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Women with mental disabilities held in Serbia’s institutions often suffer multiple forms of violence. A recent study by Mental Disability Rights Initiative-Serbia (MDRI-S) uncovered multiple forms of violence, including forced medical treatment such as the administration of contraceptives without informed consent, and forced abortions and sterilization.
The UN Trust Fund to End Violence against Women is supporting a project run by MDRI-S, a not-for-profit organization that advocates for the rights of women with mental disabilities, with a small grant. MDRI-S is the first organization in Serbia bringing the lives and narratives of women with mental disabilities living in custodial institutions to the attention of the public. MDRI-S advocates for the deinstitutionalization of people with mental disabilities and for the model of living in residential assisted living centers, while at the same time it invests in improving conditions of women still living in custodial institutions by sensitizing service providers to women’s needs.
MDRI-S has brought together numerous policy makers from government, parliament and independent bodies such as the Ombudsman and Commissioner for Equality, to present the findings of their research and recommendations for change. MDRI-S has so far trained 60 service providers on how to address violence against women with mental disabilities in custodial institutions. By involving policy makers and service providers, MDRI-S is ensuring that those working directly with women with mental disabilities are sensitized to have the information needed to prevent abuse from occurring, and encourages policy makers to become advocates and actors for deinstitutionalization.
SUSTAINABLE AND INCLUSIVE URBAN PROSPERITY IN THE STATE OF ALAGOAS – UN-Habitat partnership with the government of Alagoas, Brazil, in which UN-Habitat is going to conduct a local safety diagnosis and public spaces use, with a special focus on women, and elaborate an urban safety and crime prevention strategy, giving a special focus on violence against women and on how to promote a culture of peace.
UNLIREC contributed to an inter-agency programme funded by the Human Security Trust Fund in Peru on strengthening human security and community resilience by fostering peaceful coexistence. Under this programme, UNLIREC contributed to a course on gender in public policy, where the Regional Centre sensitized 76 participants on why and how to include a gender focus in policies on arms control, and prevention and reduction of armed violence.
UNLIREC also contributed to a project by UN Volunteers in Peru, Colombia, Honduras and Trinidad and Tobago called “Youth Volunteerism for Peacebuilding and Disarmament: Youth Measuring Community Security through Participatory Indicators”, in which youth volunteers developed community-based indicators measuring human security and progress towards the SDGs. Several of the indicators relate to violence against women and girls.
UNRWA’s Gender Equality Strategy (2016-2021), Integrating Gender, Improving Services, Impacting Lives serves to guide and frame all gender-related work by the Agency, including work on GBV.
In 2017, UNODC further expanded its activities in developing standards and tools and providing technical assistance to Member States in the field of crime statistics. Among these activities was UNODC’s publication of the Resource Book for Trainers on Effective Prosecution Responses to Violence against Women and Girls and the development of an implementation guide for the Essential Service Package for Women and Girls Subject to Violence to assist countries in the implementation of the Essential Services Package at the country level.
Further, UNODC developed a study on the role of women in the smuggling of migrants (to be published in the first half of 2018), as well as a Practitioner's Toolkit on Women's Access to Justice Programming (together with UN Women, UNDP and OHCHR).
As per its Strategic Framework 2018-21, UNV supports members states in developing policies that promote volunteerism and volunteer action. Emphasis is put on mainstreaming gender into these policies and legislation.
Field research and analysis by country research teams in China, India, Indonesia for the research project “When and Why Do States Respond to Women's Claims? Understanding Gender-Egalitarian Policy Change in Asia” (2013-2016; final publications 2018). http://www.unrisd.org/80256B3C005BB128/(httpProjects)/FFDCCF9EE4F2F9C6C1257BEF004FB03E?OpenDocument
Joint research activity with the Unicef Office of Research Innocenti on “Transformative Change for Children and Youth and the SDGs” (2017-2018) includes topic of violence against girls.
1. WHO together with UNFPA and UN Women published a clinical handbook for health providers titled "Health care for women subjected to intimate partner violence or sexual violence". Adaptation workshops and trainings based on the handbook have been held in multiple settings in 2017, including: Pakistan, Botswana, Namibia, Uruguay, and Zambia and in regional settings (e.g. Caribbean and East and southern Africa). 2. Technical support is being provided to countries and in-country partners who want to conduct national prevalence surveys on violence against women using the WHO multi-country study on women’s health and domestic violence methodology. 3. WHO is finalising the development of curricula for use in in-service and pre-service training to strengthen the knowledge, skills and attitudes of health-care professionals and ensure they can respond effectively to women suffering abuse and its consequences.
In reference to trainings and capacity building of WFP employees, a good example related to PSEA could be the online e-learning, made compulsory for all WFP employees, on Prevention of Fraud, Corruption and SEA.
WFP MYANMAR Country Office
1) For the opening of the 16 Days Campaign against GBV, WFP Myanmar closely cooperated with the National Myanmar Gender Equality Network (GEN) and supported its national campaign ‘From Peace in the home to peace in the world: Involve men to fight violence against women.” Furthermore, a brief footage in the IDP camp benefitting from the new transfer modality (e-wallet) in Myitkyina, Kachin State, was produced with statements of internally displaced women and men on the importance of understanding the root causes of intimate partner violence which might arise from changing in-kind assistance to cash based transfer modalities. WFP Field Office closely collaborated with Karuna Mission Social Solidarity (KMSS), UNFPA and UNHCR on various actions suggested to prevent GBV within the families and also in communities where strongly defined gender roles are still deeply embedded within a cultural or religious coat and gender equality neglected on the public agenda. As an example, the humanitarian community together with IDPs competed in the mini marathon organized by the GBV working group.
2) WFP male staff signed up to the WFP Men Stand for Gender Equality pledge and remained highly engaged in contributing to the country wide campaign to prevent GBV highlighted during orange days and events like the International Women’s Day.
3) WFP Myanmar reiterated its commitment to organize monthly orange days in its Field Offices. In March 2018, Myitkyina Field Office dedicated a special event to help staff understand the negative consequences of GBV against women and girls and learned about the importance of promoting a peaceful co-existence that begins at household level. WFP staff acknowledged that in their working environment, women’s voices and suggestions are still less powerful than those provided by men.
The November 2017 sub-regional Workshop on Gender Statistics ( http://www.unece.org/index.php?id=43956) included a session on gender statistics for the SDGs, including the indicators on violence against women. The workshop aimed to develop the capacity of experts from national statistics to collect data and produce statistics in line with the requirements of the SDGs and according to internationally-agreed methodology.