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In Myanmar, UNODC strengthened the capacity of the police to provide survivor-centered responses, effective investigation and inter-agency coordination among the criminal justice system to better respond to gender-based violence. The Office supported the Union Attorney General’s Office in the prosecution of cases involving violence against women and children through a training curriculum and accompanying materials piloted at two initial trainings of trainers.
In Nepal, UNODC undertook a study about women in the criminal justice system, with a focus on women criminal justice professionals, violence against women and women alleged offenders and prisoners.
In the State of Palestine, UNODC and other UN agencies launched a joint project to support the forensic science laboratory in analyzing evidence on sexual and gender-based violence cases, to sensitize criminal justice personnel and improve cooperation among the stakeholders involved in handling SGBV cases.
Half of the projects funded by the United Nations Voluntary Trust Fund for Victims of Trafficking in 2018 explicitly provided direct protection and assistance to victims trafficked in a situation of armed conflict or fleeing conflict identified within mass refugee and migration movements.
UNODC published a thematic paper on countering trafficking in persons, including the exploitation of women and girls, in conflict situations.
ESCAP and UN Women co-chair the Asia-Pacific Regional Coordination Mechanism Thematic Working Group on Gender Equality and Empowerment of Women (TWG-GEEW), which has formally integrated the Secretary-General’s UNiTE Campaign into the development and implementation of its regional interagency workplan. Under the auspices of the TWG-GEEW, ESCAP and UN Women co-organized the Regional Commemoration for the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women under the umbrella of UNiTE and #HearMeToo on 23 November 2018. The Ted-talk style event named E.Quality Talks: My Story of Ending Violence against Women, involved survivors of violence, survivor advocates, women’s movements representatives and women’s human rights defenders. Hearing directly from those who have endured violence, fought against it, or helped to prevent it happening to others added credibility, and helped put ‘a human face’ on facts and statistics that can provoke the public to take action. Feedback for the event was unanimously positive from both storytellers and listeners.
The event was attended by the diplomatic community, civil society organizations and UN staff. At the Regional Commemoration, the #DontTellMeHowToDress exhibition, which is a Thai version of the #MeToo movement, was launched at the UN compound. The exhibition displayed the clothing victims wore at the time of the assault to challenge the misconception around sexual violence.
From this year's experience, the UNITE Worknig Group learnt that it is very important to provide those who are not usually heard with an opportunity to speak, and platforms to share their messages.
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. In the absence of social protection schemes and in situations in which there is food insecurity combined with impunity for gender-based violence, women and girls are often exposed to sexual violence and exploitation as they attempt to gain access to food and other basic needs for family members and themselves.
On 18 September 2018, CEDAW published its inquiry report into so-called “bride kidnapping” in Kyrgyzstan. CEDAW found that women and girls suffer grave and systematic violations of their human rights due to a culture of abduction, rape and forced marriage. In 2018 and 2019, OHCHR supported the mandate of the UN Special Rapporteur on trafficking in persons, especially women and children, in its engagement with CEDAW for the elaboration of a General Recommendation on trafficking in women and girls in the context of global migration. The Special Rapporteur intervened in the context of CEDAW informal consultations in December 2018 and produced a written submission in the context of CEDAW Half-Day of General Discussion in February 2019.
The OHCHR supported the work of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women during the first week of CSW63 in March 2019. In particular, support was provided for three side-events:
- Side-event on 25 years of the mandate and the femicide watch initiative, co-sponsored by the Republic of Croatia;
- Side-event on the mandate of the SRVAW and CEDAW General Recommendation 35, co-sponsored by Timor-Leste;
- Side-event on online violence against women and the non-consensual distribution of intimate images, organized jointly with Facebook.
The OHCHR also supported the Special Rapporteur on violence against women in the organization of a working level meeting with the members of the institutional platform of international and regional women’s rights mechanisms created in March 2018.
In October 2018, the founder of the Panzi Hospital in Bukavu, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Denis Mukwege, was awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace for his work with women and girls who are survivors of sexual violence. The hospital helped to pioneer the Panzi Foundation model of integrated rights-based psychosocial, legal and socioeconomic support provision in one-stop centres. The Panzi Foundation, which was awarded a grant from the UN Trust Fund to enhance its services for sexual violence survivors, worked in partnership with Physicians for Human Rights, another Trust Fund grantee, to train medical, legal and psychosocial professionals on the principles underlying its model and on the collection of forensic evidence to bring the perpetrators of sexual violence to justice and obtain justice for survivors. Beginning in 2011, the Trust Fund has invested in the Programme on Sexual Violence in Conflict Zones launched by Physicians for Human Rights and is currently funding its second generation of results. Since that time, Physicians for Human Rights has trained 1,578 health-care, legal and law enforcement professionals, who have provided services to 42,162 survivors of sexual violence throughout the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Kenya.
UNODC participated in a consultation meeting for a General Recommendation by the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women on trafficking in women and girls in the context of global migration in Geneva in December 2018. UNODC will be closely involved in the development of the General Recommendation, including a keynote statement during CEDAW’s 72nd session in Geneva in February 2019.
UNODC organized a number of side events in cooperation with relevant partners, including on essential services for women and girls subject to violence and on the importance of gender equality and human rights for victims of trafficking in persons, during the Commission on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice in May 2018 and the Conference to the Parties to the United Nations Convention against Transnational Crime in October 2018.
In Peru, the organization Red Nacional de Promoción de la Mujer is implementing a project in the regions of Ayacucho and Huánuco aimed at reducing gender-based violence against older women who were victims of conflict-related violence in the 1980s and 1990s. The project has empowered more than 487 women, of whom 44 per cent were over 60 years of age, by increasing their awareness of their rights. Through peer-to-peer exchange workshops, the grantee reached more than 210 older women from various organizations and 286 men and other women, including students and youth groups. The grantee adopted a holistic approach to developing participatory needs assessments, awareness-raising and training workshops and communications campaigns, all focusing on rights, interculturality, gender and aging. The project was also aimed at raising awareness among local officials and advocating for gender- and age-sensitive public policies. As a direct result of the project’s implementation, older women are now part of community surveillance committees and the municipalities’ round table on poverty reduction. In addition, four emblematic cases of violations of women’s rights were reviewed and, to date, one case has been decided in favour of the survivor; the remaining three are pending decisions.
South Sudan Country Office
Monitoring &Evaluation and Emergency team held a GBV workshop on how WFP can adapt its work to address issues raised by the 16-days campaign.