WUNRN
Contact: Margaret Owen - director.wpd@googlemail.com
WIDOWS
FOR PEACE THROUGH DEMOCRACY (WPD)
STATEMENT BY WPD TO THE 52nd
session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women 25th February- 7th
March, 2008
With reference to the main theme:
Financing Gender Equality in Development Policies
And the sub-theme: Women and Armed
Conflict (reviewing the agreed conclusions of the 43rd CSW of 1988)
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Widows for Peace through Democracy (WPD), based in
A Fringe
Meeting on Widows: Needs and Roles in Conflict and Post-Conflict Scenarios will
take place during the 52nd CSW. All those interested in this area of
gender equality are welcome to participate.
WPD is the umbrella organisation for some 20 widows’
groups in developing countries, including several afflicted by wars. It
encourages the formation of federations of widows’ groups wherever widowhood is
a stigma and a “social death”. In 2005, it promoted the established of the
first regional caucus of widows’ groups for South Asia: SANWED (South Asian Network for Widows’ Empowerment in
Development), which brings together those representing widows of the six
countries of the region, facilitating the exchange of experience and best
practice on securing law reform, eliminating violence and harmful traditional
practices, and ensuring widows’ enjoy the rights enshrined in international and
domestic law. It has produced a “Widows’
Charter”, based on the CEDAW, for adaptation by widows’ NGOs and activists
lobbying for law reforms. As a member of GAPS
UK (Gender Action on Peace and Security), it promotes the inclusion of
widows’ representatives in peace-building activities and documents the impact
of conflict on their lives, in accordance with the requirements of UN SCR 1325.
A Neglected Gender Issue
Widowhood is one of the most neglected and hidden of all
gender issues. Given the ever increasing numbers of widows in war-affected
regions, their vulnerability to violence (within and outside the family)h and
their crucial social and economic roles in peace-building, reconstruction, the
UN and the international community now needs urgently to prioritise the complex
issues of widowhood across the whole spectrum of development policies.
Development policies tend to assume that
“women” are a homogenous whole, thus diverting attention to some of the most
vulnerable groups of women - such as widows. These women have very specific
needs but they are never mentioned in any of the 12 action areas of the Beijing
Platform for Action, nor in the Outcome Document of Bejing+5, in spite of their
extreme poverty and their exploitation and oppression as the result of
discriminatory interpretations of religion and custom. Law reforms, to comply
with international standards such as the CEDAW have failed to bring justice to
widows due to the dominance of traditional codes over modern laws in areas of personal
status land and inheritance and rights. “Chasing-off” and “property-grabbing”
are common features of widowhood across regions, cultures, class and caste.
Harmful traditional practices relating to mourning and burial rites, some of
which can be life-threatening and degrading to widows have received very little
attention.
Huge Increase in Numbers of Widows
Today, the numbers of widows,
of all ages, has increased to unprecedented figures due to armed conflict and
ethnic cleansing. Although reliable statistics are rare it is estimated that in
several countries, for example, such as
The stigma of widowhood and
its poverty impacts most disastrously and irrevocably on their children –
withdrawn from education, in exploited child labour, begging on the streets, or
sold into early marriage, to traffickers for prostitution,
Why is Financing of Gender Equality in Development
relevant to Widowhood issues?
To effectively address Gender Equality the UN international agencies and
governments must focus their attention on the status of widows whose numbers
have so dramatically increased in many countries.
·
Widows are the poorest of the poor in many developing countries,
especially in South Asia and
·
Widows do not know their rights under new laws on, for example,
inheritance and land rights, and face barriers to accessing the justice system.
·
The international community must support training and information on
widows’ rights for judiciaries, lawyers, police and community leaders.
·
Law reforms must include special provisions on the rights of widows.
·
Coping strategies to survive poverty are life-threatening but also
affect the whole of society.
·
Daughters of widows are particularly vulnerable to exploitation, sale,
forced prostitution and early child marriage. Poverty bans them from education
and therefore future employment.
·
Widows are not exclusively “victims” of discriminatory attitudes and
practices, they are key players in development
·
Policies should include financial and other support directed to widows’
organisations in developing countries so as to strengthen their capacity and
effectiveness in documenting their experiences; filling the gaps in data
collection; articulating their needs and promoting acknowledgement of their
roles.
·
Addressing issues of widowhood is essential for achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs): in
particular, the goals of reducing poverty; gender equality; school enrolment;
limiting the spread of the AIDS virus.
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