Despite the Council's clear stance against sexual violence in conflict, we al...

Despite the Council's clear stance against sexual violence in conflict, we also know about the terrible number of women and girls, men and boys, who continue to be affected by it every day. Sexual violence is not just a grave concern, it is even endemic in many current situations on the Council's daily agenda: the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mali, Afghanistan, Somalia, the Sudan, South Sudan and Syria. In the face of such violence, the international community's strong expectation — it should be their demand — is that the Council will do more. The Council's open debate on 17 April (see S/PV.6948) addressed many of the most compelling issues that we should be dealing with. Today's resolution 2106 (2013) is a further step towards ensuring that sexual violence is addressed across the breadth of our work, but in a very practical, programmatic way. That includes the consistent application of targeted sanctions and eliciting and monitoring commitments from all parties to conflict.