OHCHR

Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights

Item ID
{D66C04C4-0811-4856-AB0B-771D2A64446D}
UNAgency ID
{93310904-AE33-4D02-81AA-F06317BE02D3}
Policy Framework

See gender-related resolutions and decisions of the General Assembly, Security Council and Human Rights Council, and relevant subsidiary bodies.

Background

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), guided by the mandate provided by General Assembly resolution 48/141, OHCHR represents the world’s commitment to the promotion, protection and realization of the full range of rights and freedoms set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

OHCHR has a central role in safeguarding the integrity of the three pillars of the United Nations: peace and security, human rights and development. For the four year period from 2018-2021, the Office has identified six thematic pillars, four major shifts, with person centered spotlighting particularly women, young people and persons living with disabilities. The six thematic pillars that
from the continued solid base on which the work of the Office stands include (1) Support to the United Nations human rights system; (2) Mainstreaming human rights within the United Nations other pillars, namely development and (3) peace and security; (4) Advancing the core human rights principles of non-discrimination, (5) accountability, (6) participation. The Four major ‘Shifts’ in OHCHR mandate focus on key threats to rights and key opportunities for leveraging support to better protect and promote rights.  This means that across our six thematic pillars, OHCHR will also work to take steps to help prevent conflict, violence and insecurity; Help protect and expand civic space; Support and further develop a global constituency for human rights; Deliver human rights in the context of emerging concerns (‘frontier issues’).

All the six areas have a strong focus on women’s human rights and gender issues, including in line with OHCHR internal policies on gender equality and the Secretary General System Wide Strategy on Gender Parity.
Institutionally, OHCHR is committed to strengthening the United Nations human rights programme and to providing it with the highest quality support. OHCHR is committed to working closely with its United Nations partners to ensure that human rights are at the center of the work of the United Nations.

Resources

Report on laws discriminatory to women, prepared by Dr. Fareda Banda, 2009

Commentary on the Recommended Principles and Guidelines on Human Rights and Human Trafficking

URL

http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Pages/Home.aspx

Mail Address

Palais Wilson. 52 rue des Pâquis. CH-1201 Geneva, Switzerland

Areas of Work

The mission of OHCHR is to work for the protection and promotion of all human rights for all people; to help empower people to realize their rights; and to assist those responsible for upholding such rights in ensuring that they are implemented. In carrying out its mission with respect to violence against women, and within the overarching strategies to ensure country engagement, leadership, partnership, and support and strengthening of the Office and the human rights machinery, OHCHR is focusing on:
*Gender sensitive administration of justice, through the provision of expert legal analysis of international (and, where appropriate, regional and national) jurisprudence with commentary, relating to the effective prosecution of gender-based violence as well as legal analysis of obligations in relation to social and economic rights and the impact of the enjoyment of such rights for women on access to justice for victims of sexual violence.
*Piloting of integrated and thematic gender strategies for country engagement, including on violence against women.
*Mainstreaming gender and women’s human rights in OHCHR and with UN system partners.

OHCHR is an active member of UN Action against sexual violence in conflict. Since August 2008, the Coordinator for UN Action Against Sexual Violence in Conflict, previously based with UNIFEM in New York, is hosted on OHCHR premises in Geneva. Since 2009, OHCHR has chaired the Resource Management Committee of the UN-Action Multi-Donor Trust Fund.

Human rights monitoring and investigations, including in relation to sexual violence, are also key features of the field presences of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), particularly country offices and human rights components of UN peace operations.

Monitoring of the human rights situation, including advocacy and public reporting, is a fundamental tool for OHCHR to assess human rights problems, support the identification of adequate solutions, promote accountability and deter further violations. In particularly serious human rights violations including collective rape cases, the Office also conducts human rights investigations, by conducting detailed interviews with victims and witnesses, when possible visiting the location of the violations, and undertaking circumstantial analysis of facts, mapping of perpetrators to promote accountability through follow up with judiciary authorities.

OHCHR supportsthe Human Rights Council and its special procedures, including the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, the Working Group on discrimination against women in law and in practice, and the Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially in women and children, as well as human rights treaty bodies, including the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women.

In its’ work, the Committee on the Elimination on the Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) urges States parties to give priority attention to eliminating all forms of violence against women and to adopt comprehensive measures to address it in accordance with the Committee’s general recommendation No. 35.

Agency Type
SECRETARIAT
Title
Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
Icon
OHCHR

Mar 2018 - Jan 2019 | OHCHR

On 20 July 2018, CEDAW signed a framework of cooperation with the Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict. Under this framework of cooperation, CEDAW and the Special Representative of the Secretary General on Sexual Violence in Conflict seek to advance the rights of women and girls by combating conflict-related sexual violence and supporting the implementation of the United Nations Security Council resolutions on women, peace and security and CEDAW’s General Recommendation No.

Mar 2018 - Jan 2019 | OHCHR

In October 2018, CEDAW adopted revised reporting guidelines for States parties, which integrate SDGs with a view to ensuring systematic reporting by States parties and collection of data to be used in assessing progress made on the implementation of all SDG targets.On 22 November 2018 to commemorate the International Day on the Elimination of Violence against Women and which, inter alia, “called for strengthened cooperation between independent global and regional mechanisms, as common synergies and efforts to address violence against women under the existi

Mar 2018 - Jan 2019 | OHCHR

The OHCHR also supported the Working Group on the Issue of Discrimination Against Women in Law and in Practice (WGDAW) in developing several conclusions aimed at supporting policy development in its thematic report on “Reasserting equality, countering rollbacks”, published in May 2018 (A/HRC/38/46). It concluded that the road to gender equality and the full realization of women’s and girls’ human right remains long and challenging.

Mar 2018 - Jan 2019 | OHCHR

The OHCHR supported the work of the SRVAW who presented two thematic reports to the Human Rights Council and the General Assembly in 2018 on online violence against women and violence against women in politic.

During the period under review, the OHCHR supported the SRVAW in producing a number of legal and policy recommendations in communications sent to over 50 Member States and recommendations issued after country visits to:  Canada (11 to 23 April 2018); Nepal (19 to 29 November 2018).

Mar 2018 - Jan 2019 | OHCHR

In November 2018, the SRVAW and the CEDAW Committee agreed on a Framework of Cooperation as a means of strengthening already established cooperation on combating violence against women in line with their respective mandates, and to advance the rights of women and girls by preventing and combating gender based violence, and supporting the implementation of the Convention and its General Recommendation 35.

Mar 2018 - Jan 2019 | OHCHR

In March 2018, CEDAW adopted General recommendation No. 37 (2018) on the gender-related dimensions of disaster risk reduction in the context of climate change. The General Recommendation provides guidance to States parties on the implementation of their obligations under the Convention in relation to disaster risk reduction and climate change. The General recommendation recognises that women and girls also face a heightened risk of gender-based violence during and following disasters.

Feb 2017 - Apr 2018 | OHCHR

In Mali, OHCHR training military and government officials in relation to the prevention of CRSV by Malian actors. In 2017, 446 security officials, 132 members of the civil society organizations and 89 officials of the governmental institutions were trained to address and prevent CRSV.  

Feb 2017 - Apr 2018 | OHCHR

In Honduras, in September 2017, during a workshop organised with CEJIL for WHRD, a review of the main HR regarding of the interamerican and universal system regarding WHRD was developed.  Also as part of their engagement in the drafting of the new Criminal Code, OHCHR provided technical assistance and accompaniment in their presentation of proposals before Congress, regarding crimes concerning violence against women and femicide.

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