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Strategic objective E.2.
Reduce excessive military expenditures and control the availability of armaments
Actions to be taken
145. By Governments and international and regional organizations:
g. Take into account gender-sensitive concerns in developing training programmes for all relevant personnel on international humanitarian law and human rights awareness and recommend such training for those involved in United Nations peace-keeping and humanitarian aid, with a view to preventing violence against women, in particular;
Beijing Declaration (1995)
This particular paragraph deals in short manner with the issues of a gendered perspective on the nature of the problem. The problem of war and its costs on civilian populations who happen to be, more or less, women with the perpetrators of the violence found in the soldiers, who happen to be mostly men. Few armies near gender equality.
In the U.S., women amount to less than a quarter of the Armed Forces. Women comprise only about 15% of the active personnel in the Canadian army. Less developed nations or less rich nations with fewer resources and poorer infrastructure, and worse off liberal cultural institutions, will simply lack these similar numbers. Indeed, the draft in many countries will be for men only.
It is a form of anti-egalitarianism. In the areas of concern stipulated here, the personnel involved in international law and human rights awareness deserve recognition for a number of reasons. The base one is of equal respect for the rights of men and women. Another is the prevention of the severity of violence against women through the reduction in military expenditures.
An increase in awareness about their rights as human beings permits women the ability to say, “No,” to violations of them. A war-time context is one such arena in which this could be the case. Other cases include the ways in which the efforts to maintain and respect peace derive back to the Charter of the United Nations in Article I about the construction for international peace and security.
While also bearing in mind, the core problems faced by women in these contexts come in the form of civilian casualties. As the majority of the armies are men, of poor and minority men – which is a problem itself, and the majority of the civilian casualties are women (and children), it becomes the enduring reality of battle and combat.
The resources for peace-keeping and humanitarian aid can provide a context of greater liveability too. The idea of preventing violence against women requires a consideration of the ways in which women’s rights are violated in the first place. One of those happens to be via the acts of war and the disproportionate impacts of women and children as civilians in the context of war.
Peace-keeping efforts and humanitarian aid to women in the environments around war can be an amelioration created by a military expenditure environment in which near $2 trillion is spent per annum. The central core, as always, and emphasized in the final paragraph, enters into the Beijing Declaration in its entirety with violence against women.
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- 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).
- Some general declarations (not individual Declaration or set of them but announcement) included the UN Decade for Women (1976-1985).
- Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (1979) and the Optional Protocol (1999).
- 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), 2242 (2015), and 2467 (2019).
- 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, emphasis on the entirety of the goals with a strong focus on Goal 5
- 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.
- The Spotlight Initiative as another important piece of work, as a joint venture between the European Union and the United Nations.
- February 6, International Day of Zero Tolerance to Female Genital Mutilation is observed.
- February 11, International Day of Women and Girls in Science is observed.
- June 19, Day for the Elimination of Sexual Violence in Conflict is observed.
- June 23, is International Widows’ Day is observed.
- October 11, International Day of the Girl Child is observed.
- October 15, International Day of Rural Women is observed.
- November 25, International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women is observed.
- Gender Inclusive Guidelines, Toolbox, & United Nations System-wide Strategy on Gender Parity.
- Say No, UNiTE, UNiTE to End Violence against Women, Orange the World: #HearMeToo (2018), and the 16 days of activism.
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Photo by Obed Hernández on Unsplash