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5.Newsletter April 2015 Service en UN Comité Area 06 D27 Regina Smit Newsletter March -April 2015 ________________________________________________________________ Zonta International is a leading global organization of professionals empowering women worldwide through service and advocacy __________________________________________________________________________ What happened in NEW YORK? UN Commission on the Status of Women CSW and NGO – CSW Update March 9 to 20, 2015 New York As an International NGO Zonta International brings women’s concerns to the United Nations. Dear Zontians, This Service and UN Newsletter contains the latest update about the 59th CSW and the review about the Beijing+20. More than 50 Zontians from al over the world attended the CSW in New York. I wish you pleasant reading. Regina Smit Service and UN committee Area 06 District 27 ___________________________________________________________________________________ The Commission on the Status of Women, 9 to 20 March 2015 How to travel from A to B? UN Building Zontians from Sweden, Belgium, Oregon and New York US ZI President Maria Jose Landera Oestergard March 7 2015, ZONTA Introduction Meeting, in the US Fund for UNICEF offices in Maiden Lane NY The Zonta UN Committee hosted the first CSW orientation for all interested Zontians. Leslie Wright, ZI UN Committee chairman, explained the difference between CSW and NGO CSW. The CSW is the annual Commission on the Status of Women for Governments! The NGO CSW is the committee for NGO’s in consultatieve relationship with the UN! The 20th anniversary of Beijing is an opportunity to re-examine the Platform for Action and determine the gaps and progress made on each of the critical areas of concern. What is the program for Zonta in the NGO CSW? Side events, Zonta -UN reception, Zonta dinner on March 12, a ticket event. Introductionmeeting in the UN office Maiden Lane NY __________________________________________________________________________________ March 8, “Celebrate the Feminist and Women’s Movements 1975-2015” NGO CSW at the Consultation Day and the March to Times Square. Consultation Day The purpose of NGO CSW Forum Consultation Day is to set the stage for the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) meetings and facilitate interactions between participants. The location for the day was the Apollo Theater The Apollo Theater is in the Harlem neighbourhood of Manhattan, New York City, it is a music hall which is a noted venue for African-American performers, famous are/were Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington and more. This year was the review of the 4 Women World conferences Mexico, Nairobi, Copenhage and Beijing with panel discussions and photo’s. Keynote speakers at the Consultation Day: Phumzile Miambo-Ngcuka, Under Secretary and Executive Director of UN Women Ruchira Gupta, winner of the NGO CSW Distinction Award and winner of a Clinton Global Citizen award. Ruchira Gupta, is an Indian sex trafficking abolitionist, journalist and activist. She has worked for over 25 years to end sex trafficking and has been honored for her work by nations, governmental leaders, and organizations on a global scale. Ruchira Gupta The Women’s March to Times Square Speeches and Entertainment at Times Square about Gender Equality, Equal Rights for Women and Man Times Square, Zonta members and European Women Lobby ____________________________________________________________________________________________________ On March 9, 2015,The official opening of the CSW by General Secretary Mr Ban Ki-moon at UN Head Quarters in the General Assembly Hall ____________________________________________________________________________________________________ Women’s Voices Shut Out of UN Political Declaration on Women’s Rights UN Member States adopted a Political Declaration on the 20th anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women after several months of closed-door negotiations, in which women’s groups were largely excluded. Nearly 1,000 women’s rights and feminist organizations worldwide have issued a statement decrying the lack of transparency in this process. Historically, the Commission on the Status of Women has adopted declarations or “agreed conclusions” after a two-week session that includes robust civil society participation. In fact, engagement of civil society and women’s groups was critical in securing a bold and progressive declaration in 1995 to promote gender equality and the human rights of women and girls. The groups say that the Political Declaration adopted does not go far enough in committing to the transformative agenda that is needed to achieve gender equality. At this moment in history, women and girls face extraordinary and unprecedented challenges, including rising fundamentalisms, violent extremism, increased number of displaced persons, climate change, and increasing inequalities within and between countries, among others. The evidence is clear: women and girls suffer the disproportionate impact of these challenges and without real commitment and resources to address them, gender equality and the full realization of the human rights of women and girls is a pipe dream. Bold leadership by governments is needed now more than ever. Moving forward, governments must ensure that efforts to realize gender equality, empowerment, and the human rights of all women and girls is critical to sustainable development. None of the three pillars of sustainable development – economic, social or environmental – can be achieved without the full participation of women and girls and without all of their human rights being fulfilled. Stock exchanges ring their opening bells for gender equality on March 9, 2015 In celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing and International Women’s Day, stock exchanges from around the world joined UN Women, the UN Global Compact and the Sustainable Stock Exchanges Initiative in supporting gender equality and highlighting the pivotal role of the private sector in empowering women. Zonta Side Events Zonta International supports the UN Projects. Zonta International is the biggest donor for the UN! The projects from Zonta International in 2014-2016: • Eliminating Obstetric Fistula in Liberia in partnership with UNFPA • HIV-Free Generation in Rwanda in partnership with US Fund for UNICEF • Gender Responsive Schools in Vietnam in partnership with UN Trust Fund • Delaying Early Marriage in Niger in partnership with UNFPA • Voices Against Violence in 12 Countries in partnership with UN Women Related on the Zonta projects side events has been organized during the NGO CSW: - Make the invisible Visible: Partnering to End Violence Against Women and Children in Rwanda with US Fund for UNICEF. First HIV free generation, Improved prevention and care of HIV, Strenghened national capacity for HIV positive patients, Improved services for victims of violence, Empowerd women and girls to protect and claim their rights. The US Fund for Unicef works in this project since 2008. - Elimination of Harmful Practices against Women and Girls by 2030: What are the linkages, dynamics and drivers of son preference and prenatal sex selection, female genital mutilation and child, early and forced marriage? March 9, side event with Unicef, left in the middle ZI PresidentMaria Jose Landera Oestergard - Voices Against Violence in 12 Countries in Partnership with UN Women and WAGGGS. What do we know about WAGGGS and about the project in 12 countries? What is WAGGGS (World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts)? Nicola Grinstead is Chair of the World Board of the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts, a global movement of 10 million girls and young women in 146 countries, dedicated to supporting girls and young women to reach their full potential. In this op-ed, she emphasizes the importance of life-long learning, non-formal and self-directed education and engaging girls and boys to eradicate gender-based violence. The global community, a vast majority of national societies and experts from multiple disciplines are more aligned on the beneficial and transformative effect of education on the lives of individuals and their communities than almost any other intervention. For those people subject to the crippling effect of inequality, education is touted as the panacea, lifting them out of poverty, away from high mortality rates and saving them from violence. She said: I am part of this consensus. But, and this is a big but, what we mean by education and its practical application on the ground needs to be reassessed, refocused and redefined. Reassessed because what doesn’t enjoy the same overarching consensus as the power of education is the need for education, and the investment in it, to be about more than access to primary school. It is about continuing into secondary school and beyond. To be truly transformative, to reach the hardest to reach, to make sure we support those adults who have never had an education and have already fallen through the cracks, education must be about life-long learning. Refocused because education is not simply about mathematics and literacy. It must also initiate students - to use the jargon of global development – into “21st century skills.” That means things such as citizenship, leadership, confidence and self- esteem. And it must address the challenges people face in the 21st century, for example the issue of body confidence for girls. Redefined because although the UNESCO definition of education encapsulates three key pillars – formal, non-formal and informal – formal
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