Security Council Resolution 2242

The full text of resolution 2242 (2015) reads as follows:

“The Security Council,

“Reaffirming its commitment to the continuing and full implementation, in a mutually reinforcing manner, of resolutions 1325 (2000), 1820 (2008), 1888 (2009), 1889 (2009), 1960 (2010), 2106 (2013) and 2122 (2013), and all relevant statements of its President,

“Bearing in mind the Purposes and Principles of the Charter of the United Nations and the primary responsibility of the Security Council under the Charter for the maintenance of international peace and security,

“Affirming the primary role of Member States to implement fully the relevant provisions of Security Council resolutions on women, peace and security, and the important complementary role of United Nations entities and regional organizations,

“Recalling the commitments of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action and their twentieth anniversary,welcoming the Global Leaders Meeting on Gender Equality and Empowerment held on 27 September 2015 andcommending the concrete national commitments made by national leaders in connection to this meeting,

“Reaffirming the obligations of States Parties to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and the Optional Protocol thereto and urging States that have not yet done so to consider ratifying or acceding to it, further noting General Recommendation 30 of the Committee for the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women on Women and Conflict Prevention and Post-Conflict Situations,

“Welcoming the report of the Secretary-General of 17 September 2015 (S/2015/716) submitting the results of the Global Study on the implementation of resolution 1325 (2000), recognizing with appreciation all the work undertaken for the Global Study and encouraging close examination of its recommendations,

“Noting the substantial link between women’s meaningful involvement in efforts to prevent, resolve and rebuild from conflict and those efforts’ effectiveness and long-term sustainability, as well as the need for greater resourcing, accountability, political will and attitudinal change,

“Taking note of the Report of the Secretary-General on The Future of United Nations peace operations:  implementation of the recommendations of the High-Level Independent Panel on Peace Operations (S/2015/682) and the Report of the Advisory Group of Experts for the Review of the United Nations Peacebuilding Architecture (S/2015/490), and welcoming the recommendations contained therein relating to Women, Peace and Security, and further urging all actors to consider their implementation,

“Reaffirming the obligations of States and all parties to armed conflict to comply with international humanitarian law and international human rights law, as applicable, and the need to end all violations of international humanitarian law and all violations and abuses of human rights,

“Reaffirming that sexual violence, when used or commissioned as a method or tactic of war or as a part of a widespread or systematic attack against civilian populations, can significantly exacerbate and prolong situations of armed conflict and may impede the restoration of international peace and security,

“Welcoming the emphasis placed on achieving gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls in the recent adoption of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, reaffirming that women’s and girls’ empowerment and gender equality are critical to conflict prevention and broader efforts to maintain international peace and security, noting in this regard the emphasis of the Report of the Independent High-Level Panel on Peace Operations (S/2015/446), the Report of the Advisory Group of Experts for the Review of the United Nations Peacebuilding Architecture (S/2015/490), and the Global Study on the need, inter alia, to invest more in conflict prevention and women’s empowerment, and further emphasizing that persisting barriers to the full implementation of resolution 1325 (2000) will only be dismantled through dedicated commitment to women’s participation and human rights, and through concerted leadership, consistent information and action, and support to build women’s engagement in all levels of decision-making,

“Reiterating the important engagement by men and boys as partners in promoting women’s participation in the prevention and resolution of armed conflict, peacebuilding and post-conflict situations,

“Noting the changing global context of peace and security, in particular relating to rising violent extremism, which can be conducive to terrorism, the increased numbers of refugees and internally displaced persons, the impacts of climate change and the global nature of health pandemics, and in this regard reiterating its intention to increase attention to women, peace and security as a cross-cutting subject in all relevant thematic areas of work on its agenda, including threats to international peace and security caused by terrorist acts,

“Recognizing the differential impact on the human rights of women and girls of terrorism and violent extremism, including in the context of their health, education, and participation in public life, and that they are often directly targeted by terrorist groups, and expressing deep concern that acts of sexual and gender-based violence are known to be part of the strategic objectives and ideology of certain terrorist groups, used as a tactic of terrorism and an instrument to increase their power through supporting financing, recruitment and the destruction of communities, as described in the Secretary-General’s Report on Sexual Violence in Conflict of 23 March 2015 (S/2015/203), and further noting the Global Counter-Terrorism Forum’s good practices on Women and Countering Violent Extremism,

“Recognizing the significance of the 15-year anniversary of resolution 1325 (2000), the progress made, as well as the opportunity and need for far greater implementation of the women, peace and security agenda, remaining deeply concerned by the frequent underrepresentation of women in many formal processes and bodies related to the maintenance of international peace and security, the relatively low number of women in senior positions in political, peace and security-related national, regional and international institutions, the lack of adequate gender-sensitive humanitarian responses and support for women’s leadership roles in these settings, insufficient financing for women, peace and security, and the resulting detrimental impact on the maintenance of international peace and security,

“Recognizing the important contribution of civil society, including women’s organizations, during the last 15 years in the implementation of resolution 1325 (2000),

“Recognizing the new Global Acceleration Instrument on women’s engagement in peace and security and humanitarian affairs, in addition to existing complementary mechanisms, as one avenue to attract resources, coordinate responses and accelerate implementation,

“1.   Urges Member States, in light of the High-Level Review, to assess strategies and resourcing in the implementation of the women, peace and security agenda, reiterates its call for Member States to ensure increased representation of women at all decision-making levels in national, regional and international institutions and mechanisms for the prevention and resolution of conflict, encourages those supporting peace processes to facilitate women’s meaningful inclusion in negotiating parties’ delegations to peace talks, calls upon donor countries to provide financial and technical assistance to women involved in peace processes, including training in mediation, advocacy and technical areas of negotiation, as well as providing support and training to mediators and technical teams on the impact of women’s participation and strategies for women’s effective inclusion, further encourages the meaningful participation of civil society organizations at international and regional peace and security meetings, as appropriate, including donor conferences to help ensure gender considerations are integrated in the development, prioritization, coordination and implementation of policies and programmes, and encourages the hosts of such meetings to give due consideration to facilitating a cross representation of civil society participants;

“2.   Welcomes the efforts of Member States to implement resolution 1325 (2000), including the development of national action plans, further welcomes the increase in national action plans in recent years, and calls uponMember States to further integrate the women, peace and security agenda into their strategic plans such as national actions plans and other planning frameworks, with sufficient resources, including implementation of relevant obligations under international humanitarian law and international human rights law, through broad consultation, including with civil society, in particular women’s organizations, calls upon countries with national action plans to provide an update on the progress made in their implementation and review during the annual Security Council open debates on women, peace and security, further welcomes the efforts of regional organizations to implement resolution 1325 (2000), including through the adoption of regional frameworks, and encourages them to pursue further implementation;

“3.   Encourages Member States to increase their funding on women, peace and security, including through more aid in conflict and post-conflict situations for programmes that further gender equality and women’s empowerment, as well as through support to civil society, and to support countries in armed conflict and post-conflict situations, including through capacity-building, in their implementation of women, peace and security resolutions, calls for increased international development cooperation related to women’s empowerment and gender equality and invites aid providers to track the gender focus of aid contributions;

“4.   Urges the Secretary-General and relevant United Nations entities, including but not limited to the Department for Peacekeeping Operations, the Department for Political Affairs and the Peacebuilding Support Office to redouble their efforts to integrate women’s needs and gender perspectives into their work, including in all policy and planning processes and assessment missions, and in relation to requests made in resolution 2122 (2013), and to address deficits in accountability including through the addition by the Secretary-General of gender targets as an indicator of individual performance in all compacts with senior managers at United Nations Headquarters and in the field, including Special Envoys, Special Representatives of the Secretary-General and Resident and Humanitarian Coordinators, to be used for monitoring and to inform decision-making by the Secretary-General, including for recruiting for future posts, and further encouragescloser working relationships within the United Nations among all those responsible for implementing the women, peace and security agenda, including the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN-Women), taking into account their role on women, peace and security coordination and accountability, and the Secretary-General’s Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict;

“5.   Recognizes the ongoing need for greater integration of resolution 1325 (2000) in its own work in alignment with resolution 2122 (2013), including the need to address challenges linked to the provision of specific information and recommendations on the gender dimensions of situations on the Council’s agenda, to inform and help strengthen the Council’s decisions, and therefore, in addition to elements set out in resolution 2122 (2013), and in accordance with established practice and procedure:

(a)   Expresses its intention to convene meetings of relevant Security Council experts as part of an Informal Experts Group on Women, Peace and Security to facilitate a more systematic approach to Women, Peace and Security within its own work and enable greater oversight and coordination of implementation efforts;

(b)   Decides to integrate women, peace and security concerns across all country specific situations on the Security Council’s agenda, taking into account the specific context of each country, expresses its intention to dedicate periodic Security Council consultations on country situations, as necessary, to the topic of Women, Peace and Security implementation, progress and challenges, and reiterates its intention to ensure Security Council missions take into account gender considerations and the rights of women, including through consultation with local and international women’s groups;

(c)   Expresses its intention to invite civil society, including women’s organizations, to brief the Council in country-specific considerations and relevant thematic areas, as well as the Under-Secretary-General/Executive Director of UN-Women and the Under-Secretary-General/Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict to brief more regularly on country situations and relevant thematic areas of work on its agenda including on matters of urgency for women and girls in conflict and crisis;

“6.   Expresses its intention, when adopting or renewing targeted sanctions in situations of armed conflict, to consider designating, as appropriate, those actors, including those in terrorist groups, engaged in violations of international humanitarian law and violations and abuses of human rights, including sexual and gender-based violence, forced disappearances and forced displacement, and commits to ensuring that the relevant expert groups for sanctions committees have the necessary gender expertise;

“7.   Urges the Department of Peacekeeping Operations and Department of Political Affairs to ensure the necessary gender analysis and technical gender expertise is included throughout all stages of mission planning, mandate development, implementation, review and mission drawdown, ensuring the needs and participation of women are integrated in all sequenced stages of mission mandates, welcomes the commitment of the Secretary-General that Senior Gender Advisers will be located in the offices of his Special Representatives, calls for senior gender advisers and other gender officer posts to be budgeted for and speedily recruited where appointed in special political missions and multidimensional peacekeeping operations, and encourages greater cooperation between the Department of Peacekeeping Operations, Department of Political Affairs and UN-Women to enable more gender-responsive United Nations peacekeeping operations and special political missions, including through providing field-based gender advisers and other missions’ sectors with full access to the policy, substantive and technical support of these entities on the implementation of resolution 1325 (2000) and successive resolutions, making full use of respective comparative advantages;

“8.   Welcomes the Secretary-General’s commitment to prioritize the appointment of more women in senior United Nations leadership positions, bearing in mind a cross-geographical representation and in accordance with existing relevant rules and regulations governing administrative and budgetary issues, and encourages him to review the obstacles preventing women’s recruitment and professional advancement, further welcomesefforts to incentivize greater numbers of women in militaries and police deployed to United Nations peacekeeping operations, and calls upon the Secretary-General to initiate, in collaboration with Member States, a revised strategy, within existing resources, to double the numbers of women in military and police contingents of UN peacekeeping operations over the next five years;

“9.   Expresses deep concern over continuing allegations of sexual exploitation and abuse by United Nations peacekeepers and non-United Nations forces, including military, civilian and police personnel, urges police- and troop-contributing countries to provide robust predeployment training on sexual exploitation and abuse and vetting of their peacekeeping personnel, to conduct swift and thorough investigations of their uniformed personnel, and if appropriate, to prosecute, and to inform the United Nations in a timely manner of the status and outcome of investigations, calls upon the United Nations to cooperate as appropriate and in a timely manner with national authorities, including courts responsible for investigating such allegations, when requested for that purpose, and requests United Nations troop- and police-contributing country meetings to address sexual exploitation and abuse whenever relevant and the United Nations Military Staff Committee to discuss these issues as part of its regular programme;

“10.  Welcomes the Secretary-General’s continued efforts at implementing his policy of zero tolerance of misconduct, in particular the wide-ranging proposals on prevention, enforcement and remedial action which promote greater accountability, including his commitment to bring to public light misconduct by United Nations personnel, as well as his proposal to keep the Security Council informed of developments regarding implementation of his zero-tolerance policy on sexual exploitation and abuse, and his decision that all countries repeatedly listed in the annexes of his reports on Children and Armed Conflict and Sexual Violence in Conflict are prohibited from participating in United Nations peacekeeping operations, and urges those troop- and police-contributing countries that are currently listed to cease such violations and implement actions plans expeditiously, thereby avoiding suspension from peace operations, further requests the Secretary-General to include a section on conduct and discipline including, whenever relevant, adherence to his zero-tolerance policy on sexual exploitation and abuse, in all his reports on country-specific situations to the Security Council;

“11.  Calls for the greater integration by Member States and the United Nations of their agendas on women, peace and security, counter-terrorism and countering-violent extremism which can be conducive to terrorism,requests the Counter-Terrorism Committee and the Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate to integrate gender as a cross-cutting issue throughout the activities within their respective mandates, including within country-specific assessments and reports, recommendations made to Member States, facilitating technical assistance to Member States and briefings to the Council, encourages the Counter-Terrorism Committee and Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate to hold further consultations with women and women’s organizations to help inform their work, and further encourages the Counter-Terrorism Implementation Task Force to take the same approach in activities within its mandate;

“12.  Urges Member States and requests relevant United Nations entities, including the Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate, within its existing mandate, and in collaboration with UN-Women, to conduct and gather gender-sensitive research and data collection on the drivers of radicalization for women, and the impacts of counter-terrorism strategies on women’s human rights and women’s organizations, in order to develop targeted and evidence-based policy and programming responses, and to ensure United Nations monitoring and assessment mechanisms and processes mandated to prevent and respond to violent extremism, which can be conducive to terrorism, have the necessary gender expertise to fulfil their mandates, including relevant sanctions experts groups and bodies established to conduct fact finding and criminal investigations;

“13.  Urges Member States and the United Nations system to ensure the participation and leadership of women and women’s organizations in developing strategies to counter terrorism and violent extremism which can be conducive to terrorism, including through countering incitement to commit terrorist acts, creating counter narratives and other appropriate interventions, and building their capacity to do so effectively, and further to address, including by the empowerment of women, youth, religious and cultural leaders, the conditions conducive to the spread of terrorism and violent extremism which can be conducive to terrorism, consistent with the United Nations Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy (A/RES/60/288), welcomes the increasing focus on inclusive upstream prevention efforts and encourages the forthcoming Secretary-General’s Plan of Action to Prevent Violent Extremism to integrate women’s participation, leadership and empowerment as core to the United Nation’s strategy and responses, calls for adequate financing in this regard and for an increased amount, within the funding of the UN for counter-terrorism and countering violent extremism which can be conducive to terrorism, to be committed to projects which address gender dimensions including women’s empowerment;

“14.  Urges Member States to strengthen access to justice for women in conflict and post-conflict situations, including through the prompt investigation, prosecution and punishment of perpetrators of sexual and gender based violence, as well as reparation for victims as appropriate, notes that the fight against impunity for the most serious crimes of international concern committed against women and girls has been strengthened through the work of the International Criminal Court, ad hoc and mixed tribunals, as well as specialized chambers in national tribunals and reiterates its intention to continue forcefully to fight impunity and uphold accountability with appropriate means;

“15.  Encourages empowering women, including through capacity-building efforts, as appropriate, to participate in the design and implementation of efforts related to the prevention, combating and eradication of the illicit transfer, and the destabilizing accumulation and misuse of small arms and light weapons, and calls uponMember States, United Nations entities, intergovernmental, regional and subregional organizations to take into consideration the specific impact of conflict and post-conflict environments on women’s and girls’ security, mobility, education, economic activity and opportunities, to mitigate the risk of women from becoming active players in the illicit transfer of small arms and light weapons;

“16.  Calls upon Member States, the United Nations, and other relevant actors to ensure due consideration is given to the Women, Peace and Security agenda in the process and outcome of the World Humanitarian Summit in Istanbul, Turkey, in 2016, further recognizes the importance of integrating gender considerations across humanitarian programming by seeking to ensure the provision of access to protection and the full range of medical, legal and psychosocial and livelihood services, without discrimination, and through ensuring women and women’s groups can participate meaningfully and are supported to be leaders in humanitarian action, and urges the Secretary-General to strengthen leadership and political will at all levels on this issue and ensure accountability to existing humanitarian frameworks related to women’s empowerment and gender equality which contribute to the implementation of the women, peace and security agenda;

“17.  Invites the Secretary-General in his next annual report on the implementation of resolution 1325 (2000) to submit information on progress made to follow up on the High-Level Review including the recommendations highlighted in the Secretary-General’s report on the Global Study and new commitments made as part of the High-Level Review, as well as appropriate monitoring and evaluation arrangements for the UN system, and to make this available to all Member States;

“18.  Decides to remain actively seized of the matter.”