Yakin Ertürk, Director, UN Division for the Advancement of Women
...The issues which widows generally face and those encountered by women in developing countries are cause for serious concern. The situation of widows should continue to be featured on the international fora until they become firmly integrated into the policy agenda.
WRI
Newsletter 2nd Edition March 2005
Editorial - Ten Years After Beijing – Gender Equality Still to Be Achieved
Ten years after the Beijing World Conference on Women, the global importance of gender equality, women’s empowerment and human rights were successfully and unequivocally reaffirmed at the 49 th session of the Commission on the Status of Women held at the United Nations February 28 to March 11. Thousands of women’s rights advocates were present to support this reaffirmation of the Beijing Platform for Action (PFA) as well as the Outcome Document of the of the Beijing +5 Special Session in 2000.
This reaffirmation was contained in a political Declaration adopted by representatives of Governments, including Ministers from eighty countries. The Declaration also emphasized the strong link between the Beijing PFA and the Millennium Declaration. Governments and non-Governmental organizations (NGOs) accepted that the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), the time-bound targets for eradicating poverty and implementing the Millennium Declaration, would not be achieved without advancing gender equality and the empowerment of women.
The main purpose of the CSW was to review the progress which countries had made in implementing the two documents that have steered action to achieve gender equality : the PFA and Beijing +5 Outcome Document. The Political Declaration of the CSW would also be an important contribution to the high-level plenary meeting of the review of the Millennium Declaration which will be held next September.
In negotiations at the CSW, the United States delegation strongly opposed any language in the proposed Declaration and in several resolutions before the meeting, that referred to reproductive rights, as well as references to the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), a treaty the UN has neither signed nor ratified. But after a week of intensive negotiations, the US withdrew its attempt to include in the Declaration language which stated that by reaffirming the outcomes of the two prior conferences, the CSW would also reaffirm that no new international human rights or the right to abortion would be created.
In addition, 10 resolutions were adopted at the CSW. These covered Gender Mainstreaming, HIV/AIDS, Women in Afghanistan, Women in Palestine, Indigenous Women, Women and Natural Disasters, INSTRAW, Economic Advancement of Women, Trafficking and a proposal to consider in 2006 appointing a special Rapporteur on Laws that Discriminate Against Women.
Resolutions introduced by the United States on the economic advancement of women and to reduce the demand for trafficking in women and girls were heavily and successfully amended by Governments. The Trafficking resolution was passed in a modified form, but after the Economic resolution was expanded by countries to address the feminization of poverty, the role of the public sector and the link between reproductive rights and economic independence, the US withdrew its sponsorship but the resolution was adopted.
The final session of the CSW ended before the agenda was completed. Many of the amendments proposed to some of the resolutions were subjected to roll-call voting , which delayed matters considerably. The result was that proceedings were abruptly terminated by an announcement from the Chairperson that the Commission had run out of time and the remaining agenda items would be dealt with when the Commission was reconvened at a date to be announced.
While this was a disappointing end to two weeks of intense activities, the overall consensus of participants was that while there had been undoubted progress towards the goals set at Beijing and Beijing +5 to achieve gender equality, substantial challenges and obstacles remained. In this context, representatives of civil society called on Governments and the UN to include women’s organizations in the UN reform process and the Millennium Summit as none of the goals set out in these two processes can be achieved without women’s equality.
Patsy Robertson, Treasurer of WRI
Copies available from WRI office