Paragraph 121 of the Beijing Platform for Action

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121. Women may be vulnerable to violence perpetrated by persons in positions of authority in both conflict and non-conflict situations. Training of all officials in humanitarian and human rights law and the punishment of perpetrators of violent acts against women would help to ensure that such violence does not take place at the hands of public officials in whom women should be able to place trust, including police and prison officials and security forces.

Beijing Declaration (1995)

Paragraph 121 of the Beijing Declaration deals even further with violence against women in conflict and non-conflict contexts. When we look into the variety of situations in which there is violence forced on women, it can be in both of the aforementioned contexts.

Within a humanitarian frame, one disturbing trend is the increase of the civilian casualties from war, as a proportion of victims. In fact, the majority of the civilian casualties in war are women and children.

In either case, whether in a civil environment or a war context, women will be more likely to be subject, as non-combatants, to the impacts of war. The emphasis here, even as far back as 1995, is to work for proper training of the humanitarian and other officials in both “humanitarian and human rights law.”

The knowledge of this can provide a modicum of backdrop into the rights and potential rights violations involved around violence against women. It can also provide some information as to what the appropriate level and kind of punishment are both considered requisite and proportional to the crime.

The idea is to ensure, inasmuch as is possible in each specific locale, the lack of violence by public officials against women, especially those in whom “women should be able to place trust.” This means the law enforcement or prison officials.

To the degree that this happens, we are moving to one systematic reduction in the degree to which there is lessened violence against women.

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(Updated 2018-11-10) One can find similar statements in other documents, conventions, declarations and so on, with the subsequent statements of equality or women’s rights:

The Universal Declaration of Human Rights in the Preamble, Article 16, and Article 25(2).
Convention Against Discrimination in Education (1960) in Article 1.
The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (1966) in Article 3, Article 7, and Article 13.
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (1966).
Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1979).
Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment (1984).
The Declaration on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women and the optional protocol (1993).
Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (1995), Five-year review of progress (2000), 10-year review in 2005, the 15-year review in 2010, and the 20-year review in 2015.
United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 (2000), and the UN Security Council additional resolutions on women, peace and security: 1820 (2008), 1888 (2009), 1889 (2009), 1960 (2010), 2106 (2013), 2122 (2013), and 2242 (2015).
Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, especially Women and Children (2000).
The Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa or the “Maputo Protocol” (2003).
Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence or the Istanbul Convention (2011) Article 38 and Article 39.
UN Women’s strategic plan, 2018–2021
2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
2015 agenda with 17 new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (169 targets for the end to poverty, combatting inequalities, and so on, by 2030). The SDGs were preceded by the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) from 2000 to 2015.

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Human Rights
Wednesdays 1 pm EST / 10 am PST
Call-In Details: (701) 801-1220
Meeting ID: 934-317-242
Lead Page: https://goodmenproject.lpages.co/conscious-intersectionality/
Led by: Scott Douglas Jacobsen

To the socio-political Right, a disclaimer; to the socio-political Left, a trigger warning: the subject matter may be disturbing or triggering for some listeners, speakers, or call members. The statistics on international violence against women is disproportionately more than violence against men. In turn, there is violence against women committed by women against women but more often by men against women. It is the statistical difference, which is the basis for the international emphasis on violence against women in multiple spheres rather than localized differences. Wednesday morning, we will speak on violence against women for one hour or so.

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