WILPF Int & Sections
WILPF Sweden
This year's spring has meant full activity for us at the WILPF Sweden section. April was initiated with an ATT seminar at the parliament. It was a unique event, since it gathered representatives from government, business and civil society sector. Our Secretary General Petra Tötterman Andorff was one of the panel speakers, and she contributed with a gendered perspective on disarmament issues. She raised the question whether security within the ATT context should be thought of as military or human.
Women, Peace and Disarmament (WPD) day takes places on May 24th – WILPF Sweden will be organizing a reading of the famous play “Seven” which portrays the experiences of seven women's rights activists from different cultural backgrounds. One of the women is Inez McCormack, who has been working with the advancement of women's rights and social justice issues since the early 60's in Northern Ireland. She will be visiting Sweden a week prior to WPD-day. The office will be hosting a dialogue between Inez McCormack and the Swedish author Louise Boije af Gennäs, who will portray the role of McCormack in the reading of “Seven”.
The office is preparing for the political week in Almedalen. It is an annual political gathering that brings politicians and civil society together through seminars, speeches and other political activities. Last year they arranged a seminar between WILPF's Secretary General Madeleine Rees and UNSRSG Margot Wallström, among others. Almedalen week is a very important forum in Swedish politics and the WILPF Sweden section participate in collaboration with several other political actors by organizing “Security Policy Summer Forum”. This year's seminar will focus on armed violence against women. Please click here view the seminar online.
Reaching Critical Will
The Meeting of Government Experts on small arms and light weapons opened Monday, 9 May. Check out the UN official page and keep up with NGO monitoring on RCWs site.
The UN Disarmament Commission 2011 session closed on 21 April without any substantive recommendations. Find out what happened wih the RCW blog. Also check out statements and papers. Reaching Critical Will co-sponsored an event on NATO and nuclear weapons with IKV Pax Christi on 3 May at the Church Center for the United Nations in New York.
From 9 to 13 May 2011, states will gather for the first time in an open-ended meeting of government experts (MGE) to address key implementation challenges and opportunities in the UN small arms process. This particular MGE will focus on the marking and tracing of small arms and light weapons, in accordance with the International Tracing Instrument. Check out the UN official page and keep up with NGO monitoring on RCW's site.
WILPF International