A Mediator's Perspective: Women and the Nepali Peace Process

Women's roles in Nepali society and the core issues of the Nepali peace are an expression of the active political role Nepali women started to play – in particular in the wake of the “people's movement” of 1990-92 (janaa andolan I) and April 2006 (janaa andolan II). Women activists were not satisfied with being politically marginalised. Instead, they requested a seat at the peace table
to defend their own rights, to get first hand information about the conditions to end the war, to shed light on problems, to open up the close circle of men who represented the conflict parties, to articulate their own perspectives, and to define their own future in a new Nepali society – in particular with regard to the constitution making process. All this together makes Nepal a particularly interesting case for studying the participation of women in a peace process in the last five years.