Egypt
At the outset, allow me to express our appreciation for your invitation to co...
At the outset, allow me to express our appreciation for your invitation to convene this ministerial meeting of the Security Council on this important occasion. Our appreciation also goes to the Secretary General for his important report on the steps and measures taken to implement resolution 1325, as well as to the role played by the United Nations machinery, including in both the Security Council and the General Assembly and to all UN Member States taking effective steps in that regard. We express our appreciation to the briefings we heard at the beginning of the Council's meeting today.
This year we are commemorating 10 years of the adoption of Security Council R...
This year we are commemorating 10 years of the adoption of Security Council Resolution 1325 on women, peace and security, which represented, and still represents, the responsibility of the international community to ensure and protect and advance women's rights in conflict, post-conflict situations and in peace processes.
Egypt has been always supportive to 1325 and to its full implementation. It p...
Egypt has been always supportive to 1325 and to its full implementation. It played a historical role to ensure the protection of women in armed conflict situations. Egypt was even among a number of states who contributed in the formulation of "The Declaration on the Protection of Women and Children in Emergency and Armed Conflict" adopted by the General Assembly resolution 3318 (XXIX) as early as 14 December 1974. Unfortunately, this important declaration has never been taken into consideration or referred to, neither in resolution 1325 nor in any of its subsequent relevant Security Council Resolutions and statements. The declaration condemned and prohibited all attacks and bombings on the civilian populations, particularly women and children, thus planting the early seeds for effective dealing with women's issues through Security Council resolution 1325 and beyond.
A strong and sustained campaIgn is led by the Suzanne Mubarak International M...
A strong and sustained campaIgn is led by the Suzanne Mubarak International Movement of Women for Peace to support fostering
international and regional actions to overcome the dangers to which women are exposed in situations of armed conflicts and post conflict situations and to ensure gender equality and empowerment of women. The movement organized a series of regional and international seminars and workshops, with the support of UN entities, in order to effectively implement national action plans to implement 1325, with a special focus on promoting a culture of peace and enhancing women's role in peace-making, peace-building and post conflict peace-building. Among these significant events, the international forum entitled "Towards Enforcing Security Council Resolution 1325" was held in Cairo in 2006 where very practical recommendations were approved. Egypt will continue to support Security Council resolution 1325 and will host an international conference on the implementation of 1325 in November this year in parallel to its efforts to solidify and enhance UN WOMEN as the only organ in the United Nations that could be qualified to consider and propose indicators and bench marks to be applied on all member states following their consideration and approval in the General Assembly.
The Secretary General's report presented upon request of the Security Council...
The Secretary General's report presented upon request of the Security Council a set of proposed indicators to track the implementation of the resolution. These indicators -if approved-should only apply to the situation of women in conflict and post-conflict situations. Generalizing these indicators and attempting to impose them to serve as a common basis for reporting by member states of the organization, UN agencies and institutions require thorough consideration and approval by the General Assembly of the advisability of this step, as well as of the validity of each and every indicator and the methods followed by the secretariat to overcome the difficulties and differences in formulating these indicators, which were reported by the Secretary General in his report last year on the implementation of this important resolution (S/2009/465).
Moreover, Egypt strongly believes that any attempt to extend the scope of ap...
Moreover, Egypt strongly believes that any attempt to extend the scope of application of the proposed indicators beyond conflict and post conflict situations, or any attempts to provide a wider defmition for conflict and postconflict situations will be a clear encroachment from the Security Council on the competence of the General Assembly, and would affect negatively the mandate, competence and effectiveness of UN WOMEN, the entity that we all struggled to create to deal effectively with promotion and protection of all women around the world through ensuring gender equality and empowerment of women all around the globe. It will also cause clear duplication to the work and activities by international legally binding instruments such as CEDAW, and contradicts other significant documents and instruments, including Programme of Action of the United Nations International Conference on Population & Development (Cairo, 1994) and Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action (1995) and many other documents I trust that the Security Council supports its activities, and we look forward to the continued cooperation and coordination between the Security Council and the General Assembly dealing with this issue.