WUNRN
PROMOTING WOMEN'S PARTICIPATION IN
PEACE NEGOTIATIONS & PEACE PROCESSES
Direct Link to Full 81-Page 2014
Publication:
Coherent and comprehensive approaches and strategies for implementing UNSCR 1325 become even more essential when considering the realities on the ground. There is still no ‘critical mass’ of women peacebuilders and mediators engaged in formal track I peace processes. The number of women negotiators, witnesses and signatories to peace agreements still remains astonishingly low.
A UN Women (2012) review identified that, out of 31 major peace
processes conducted since 1992: • 4% of signatories of peace agreements were
women; • 2.4% of chief mediators were women; • 3.7% of witnesses or observers
to peace negotiations were women; • 9% of negotiation team members were women.
3
At the same time, most local women peace activists on tracks II and III, drawing on their personal and political convictions, courageously tackle questions of social justice, human rights and genderbased violence (GBV). GBV is still a prominent feature of all violent conflicts and remains unaddressed in most peace negotiations and agreements. The work of local women’s organisations and individual women peace activists on GBV, social justice and other peacebuilding issues has no formal mandate and is very often not linked to the official peace process. However, local and international networks and organisations 4 have made women’s often invisible and unacknowledged work visible and have highlighted their contributions to the official peacebuilding processes.
