The UN adopted on Monday a minimum political declaration on the status of women, which tries to preserve threatened gains in several countries without seeking new avenues for progress on gender equality.
This declaration was approved by consensus at the 64th session of the Commission on the Status of Women, reduced to its opening session when it was to last until March 20 and gather 12,000 participants.
"A gaping power gap between the sexes", regrets Guterres
Due to the coronavirus epidemic, UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres had recommended that member states limit themselves to the political declaration, negotiated every five years, and delete general debates and related events, which have been postponed indeterminate.
“Centuries of discrimination, deep-rooted patriarchy and misogyny have created a yawning power gap between the sexes in our economies, political systems and societies. It just has to change, ”said Antonio Guterres at the opening of the meeting.
France to host “Beijing + 25” conference
The adopted text takes up the main lines of the Beijing Declaration which, in 1995, had led to the emancipation and promotion of women around the world. It set goals for gender equality in various areas, including the economy, the fight against violence, women in power or women and the environment.
France plans to host a UN conference in July called “Beijing + 25”, in order to monitor and develop the gains linked to the status of women for twenty-five years.
Reproductive sexual health and new families who have failed
Their "situation is not at all at the level where it should be after all these years since the meeting in Beijing," said the European Union ambassador to the UN, the Swedish Olof Skoog. "It is not a problem of interest, it is because there is an active political push for a retreat in several countries", he explains to journalists.
In order to avoid failure, the negotiators of the text have deleted any reference to reproductive sexual health, fought for years by the United States, which sees it as an encouragement to abortion, and references relating to the family, interpreted restrictively and conservatively by Russia, Saudi Arabia, Egypt or Algeria, according to diplomats. "The ambition this year was to protect what we have rather than moving files forward," agrees Olof Skoog.
Three-quarters of parliamentarians worldwide are men
The declaration expresses the "concern" of the countries of the UN in the face of "progress which is not fast enough or deep enough", while "in certain areas it is uneven and significant gaps remain". For example, in the political field, notes a diplomat, three parliamentarians out of four in the world are men.
"In some areas, progress towards gender equality has stalled, if not reversed," said Antonio Guterres. “Some countries have overturned laws that protect women from violence; others reduce civic space; still others pursue economic and immigration policies that indirectly discriminate against women. Women's access to sexual and reproductive health services is far from universal. We have to counter the hindsight, ”he said.
Commitments against violence against women
The UN text also recognizes that "25 years after the Beijing Declaration, no country has fully achieved gender equality". "Significant levels of inequality persist globally and many women and girls experience multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination, vulnerability and marginalization throughout their lives," said the UN statement.
In terms of violence against women, brought to the fore by the #MeToo movement, the signatories undertake to "eliminate, prevent and respond to all forms of violence and harmful practices against women and girls ". And this, "in public and private spheres, including via social networks". Likewise, they promise to combat "trafficking in human beings and modern slavery" and to "guarantee access to justice and the provision of support services, including legal, health and social services, to all women victims of violence ”, specifies their statement.
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