United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women

UNIFEM, now part of UN Women, contributed to the development of national strategies and plans on gender-based violence in Afghanistan, Liberia and Ecuador. Hide

In collaboration with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), DAW, now part of UN Women, organized an expert group meeting on good practices in legislation on violence against women at the United Nations Office at Vienna, in May 2008. The report of the expert group meeting includes a model framework for legislation on violence against women with detailed recommendations and explanatory commentaries containing examples of good practice. Hide

In Burundi, UNIFEM, now part of UN Women, , UNDP, UNESCO and UNICEF worked together to provide training and reporting assistance for civil society organizations and police to improve statistics and data collection on cases of gender-based violence. Hide

UNIFEM, now part of UN Women, provided capacity development to the Burundian police and judiciary to improve protection mechanisms for survivors of violence against women and to civil society partners, working on violence against women in Indonesia, Thailand, Timor-Leste and the Philippines. It also supported the development of a training course, "Empowerment, HIV and violence against women in the Caribbean." As part of the Safe Cities Programme, UNIFEM and Red Mujer y Habitat supported an online learning course, “Urban violence, insecurity and discrimination”. Hide

DAW, now part of UN Women, prepared reports of the Secretary-General to the sixty-third session of the General Assembly on intensification of efforts to eliminate all forms of violence against women (A/63/214), trafficking in women and girls (A/63/215), and eliminating rape and other forms of sexual violence in all their manifestations, including in conflict and related situations (A/63/216). Hide

UNIFEM, now part of UN Women, facilitated the Wilton Park conference of May 2008 on the role of military peacekeepers in addressing sexual violence during armed conflict, and contributed to the dissemination of the results. Hide

In May 2008, UN-INSTRAW, now part of UN Women, undertook an assessment of gender-based violence in the aftermath of Tropical Storm Noel in the Dominican Republic. The study revealed that there was very little attention to, or provision in post-disaster reconstruction efforts to address gender-based violence, particularly among residents of temporary shelters. Hide

In June 2008, UNIFEM, now part of UN Women, organized a workshop with representatives from Afghanistan, Haiti, Liberia, Rwanda, Timor-Leste and Uganda as part of a programme on Supporting Women’s Engagement in Peace-Building and Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict: Community-Led Approaches. Hide

UNIFEM, now part of UN Women, and DFID supported a conference organized by the Rwandan Defense Forces in Kigali in March 2008 on women’s participation in peacekeeping missions, as part of prevention of gender-based violence. In collaboration with UNFPA and UNDP, UNIFEM organized a satellite session “From acknowledgement to action: Intersections between violence against women and HIV/AIDS”, at the International Conference on AIDS in Mexico City, in August 2008.UNIFEM leads or partners on several joint United Nations initiatives on violence against women, including programmes in Bangladesh, Colombia and Morocco; the Asia Pacific Regional Joint Programme Partners for Prevention: Working with Boys and Men to Prevent Gender-based Violence; and the One UN pilots in Albania, Rwanda and Uruguay, which include violence against women in their programming. Hide

UNIFEM, now part of UN Women, supported the issuance of two publications to raise awareness about the linkages between violence against women and HIV, namely “The Multiple Faces of the Intersections Between HIV and Violence Against Women” and “Women, Violence and HIV&AIDS: Exploring Interfaces”. Hide