National Legislation

In the ECIS region, legislative development support was provided by UNDP in Kosovo, where the Law on Domestic Violence was adopted. In Serbia, UNDP assisted with drafting recommendations for legislative changes related to sexual gender-based violence.

The OHCHR Regional Office for Central America provided in El Salvador technical advice to the Salvadorian Institute for the Advancement of Women (Instituto Salvadoreño para el desarrollo de la Mujer, ISDEMU), the Prosecutors’ Office and the Parliamentary Group on a new legislative act on the elimination of violence against women, which was adopted on November 25th 2010.

UNICEF - including through the UNFPA-UNICEF Joint Programme to Accelerate the Abandonment of FGM/C - has provided support to development of legislation addressing violence against girls at country level.

UNODC is currently working at developing a gender approach in the criminal justice system of Panama, including the effective application of the law on the prevention of violence against women.

Former UNIFEM now part of UN Women provided technical support to stakeholders who contributed to the enactment of the Domestic Violence Bill in Grenada, the Ley Especial Integral para una Vida libre de Violencia para las Mujeres in El Salvador, the development of the Domestic Violence (Crime and Punishment) Regulation in Nepal and the adoption of new provisions in the Law on Protection against Domestic Violence in Albania.

UNESCO continues to carry out a series of studies which examine the family laws in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). The UNESCO Office in Beijing initiated public awareness campaigns in Mongolia to strengthen the implementation of the law to combat domestic violence in local areas, engaging a broad range of stakeholders.

UNIFEM’s, (now part of UN Women) continued support for advancing legislation on violence against women, in collaboration with national institutions, included: domestic violence legislation in Kazakhstan, Mozambique and Nepal; law reform and harmonization in Afghanistan, Cambodia, Georgia, Mexico, Senegal and the Solomon Islands; legal measures against sexual harassment in Bolivia and Pakistan.

In Timor-Leste, the UNDP National Parliament Project is providing technical support to the National Parliament as it deliberates the draft Law on Domestic Violence. Through the UNDP-supported project “Equal Access to Justice” in Sri Lanka, a cabinet committee in the Ministry of Justice is supported to look into reforms of existing laws applicable to Muslims, especially those laws that do not provide equal status to women.

UNICEF continued to work with the Inter-Parliamentary Union and provide support at regional and national level to legal reform on violence against women and girls.

UNIFEM’s, now part of UN Women, support in the formulation, reform and implementation of legislation to address violence against women and girls, in partnership with a wide range of stakeholders, included: domestic violence laws and bills in Indonesia and Thailand; a workshop for ASEAN Member States to review domestic violence legislation and best practices (October 2008); a regional workshop on coordinated community responses to domestic violence with local government representatives and civil society organizations (CSOs) (including UN Trust Fund grantees) from Central and Eastern Europe an