EWD Workshop reports

Widows without Rights Conference

London - 6-7 February, 2001

Wednesday 7th February - afternoon session

How to get a resolution into the United Nations:
Presentation by Patsy Robertson

The first and most important fact about the United Nations is that it is an organization of sovereign and independent states and it does only what Member States have agreed it can do; it is their instrument. By co-operating at the United Nations, states build structures that regulate international life. International agreements also require states that enter into them to fulfil common requirements. But the framework of the UN does provide opportunities to involve other organisations whose cooperation is increasingly vital for solving global problems. Among these are NGOs and thousands of these , including EWD, have consultative status with the Economic and Social Council - the main policy making body on economic and social matters. ECOSOC promotes issues relating to living standards, employment, economic and social progress as well the promotion of universal respect for human rights. After years of hard work, women have established fully that women's rights are human rights issues and it is under the UN's comprehensive body of human rights law and its development of effective mechanisms to protect those rights that there is an opportunity to get the issues of widow's rights fully on the international agenda. There is already in place a substantial body of laws and commissions to monitor them. For instance women's rights are enshrined in the UN Charter and Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which established gender equality as a fundamental human right. The UN has also set international standards on women's rights and has created instruments to monitor them.

The adoption in 1979 of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) brought into being al international bill of rights for women as well as a blueprint for action by countries to guarantee these rights. A special UN committee of independent experts monitors implementation of the Convention at annual CEDAW meetings in New York. Then there is the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW), established as long ago as 1946 which meets annually on matters concerning women's rights, making recommendations on problems requiring immediate attention and initiating legislation to promote women's rights. So the framework is in place for us to push forward on to the international agenda the whole question of what is happening to widows in so many societies today. You will recall the Beijing Plan of Action promoted the life cycle approach to issues affecting women yet not once did it mention widows, whose situation certainly warrants inclusion in several of the critical areas of concern in the PFA; for instance under poverty, violence, armed conflict, lack of awareness and commitment to internationally and nationally recognized women's human rights and the girl child.

How do we go about pushing this agenda forward?
The first action is to formulate a strong statement about the status of widows which should be issued by this conference, in which a request for international action should be included. This statement should be circulated widely to the UN and its agencies (including the Secretary-General and his Adviser on Gender Angela King) and to all member states of the UN through their gender machineries.
It is good that the Division for the Advancement of Women is publishing a report on Widows prepared by Margaret Owen - this will be an important addition to the armoury of facts which all NGO's gathered here must begin collecting. These facts should be circulated widely.

The next step is to get the issue on to the agenda of the CSW and ECOSOC. This is where Governments can be helpful, they can bring this about. They can also arrange for the status of widows to be debated at ECOSOC and at Security Council Meetings. For instance, it is quite proper for the President of the Security Council, which rotates on a monthly basis among its member states, to decide that this can be a topic for debate during his or her presidency. For instance last July when the Jamaican Ambassador was President for the month of July, she initiated a debate on the state of the world's children.

What this means is that a great deal of lobbying will have to be undertaken - mainly at the Governmental level. Those of us here who are totally committed to this issue must take the trouble, when we return to our countries. to find out how our Governments operate at the UN and begin lobbying the Head of Government and the Foreign Minister to take up these issues at the UN - in their meeting in Committees of the General Assembly , on the occasions when they are elected to be among the 45 member states, who sit on ECOSOC on a rotating basis and whenever they get the opportunity to address international gatherings.

A lot of hard work will have to be undertaken to mainstream widows issues and here the Division for the Advancement of Women , UNIFEM and all other UN agencies which are mainstreaming gender issues will be important allies. But to bring this about, organisations including WRI will have to be strengthened .The role of WRI will be to undertake an advocacy role at the international level, seeking opportunities for observer status at UN conferences and at ECOSOC meetings, ensuring that widows issues appear on the agenda of the CSW. An attempt should be made to ensure that a representative of WRI should be present to seek every opportunity to speak at the CSW meeting in March - particularly at the many satellite meetings which are organised around the main conference.. In any case, strenuous efforts should be made to get a few Government delegations to bring up the issue of widows when they are addressing the CSW - there is no reason why this should not be a goal of representatives at this conference. This will be a great challenge to many of us here from developing countries - but remember most of our countries have signed up to CEDAW and other conventions and will be monitored in due course. So there is much work to be done. It would be good if say Britain and India could speak about the treatment of widows at the CSW - that would be a good start.

I know it might be difficult initially to persuade many of our Governments to begin to take this matter seriously, but it is our duty to force them to do this. The UN is ready to move on this issue . At the end of the day we must aspire to a UN supported international conference on widows, perhaps in a year or so. I can see no harm in letting Kofi Annan and his Adviser on Gender Issues Angela King know about the conference and that we would like to have, perhaps a special day set aside in the coming months to highlight the plight of widows in so many member states.