WUNRN
UN Statement on Behalf of the Spanish Society for
International Human Rights Law (SSIHRL), UNESCO Etxea and the Working Group on the Role of Men and
Boys in Advancing Gender Equality of the NGO Committee on the Status of Women
in Geneva (CONGO)
THE ECONOMICS OF THE FINANCIAL CRISIS:
GENDER EQUALITY AND THE ROLE OF WOMEN
International Women's Day Statement
Palais de
Nations (
I make the following
statement on behalf of the Spanish Society for International Human Rights Law
(SSIHRL), UNESCO Etxea and the Working Group on the Role of Men and Boys in Advancing
Gender Equality of the NGO Committee on the Status of Women in Geneva (CONGO)
The Human Right to Peace and the Gender Equality as Means to Overcome the Current Economic and Financial Crisis
The spreading global
financial crisis - which has taken a heavy toll of international bankers,
investors and speculators - is also having a devastating impact on some of the
most vulnerable and marginalized groups in society, including women and
children.
As indicated
by Mr. Sha Zukang, under Secretary General for Economic and Social Affairs at
the 53rd session of the Commission of the Status of Women (CSW) on
Rachel Mayanja, U.N.
special adviser on Gender Issues and the Advancement of Women, told the CSW
that the confluence of the global financial crisis - including a projected
global economic slowdown, the food and energy crises, the rise in unemployment,
instability and hostilities, and violence against women and environmental
deterioration - had already seriously impacted progress towards achieving
gender equality and women's empowerment.
Policy
responses to the financial crisis must take gender equality perspectives into
account to ensure, for example, that women as well as men can benefit from
employment creation and investments in social infrastructure.
The role of
men and boys is indispensable in achieving both gender equality in economic,
social and cultural rights and the human right to peace. The Charter of the
United Nations was the first international instrument to recognize women’s
equal rights with men and has created the impulse in providing a legal
codification of these rights in the international human rights treaties and
national laws. It follows that a transformed partnership based on equality
between women and men is needed as a condition for people-centred sustainable
development and world peace.
In these times
it is advisable that governments include in their recovery economic plans the
following five core feminine values in order to overcome the current economic
crisis and to ensure social peace:
The most critical
deterrent to the human right to peace and the economic gender inequality,
however, is the prejudice and bias that remains in the mental attitudes and
behaviour of many men that perpetuate the notion of power that deprives women
of the enjoyment of their basic human rights and human dignity. It follows that
equality between women and men is a matter of human rights and a condition for
social justice and is also a necessary and fundamental prerequisite for
equality, development and peace. As indicated by the preamble of the Convention
on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women “the welfare of
the world and the cause of peace require the maximum participation of women on
equal terms with men in all fields.”
Happy International Women's Day
David Fernandez
Puyana
Representative of
the SSIHRL, UNESCO Etxea and the Working Group on the Role of Men
and Boys in Advancing Gender Equality of the NGO Committee on the Status of
Women in
david.fernandez-puyana@orange.fr
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