Peacekeeping

The Peacekeeping theme focuses on a gendered approach to multi-dimensional peacekeeping missions, predominantly through gender mainstreaming of peace support operations and the increase of female recruitment in peacekeeping, military, and police.

The Security Council calls for an increase in the number of women in peacekeeping operations (1325,OP6).

It is also important to note that the issues of gender and peacekeeping should never be reduced to the number of women recruited as peacekeepers. Promoting security is about providing real human security for the population, not about the militarisation of women. The point is not to achieve gender parity for its own sake, but rather to draw on the unique and powerful contribution women can make to peacekeeping.

The Security Council commits to include a gender component in UN field operations (1325,OP5), and requests that the Secretary-General’s reports to include information on the progress of gender mainstreaming within each operation (1325,OP17). Without a gender perspective, it is almost impossible to adequately create an inclusive security, which forms the basis of promoting sustainable and durable peace. Gender training, pre-deployment, on the ground, and post-deployment is effective for ensuring peacekeeping personnel have sufficient knowledge and skills.

Peacekeeping missions are increasingly being mandated to address sexual violence (1960,OP10), and training can increase the prevention, recognition, and response to sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) and sexual exploitation and abuse (1820,OP6). The implementation of the Women, Peace and Security agenda varies greatly among Peacekeeping Operations. This variation is a result of the peacekeeping mission’s mandates and also structure, leadership, funding, whether there is a designation of a separate unit to address gender, and the number of gender advisors. These key gaps were highlighted in DPKO’s Ten-Year Impact Study on Implementation of Resolution 1325 in Peacekeeping.


These measures can trigger positive changes for women within conflict and post-conflict situations, such as increased physical security, employment-related benefits, capacity building for local women’s organisations, and increased awareness of women’s rights. Additionally, positive role models and examples of women’s leadership have a positive effect on the environment and contribute to the success of peacekeeping missions.

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MIDDLE EAST: Aspirations of Women

Aside from ushering in hitherto unprecedented changes, the Arab Spring also brought to the fore an unsaid aspect — that the situation of women in Arab countries is more or less the same. In Tunisia, Egypt and Syria, or in some other countries that saw revolutions, the women do not differ from each other.

SYRIA: Syrian activists say women must not be sidelined at peace talks

GENEVA - Syrian activists said Monday that the voice of women from the war-ravaged nation must not be sidelined at peace talks due to start next week in Switzerland.

"We have to take part in the whole process, from A to Z," Syrian Women's League member Sabah Alhallak told reporters in Geneva.

EL SALVADOR: Corrected-Can Women Boost El Salvador's Fragile Gang Truce?

With El Salvador's gang truce teetering on the brink, it's high time to get women involved in any peace negotiations between rival gangs - a move that could help the truce last and protect women's rights, experts say.

El Salvador's two most infamous street gangs - the Mara Salvatrucha, or MS-13, and rival Barrio 18 signed a truce in March 2012, which helped to lower murder rates in one of the world's most violent countries.

INTERNATIONAL: Women Need to Be Included in Syria's Peace Process

Next month in Geneva, rebels will sit down to talk to representatives of President Bashar al-Assad's government about a peace plan to end Syria's civil war -- a conflict that has killed over 100,000 people since 2011 and driven a third of the population from their homes. In the room alongside the rebels and government officials will be a whole slew of negotiators from various Western countries and Russia.

KOSOVO & AFGHANISTAN: Efforts to Develop a Gender Perspective in NATO-Led Operations Get Mixed Review

A searching independent review finds that NATO and its operational partners have made ‘significant progress' in implementing United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 in NATO-led operations in Afghanistan and Kosovo – but says there is ‘ample room for improvement'.

INTERNATIONAL: End Sexual Violence In War Zones

Half a million women were raped during the Rwandan genocide. As many as 64,000 suffered sexual violence during Sierra Leone's brutal blood diamond fueled civil war. And 40,000 were raped in Bosnia. The sheer magnitude of women raped and the frequency of the crime tells us something. These attackers aim to do more than rape. They seek to shame and demoralize, break down the fabric of victim communities, and stigmatize survivors for life.

New Research on Gender, Peace, and Security and the Implementation of UNSCR 1325

The journal International Interactions has just published a special issue titled "A Systematic Understanding of Gender, Peace, and Security—Implementing UNSCR 1325", edited by Louise Olsson (Folke Bernadotte Academy) and Theodora-Ismene Gizelis (Unversity of Essex), and with contributions from PRIO-affiliated researchers.

LIBERIA/INDIA: Indian Women Peacekeepers Inspire Liberian Women

New Delhi, Sep 12 (IANS): An all-women police unit provided by India, as part of a UN peacekeeping force, inspired many Liberian women to join the West African nation's police and security services.

NIGERIA: Nigeria Launches UN's Action Plan on Women, Peace, Security

NIGERIA is set to launch national action plan for full implementation of the United Nations' Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1325 on women, peace and security.

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