. Also, by noticing any shortcomings in procedures, it allows us to plan for future events to ensure that we wont fall victim to the same issues.