WUNRN
ARRIA FORMULA PROVIDES POTENTIAL
ACCESS TO UN SECURITY COUNCIL FOR NGO'S - GENDER - ON ISSUES OF SPECIFIC SC
INTEREST
The ARRIA
FORMULA enables a member of the UN Security Council to invite other
Security Council members to an informal meeting, held outside of the Council
chambers and chaired by the inviting member. The meeting is called for the
purpose of a briefing given by one or more persons, considered as expert in a
matter of concern to the Council. An Arria Formula meeting is an informal event
that allows for more interaction between the Security Council members, civil
society, UN agencies and other sectors on international peace and security
issues.
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ARRIA FORMULA MEETING EXAMPLES -
WOMEN'S ISSUES
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Arria Formula Meeting on
Implementing the UN Security Council's Women, Peace & Security Agenda -
Perspectives from the Field: Gender Practitioners in UN Peacekeeping Operations
May 17, 2013
- The Permanent Mission’s of Australia and Guatemala to the United Nations in
cooperation with DPKO organized the Arria Formula meeting. The focus was on the
role of gender practitioners in UN Peacekeeping Operations. Panelists included
Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Hervé Ladsous; Gaynel Curry, the first
women protection adviser deployed in the UN Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS);
Elsie Effange-Mbella, a senior gender adviser in the UN Stabilization Mission
in the DRC (MONUSCO); and Lucien LeClair, a police adviser for the UN
Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH). Other member states and civil
society were also represented at the meeting. The aim of this Arria Formula was
to demonstrate to Council members how Gender Advisors (Gas) and Women
Protection Advisors (WPAs) fulfill different roles and how both add value to
peacekeeping operations. (GAs are responsible for integrating a gender perspective
into all aspects of a peacekeeping mission. WPAs have a specific mandate to
address conflict-related sexual violence.)
Summary
of the Speakers
Mr Hervé
Ladsous,
Under-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping (DPKO), focused on DPKO’s mandate to
protect and empower women and girls through its peacekeeping operations. He
reminded the members that women and girls are among the most effected by war
and armed conflicts. He urged Member States continue the work on the Women,
Peace and Security Agenda especially through strengthening the role of civil
society and reforming security systems so that it can better ensure protection
and promotion of women’s rights.
Ladsus
further mentioned the need to undertake diverse gender related activities.
Gender Advisors and Women Protection Advisors fulfill their role in the field,
but at the same time the security system needs to be improved. Finally, he
emphasized that the employment of WPAs should be included in regular UN
budgets, not just mission budgets.
Ms Gaynel
Curry,
First Women Protection Adviser (WPA) deployed in the UN Mission in the Republic
of South Sudan (UNMISS), shared her experiences from the set-up of the Women’s
Protection Advisers as well as the rollout of the Monitoring, Analysis and
Reporting Arrangements (MARA) in response to conflict related sexual violence.
WPAs can bring the added value of their strong expertise on sexual violence in
conflicts that can enable efficient allocation of resources in order to respond
to sexual violence in conflict effectively. The particular focus should however
be on how and where to deploy the WPAs to maximize the efficiency of the
program.
Sexual
violence as a multi-layered problem requires an integrated approach from the UN
system. Curry stressed that the understanding of sexual violence phenomena
still remains a challenge: not only among hosting government’s stakeholders but
also among colleagues within the UN mission. Curry emphasized the central focus
on accountability, support and prevention. Since UNIMISS is the only mission
with WPAs and it seems to already have positive impact, Curry encouraged
building on existing structures rather that creating new. The example of the
deployment of WPAs in UNIMISS can be used as an operational model in the
future.
Ms Elsie
Effange-Mbella,
Senior Gender Adviser from the UN Organization Stabilization Mission in the
Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUSCO), addressed the role of GAs in the UN
Peacekeeping Operations. Effange-Mbella has significant experience in fronting
the Women, Peace and Security agenda within the UN but also on the national
level. In the DRC she has coordinated support from civil society, United Nations
Agencies and government stakeholders for the development of DRC National Action
Plan on SCR1325 (2010). As a Senior Gender Advisor for MONUSCO she has promoted
first hand programs to enhance the rehabilitation of women and girls in
conflict and post-conflict settings. Effange-Mbella emphasized the importance
of building partnerships to promote the rights of women. Supporting local
women’s civil society organizations and training local partners on sexual
violence has proved to be very efficient. However, technical support in the
Parliament is also needed. Effange-Mbella has a clear focus on the need for
active participation of women in all peace and rehabilitation processes.
Despite the resources available to combat sexual violence in conflict, Effange-Mbella
addressed the need to allocate additional resources for women’s participation
more broadly.
Mr Lucien
LeClair,
UN Police officer involved in the project relating to Sexual and Gender Based
Violence (SGBV) in the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti
(MINUSTAH), shared his experiences of working with security system reform in
Haiti. After the earthquake in 2010, Haiti was plagued by sexual and gender
based violence and other atrocities. LeClair worked under the SGBV Norwegian
project on restructuring the police.
In 2012 he
also worked on Sexual and Gender Based violence issues in the UN Mission in
Haiti (MINUSTAH). At the meeting he discussed two main problems: under-reported
cases of sexual violence and lack sensitivity by the police to the seriousness
of sexual aggression. The program aimed to train local police officers on
sexual and gender-based violence, teach them what sexual aggression is, how to
investigate it, how to take the testimony from the victim and undertake further
steps.
Comments
and Remarks
Council Members reaffirmed the importance of the Women, Peace and Security
agenda and in particular the need to work with gender practitioners in the
field in order to strengthen this agenda. In the comments the Member States
showed their support to the deployment of gender advisers and women protection
advisers in the field. However, only Argentina addressed the deep roots of
sexual violence in conflict: gender inequalities and the perception of women as
men’s inferior. Finally, NGO Working Group on Women, Peace and Security,
Women’s Refugee Commission and Pax Christi spoke on behalf of civil society.
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The Arria
Formula assumed special importance because under long standing Council
practice, only delegations, high government officials (of Council members) and
United Nations officials could speak at regular Council meetings and
consultations. The Arria Formula enables a member of the Council to invite
other Council members to an informal meeting, held outside of the Council
chambers and chaired by the inviting member. The meeting is called for the
purpose of a briefing on a matter of concern to the Council.
The formula
is named for Amb. Diego Arria of Venezuela who devised it. In 1992, during the
crisis in former Yugoslavia, a Bosnian priest came to New York and asked to
meet with various Council members individually. Only Ambassador Arria agreed to
meet him. Ambassador Arria was so impressed with the priest's story that he felt
all Council members should hear it too. Obviously, it was impossible to get the
Council to agree to hear this testimony in its official sessions. So Arria
simply invited Council members to gather over coffee in the Delegates' Lounge.
Many attended, the meeting was a great success and the Arria Formula was born.
Today, Arria
Formula meetings take place regularly. Attendance is typically at a very high
level -- the permanent representative or deputy. The meetings are announced by
the Council president at the beginning of each month or whenever organized, as
part of the regular Council schedule. And the meetings are provided with full
interpretation by the Secretariat.
The Arria
system is an interesting mixture of informality and formality. It allows the UN
Security Council to sidestep its bound Rules of Procedure and open itself in a
very limited way to the selective outside world.
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