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NGO Concluding
Statement on CSW49/Beijing +10
NGO Linkage Caucus, New York, 9 March
2005
The Linkage Caucus represents a diverse
group of NGOs from all regions of the world gathered at the 49th Session of the
Commission on the Status of Women.
As long-standing supporters of and
advocates for the United Nations and the multilateral system, we believe that
the UN Member States and the UN leadership need to take strong action to advance
gender equality within the UN system and to make the promotion and realization
of women's empowerment and human rights a priority.
Based on the
discussion at this 49th Session of the CSW reviewing implementation of the
Beijing Platform for Action, we note that the UN system needs both more
effective, results-driven gender mainstreaming, and effective, adequately
resourced women's units to bring us closer to implementing the Beijing Platform,
to achieving the Millennium Development Goals, to ending the pandemic of
violence against women, and to reflecting the UN's unequivocal commitment to the
world's women in all their diversity.
In this regard, we would like to
emphasize the need to upgrade and better resource the gender architecture and
its related mechanisms within the UN. The UN system must elevate gender equality
to its appropriate place within its own organizational chart. The status of the
personnel and funding of the units that work on women's issues within the UN
should reflect the high priority that the system says it places on gender
equality. Women's participation and equality is essential to meeting the
Millennium Development Goals, as well as to fulfilling the myriad other
commitments the UN has made to combating gender inequality and
discrimination.
Over the past two decades, Member states have steadily
expanded the mandates and expectations that they put on UNIFEM and the Division
for the Advancement of Women in particular. Furthermore, the status of the
personnel charged with the advancement of women must be raised to the level of
others dealing with equivalent concerns.
In additions, it is urgent that
the low percentage of women in high level posts within the UN be addressed.
There is currently no Under Secretary-General dedicated to and only one
Assistant Secretary-General working on gender issues. Thirty years after the
first International Women's Year Conference, it is shocking that only a handful
of approximately sixty Secretary Generals Special Representatives (SRSGs) and
Deputy Special Representatives are women. This and the lack of progress in
appointing women heads of agencies underscores the problems with implementation
if gender equality policies within the UN system.
The UN should be
setting an example for gender balance and assisting Member States in achieving
the BPFA goal of at least 30% women in decision-making positions˜a goal which is
far from being realized one decade later. Furthermore, we note with concern that
there are only 11 women ambassadors at the UN and that Member States have been
slow to put forward women candidates for SRSGs and heads of UN
agencies.
A clear commitment on the part of Member States to nominate and
the SG to appoint more women to leadership positions would show strong
commitment in
the area of gender equality.
We hope that in the context
of UN reform Member States and the UN leadership will propose and implement
structural changes that would have a real impact on the work of the United
Nations on gender equality as well as serve as a model for Member
States.
The time to act is now.