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The Euro-Med Conference
of civil society organizations and networks “Women’s Rights and Democracy Building: Promoting a common agenda for equality between women
and men” took place on 7 – 8 June, Hotel Landmark, Amman Jordan. It was organized by the European Feminist Initiative
IFE-EFI and the partners in the MENA region Arab Women’s Organization and
Sisterhood is Global Institute from Jordan, Association Najdeh and
Rassemblement Démocratique des Femmes Libanaises from Lebanon, the
Association Tunisienne des Femmes Démocrates from Tunisia, the Egyptian
Association Enhancing Community Participation from Egypt and Women’s Studies
Centre from Palestine as a result of the two years regional process to
promote a common agenda for equality between women and men through
Istanbul-Marrakech Framework of Action.
The goal of this process is to sustain the Istanbul-Marrakech Frame of Action
as a major regional tool for improving of womens’ rights; to contextualize it
in the present developments in Euro-Med: political transitions in the MENA
and economical and financial crises in Europe; to promote it as a part of the
international women’s rights frame linked with the Millennium Declaration
that reaffirmed that gender equality is both a goal in itself and a condition
for the achievement of other goals and development.
The Conference held on 7-8 June in Amman was a culmination of this process. It gathered over
120 representatives
from women’s rights organizations and networks, State actors, political
leaders, members of parliaments, academics and media from the Euro-Med region
to discuss and finalize the recommendations to the 3rd Ministerial Meeting to
be held in September in Paris.
The Conference expressed the support of the women’s rights organizations to
the Conclusions of the Ministerial Meeting Marrakesh 2009 and called upon the
governments to ensure that the Paris Ministerial Meeting 2013 further enhance
gender equality towards adopting concrete policies, aiming at ensuring that
both women and men enjoy the same opportunities, rights and duties in all
areas of life. It was reminded that gender equality means nothing more than
women and men are of equal worth and therefore policies are needed to ensure
that the knowledge and experience of both men and women are used to promote
progress in all spheres of society. It is a matter of social justice to
implement the principle of gender equality - that everyone, regardless of
sex, has the right to work and support themselves, to balance career and
family life, to participate in the political and public life on equal footage
and to live without the fear of abuse or violence.
The participants acknowledged the role of Jordan in hosting this conference and welcomed the initiative
of Jordan, France and the EU to organize the next Ministerial Conference on
Women in September 2013 in Paris. They underlined the importance of making their voice
heard in the Paris Ministerial Meeting.
The Conference
issued a set of comprehensive and concrete recommendations to the Ministerial
Meeting in September in Paris
and to the preparatory meeting on 11 June 2013 in Malaga,
Spain. The recommendations incorporate principles, measures,
and actions to be taken in the fields of democracy and women’s participation;
women’s rights and regional and international mechanisms that promote them;
education and awareness raising; dialogue between women’s rights organizations
and decision makers and on violence against women, peace and security.
The Conference called for the adoption of transitory mechanisms, ensuring
women’s more equal participation in political and economic decision and
policy-making and implementation. Such mechanisms as adopting of a
proportional electoral system, combined with legally and constitutionally
binding gender zipper quota of minimum 40% representation of women, in order
to ensure their application, address the deficiency of democracy and follow-up
non-compliance through significant sanctions, including disqualifying the
non-compliance lists.
The Conference called for adopting gender equality laws in all the countries
of the Euro-Med region, ensuring institutionalizing of gender equality in the
government policies and action plans, and safeguarding women’s rights from
regressive measures.
Furthermore, the Conference called for forming of women’s rights or gender
equality committees in the national assemblies and satisfying the long term
demand of the civil society to of lifting of all reservations to the CEDAW
and ratifying the optional protocol.
The participants called for harmonizing national legislations with
international norms and standards for women’s rights grounded in their
universality, exerting efforts to reform the educational system, the
curricula and the educational programs to promote the values of citizenship,
human rights and gender equality, to stop violence and discrimination, to
promote women’s rights as a human rights issue and not a family issue.
Also, it called for introducing urgently binding legal measures criminalizing
and penalizing all forms of violence against women in order to contribute to
filling up the gap between formal rights and substantial rights and for strengthening
the public awareness on the violation of women’s sexual and reproductive
rights.
The participants underlined that the civil society is a critical partner in
the reform processes, bringing the voice of women on the reform agenda. It
was emphasized that the independent status and functioning of the women’s
rights organizations is a precondition for having a vocal civil society. Independence of the womens’ rights NGOs is a fundamental principle
in the dialogue with the State’s leaders. The need to install channels for
dialogue with women’s rights NGOs as independent and full rank interlocutors
was reiterated and forming of cross sectoral committees enabling dialogue on
gender equality of diverse actors was encouraged.
The participansts emphasized that the occupation of Palestine
is a main impediment for women to play their role in building of their
society and stressed on the urgent need to end occupation and recognize an
independent and sovereign Palestine State on occupied territories of 1967
war, with East Jerusalem as its capital, the respect of the right of the
Palestinians to return to their home land according to the UN resolutions and
support the State of Palestine to be a member in the international agencies.
The participants also called for a political solution for Syria, based on a
civil, pluralistic and democratic Syrian State free from oppression and
dictatorship, through and urged for inclusion women’s rights and gender
equality on the agendas of democratic transformation and for inclusion of the
women’s rights movement in the building process of the new Syria, the new
constitution and transitional justice program. They asked for protection of
the women from any kind of violence with allowance of financial dedicated
means and for includion of the needs of Syrian women refugees and displaced
women in all humanitarian aid programs.
Finally it was emphasied that women should take part in a comprehensive and
participatory peace process as according to the UNSCR1325 on Women, Peace and
Security, as one of the conditions to allow transition towards democracy,
enhancing respect of human rights of both women and men in the whole region.
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