WUNRN
Substantive
New Normative Provisions on Women & Armed Conflict Adopted by the UN
Security Council & the CEDAW Committee
By Aisling Swaine* -February 18,
2014
Introduction
October 18th, 2013
heralded significant normative advancements for what is now referred to as the
international “women, peace and security (WPS) agenda.” In Geneva, in its 56th
Session, the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (the
Committee), adopted a new General Recommendation providing specific guidance on
the application of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of
Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) to conflict and post-conflict contexts,
while the Security Council, in its annual debate on WPS in New York, adopted
Resolution 2122, focused on women’s participation and leadership. Both
instruments significantly strengthen international norms aimed at promoting and
protecting women’s rights related to situations of conflict, with the potential
to significantly influence the actions of states and international
organizations in their practice of the maintenance of international peace and
security.
This Insight will provide
an overview of the substantive provisions set out by these new developments,
and comment on their contribution to strengthening women’s rights in efforts to
prevent, manage and resolve armed conflicts.
Background
The advancements
in the human rights agenda of the 1990s offered the initial entry points for
issues of women’s rights related to situations of armed conflict to gain
normative traction. The Vienna Declaration (1993)[1]
and the Beijing Platform for Action (1995, BPFA)[2]
both articulate concerns about violations experienced by women in situations of
conflict, with the BPFA setting out a framework of related strategic actions.[3]
Concurrently, events in the former
Building on these
events, an intensified lobby by transnational women’s networks led to the
adoption of Resolution 1325 in 2000, which established for the first time
normative standards agreed by the world’s primary security body on women’s
right to participate in, and have their specific interests addressed in all
matters relating to international peace and security. As the issue of
sexualized violence in armed conflict gained traction during the first decade
of the new millennium, the Security Council incrementally adopted a series of
subsequent WPS resolutions primarily focused on this issue,[4]
as well as a resolution aimed at furthering implementation of Resolution 1325.[5]
The Security Council has become the primary norm-producing site on issues of
women and armed conflict, with a total of six resolutions adopted under its WPS
agenda item by June 2013.
A substantive
synergy has been emerging between the WPS agenda and international human rights
frameworks through recent steps taken by the CEDAW Committee. In 2011, the
Committee produced a concept note and undertook consultations with
constituencies globally to inform the development of a General Recommendation
on the protection of women’s rights in conflict and post-conflict contexts.[6]
Noteworthy is that the Committee had already begun drawing the Security Council
resolutions into its consideration of States Parties reports prior to this
initiative. As early as 2008 for example, the Committee called for the full
implementation of Resolution 1325 by the United Kingdom in its territory of
Northern Ireland,[7]
and continues to reference the resolutions in responding to State Party reports.[8]
The work of both
the Security Council and the CEDAW Committee culminated in the adoption on
October 18th of new normative provisions that situate the thematic issue of
women and armed conflict under both the UN’s human rights framework, as well as
under its mandate on international peace and security.
Resolution
2122 Adopted by the UN Security Council
During its now
annual open debate on WPS, and under the Presidency of Azerbaijan, the Security
Council unanimously adopted Resolution 2122, which is already being referred to
as the resolution on women’s leadership. While Resolution 1325 (2000) and
Resolution 1889 (2009) focus on women’s agency and participation, Resolution
2122 offers the strongest language in this respect so far. This resolution
articulates the Council’s intention to “focus more attention on women’s leadership
and participation in conflict resolution and peace-building,” and specifically
nominates concepts of gender equality as integral to sustainable peace, a far
more strengthened reference to the equality aspects of this agenda than seen
before. The resolution also provides for strengthened implementation of the WPS
resolutions in the Council’s broader thematic areas of work, including
references to areas such as promotion of the rule of law and threats to peace
and security by terrorist acts (offering a new and significant opportunity for
the application of the WPS agenda to this critical aspect of the Council’s
work). There has been critique of the Council’s consecutive adoption of
resolutions that are focused on protecting women as vulnerable victims of
sexualized violence as a tactic of conflict. By requesting UN peacekeeping
mission leadership to assess “human rights violations and abuses” and “security
threats” affecting women, Resolution 2122 creates space for a broader range of
conflict-related gender-based harms to be recognized, documented and addressed.
Important going forward will be interpretation of this provision by UN
missions, and whether specific efforts are made to document and address the
broader range of gender-based rights violations and insecurities that women
face alongside, as part of, and distinct from strategic sexualized violence.
Perhaps of most
significance is the articulation in Resolution 2122 of the Security Council’s
support for reproductive rights of women in conflict-affected contexts. While
this issue is referred to in the preambular section of the resolution, its
inclusion nonetheless expresses the Council’s acknowledgement of “the need for
access to the full range of sexual and reproductive health services, including
regarding pregnancies resulting from rape, without discrimination.”[9]
This responds to the UN Secretary-General’s recommendation in his 2013 report
on women and peace and security to the Security Council, that termination
services should be made available in such contexts in line with national law.[10]
The provision on reproductive health in Resolution 2122 did jar with a number
of UN member states, however.
General
Recommendation 30 Adopted by CEDAW
The stated aim of
General Recommendation No. 30 on women in conflict prevention, conflict and
post-conflict situations[11]
is to underline States Parties’ obligations under CEDAW related to situations
of conflict, and to overcome gaps in States Parties’ reporting on the same.
Significantly, the General Recommendation stipulates the application of CEDAW
not only to situations of conflict classified under international humanitarian
law, but also to “other situations of concern” and lists examples of these such
as “war against terrorism,” “internal disturbances,” and “political strife.”[12]
The General
Recommendation includes a specific section referencing the Security Council WPS
agenda. It notes that “all the areas of concern addressed in [the WPS]
resolutions find expression in the substantive provisions of the Convention,”
[and] “reiterates the need for a concerted and integrated approach that places
the implementation of the Security Council agenda on women, peace and security
into the broader framework of the implementation of the Convention and its
Optional Protocol.”[13]
Recommendations are made that States Parties report on the implementation of
the WPS agenda through the CEDAW reporting procedure, with a list of ways that
States Parties can advance their commitments.
The
Potential for Synergies Between Security Council and Human Rights Normative
Provisions
A perceived
weakness of the series of WPS resolutions is their lack of enforceability under
the Security Council’s working methods. Specific measures are being developed
at international levels to redress this gap.[14]
General Recommendation 30 may also be considered to hold significance for not
only strengthening the application of CEDAW to conflict-affected contexts, but
also strengthening accountability of states on implementation of the WPS
resolutions.
In General
Recommendation 30, the CEDAW reporting procedure is presented as a way to
“consolidate the Convention and Council’s agenda.”[15]
Specific measures are proposed to states to advance implementation of the
resolutions, with the recommendation that states ensure “a model of substantive
equality [that] takes into account the impact of conflict and post-conflict
contexts on all rights enshrined in the Convention.”[16]
The General Recommendation situates the Security Council resolutions in a wider
context of equality and non-discrimination found in international human rights
law, and posits that CEDAW can lend the enforcement of international law to the
provisions set out in the resolutions.[17]
Conclusion
Resolution 2122
augments the potential for the substantive equality provisions of the WPS
agenda to be taken forward, while General Recommendation 30 strengthens
enforcement of the equality and non-discrimination norms of CEDAW to conflict
and post-conflict contexts. Both developments also offer potential for a
progressive move towards holding States Parties to account on their
implementation of both CEDAW as well as the WPS resolutions in situations of
conflict, post-conflict, and beyond. Going forward, it will be interesting to
see how the General Recommendation is utilized by the Committee, and in
particular, how it is responded to by states operating on these issues under
two differing frameworks. Also of consideration is whether the human rights
framework and reporting procedures offered by CEDAW under the General Assembly
are seen to come up against or mutually reinforce the distinctive mandate of
these issues under the Security Council. How the consolidation between these
bodies proposed by the CEDAW Committee is viewed from a political perspective
by the Security Council, and in particular by members such as Russia who
continuously reiterate the need for the WPS resolutions to be applied only in
strict adherence to the mandate and agenda of the Security Council, also
remains to be seen.
About the Author*: Associate Professor of
Practice of International Affairs,
ENDNOTES
[1] World
Conference on Human Rights, June 14–25, 1993,
[2]
Fourth World Conference on Women, Sept. 4–15, 1995,
[3] The
Human Rights Council has also, on earlier and concurrent dates, adopted
resolutions focused on issues of women and armed conflict, such as resolutions
specifically focused on the issue of sexualized violence targeted at women in
specific country situations and those more widely focused. Rape and Abuse of
Women in the Areas of Armed Conflict in the Former
[4] S.C.
Res. 1820, U.N. Doc. S/RES/1820 (June 19, 2008), http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N08/391/44/PDF/N0839144.pdf
S.C. Res. 1888, U.N. Doc. S/RES/1888 (Sept. 30, 2009), http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/vaw/securitycouncil/S-RES-1888-(2009)-English.pdf;
S.C. Res. 1960, U.N. Doc. S/RES/1960 (Dec. 16, 2010), http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N10/698/34/PDF/N1069834.pdf;
S.C. Res. 2106, U.N. Doc. S/RES/2106 (June 24, 2013), http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=S/RES/2106%282013%29.
[5] S.C.
Res. 1889, U.N. Doc. S/RES/1889 (Oct. 5, 2009), http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N09/542/55/PDF/N0954255.pdf.
[6] Comm.
on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, Concept Note: General
Discussion on the Protection of Women’s Human Rights in Conflict and
Post-Conflict Contexts, 47th Sess. (2011) [hereinafter Concept Note], http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/CEDAW/Womenconflictsituations/GR....
[7] Comm.
on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, Concluding Observations on
the Seventh Periodic Report of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern
Ireland, ¶ 285, 41st Sess., June 30–July 18, 2008, U.N. Doc. CEDAW/C/GBR/CO/7
(July 10, 2008), http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N09/555/92/PDF/N0955592.pdf; see also Comm. on the
Elimination of Discrimination against Women, List of Issues and Questions with
Regard to the Consideration of Periodic Reports: United Kingdom of Great
Britain and Northern Ireland, ¶¶ 42–43, 55th Sess., July 8–26, 2013, U.N. Doc.
CEDAW/C/GBR/Q/7 (Nov. 2, 2012) (reiterating the call for full implementation of
Resolution 1325).
[8] The
CEDAW Committee has, for example, made references to the WPS agenda in its
concluding observations to all conflict-affected contexts on the agenda of its
53rd session in July 2013.
[9] S.C.
Res. 2122, pmbl. ¶ 8, U.N. Doc. S/RES/2122 (Oct. 18, 2013), http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N13/523/44/PDF/N1352344.pdf
.
[10] U.N.
S.C. Rep. of the Secretary General on Women and Peace and Security, U.N. Doc.
S/2013/525 (Sept. 4, 2013), http://www.unwomen.org/~/media/Headquarters/Attachments/Sections/News/In....
[11] Comm.
on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, General Recommendation No.
30 on Women in Conflict Prevention, Conflict and Post-Conflict Situations, ¶
26, 56th Sess., Sept. 30–Oct. 18, 2013, U.N. Doc. CEDAW/C/GC/30 (Sept. 4, 2013)
[hereinafter General Recommendation No. 30], http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/CEDAW/GComments/CEDAW.C.CG.30.pdf.
[12]
[13]
[14] This
includes for example development of a set of indicators to track and by default
prompt strengthened implementation of the resolutions, as well as encouragement
to states to develop national action plans aimed at increasing the range and
depth of actions taken at national levels.
[15]
General Recommendation No. 30, supra
note 11, ¶ 2.
[16]
[17] As
stated in Concept Note, supra
note 6, at 17.