CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY

The Harri Holkeri Lecture “Reflections on women and peacebuilding” by President The Queen's University, 9.5.2017

Ladies and Gentlemen, Excellencies, Distinguished participants,

It is a wonderful pleasure to be here at the Queen’s University in Belfast. Thank you very much for the invitation. I am honored to have this opportunity to speak as part of the Harri Holkeri Lecture series.

I have great memories from visiting Northern-Ireland when I was young. I have always also appreciated much the friendship between Finland and the Britain and Ireland. For example in the EU context both countries have been very helpful since we joined the Union in 1995.

I have a lot of respect for our late Prime Minister Harri Holkeri. He was a pragmatic politician who built bridges across political party lines. The coalition government he led was actually the government in which I held my fist ministerial posts first as Minister of Social Affairs and later as Minister of Justice. I am sure that his personal characteristics also played a role here in Northern Ireland as he helped to shepherd the talks that led to the historic 1998 peace agreement.

When Mr. Holkeri served as the President of the General Assembly in 2000- 2001, I had been elected for my first term as President of the Republic of Finland. As that period coincided with the Millennium celebrations, I had the honor of co-chairing the at the UN in September 2000. It was a memorable and very special assignment that later led me to being involved actively with the United Nations.

During my time as President of the Republic I co-chaired the ILO’s World Commission on the Social Dimension of Globalization (2002-2004) and the UN Panel on Global Sustainability (2010-2012). Since I left office I have continued to work particularly with the UN, but also with many other international organizations and networks. My main focus has been on sustainable development, gender equality, health and human rights and issues of social justice.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

The optimistic atmosphere of the turn of the millennium has somewhat faded. Our societies seem more divided than before. There is an increasing number of people and popular politicians that want their countries to turn inward and be more protective of their self-interests even at the expense of others. The dissatisfaction that has been growing under the surface has come to light. Democratic elections bring results that were not necessarily anticipated.

Globalization has brought a lot of good during the last decades, but it has also brought problems and affected people negatively. However, globalization is here to stay and expand. There is a serious need to address the problems caused by change that is at times too rapid. The questions asked are usually not wrong, the answers unfortunately sometimes are. This time of uncertainty is both the reason and a consequence of the contradictions and inequalities that we have not been able to solve. It is somewhat paradoxical as we have advanced so much in so many sectors. There is plenty of science and knowledge and resources to do better. The importance of openness and cooperation is increasingly necessary in our world. Our most pressing problems and threats cannot be solved by individual countries and politics of withdrawal. The problems are complex and challenging, and so are the solutions, but they are not impossible.

Now this is anyhow the world in which we live in. It is the world in which we have to build the foundations for the future. On that path the adoption of the Sustainable Development Agenda 2030 and the Sustainable Development Goals at the United Nations in September 2015 was a remarkable moment. All nations came together to agree on a new holistic framework which aims for a more prosperous, socially just and ecologically sustainable future for our planet. That brought a lot of hope. It is a framework that now guides the work of the global community despite the tensions and some forces that draw us a part.

Implementing the Sustainable Development Agenda will succeed if we are ready to use resources wisely and work together. We know what to do. Now it is a matter of political will. Sustainable development is about and it directly contributes to the fight against climate change, degrading environment, loss of biodiversity, desertification, the roots causes of uncontrolled migration, prolonged conflicts, unemployment, lack of opportunity and the many inequalities that exist in our world.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

During the years that I have followed and worked with global development issues, including conflict resolution and peace building, maybe the one most transformative new realization has been an understanding of how gender inequalities affect our societies and the opportunities for development. The role and status of women and girls is absolutely the key to a sustainable future be it at the global or very local level, or there in between.

Wherever we look, women and girls are at a disadvantaged position – be it in the aftermath of disasters, armed conflicts, education sector, access to health care, the labor market or property law. Gender disparities are not a matter of opinion, but hard facts. Social and cultural norms and stereotypes have kept women from reaching an equal standing with men and boys.

We have come to understand that sustainable development is not possible without gender equality. It is a human rights question, a moral question, but also a question of smart economics and a good development strategy. It was at the Rio+20 Summit where we said that we have overused our natural resources, but underused the human potential of especially women – but also the poor and the youth.

Now let’s turn to some reflections on gender and peace,

Unfortunately crises and armed conflicts in the world are not disappearing. The nature of conflicts has changed and crises are prolonged. In many regions, crisis management and crisis resolution attempts last from one decade to another. Again here, the role women can play is not fully understood or used for the benefit of peace.

2

Women and girls suffer disproportionately during and after war. Women are particularly vulnerable, not because of their gender, but because of social, political, cultural and economic factors. As women are more likely to suffer from poverty, exclusion and discrimination during times of peace, they are even more likely to suffer during armed conflict. In my work as UN Global Champion for Disaster Risk Reduction I have come across the statistic many times, that women and children are 14 times more likely to die during and after natural disasters than men. Wars are disasters, and the non-combatant deaths are also disproportionate.

Wars have always been violent, but civil wars are especially harmful to the civilian population. Today the acts of war are more and more targeted at civilians. The purpose of those atrocities is to hurt and degrade the population as a whole. The most vulnerable targets are sought – women and children. The war in Syria is a terrible example.

People living very far from the scenes of war are also increasingly targeted through terrorist attacks. Unpredictability of where and when and how terror is committed threatens the feeling of security of everyone. The usage of women and children as weapons of war tells its own terrible story about how civilians are being used in wars.

During armed conflict, women and girls are particularly vulnerable to sexual violence and exploitation. Although sexual crimes are also targeted at men, the effects on women are different and longer, not just in terms of health, but also in social consequences. Because women are able to give birth to a child conceived from rape and bear responsibility for this child, it also demands more from families and communities in dealing with post-crisis traumas. Due to the changed nature of armed conflicts, the rehabilitation of victims is an ever more demanding task in economic, social and cultural terms.

In this context I should also mention the importance of Sexual and Reproductive Health and Rights as crises and conflicts considerably worsen the situation of women and girls. SRHR lies at the core of everybody’s opportunity to chart their own lives and to have control over the most personal decisions of their lives: about sexuality, health, relationships, love, marriage and childbearing. If people cannot decide for themselves on their most private matters, how could we expect them to be able to take broader responsibility for their communities and the rebuilding of societies?

I have worked with SRHR and with broader health issues as a member of the Steering Committee of the Every Woman Every Child movement. I am also the co-chair of the Health and Human Rights Working Group set up by the WHO and the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights. The report of our working group with key recommendations will be published during the World Health Assembly on the 22nd of May and later in connection with the Human Rights Council in June. Health is not just about physical health – it is about the overall wellbeing of people. It is about human rights, and also about economic prosperity and eventually the security of nations.

One aspect that we should also keep in mind is that men and boys need to be kept involved in our work to fight gender inequality. It is important to allow boys and men to have new types of role models and chances in life to pursue careers, lifestyles and family roles that lead to greater sharing and equality in life and change attitudes and social norms. In fact, the HeForShe campaign launched by UN Women has been a very successful campaign in getting men also involved in the work to promote gender equality.

3

Women are also experts on how to survive during and rebuild after conflicts. Countries recovering from conflict face enormous challenges in recovery and reconstruction. Despite a general recognition that women and men need to be equal partners in these processes, and that inclusiveness sustains peace, peacebuilding remains largely dominated by men.

When men wage war, women work at the home front with everyday tasks. In fact women are often very determined and courageous and they are able to find very smart ways of coping with the difficulties they face when being alone the head of a household and taking care of children, the sick and the elderly, often working and taking part in community life. Women are the ones struggling to provide food, water and fuel for their families. Women also greatly influence the attitudes and behaviors of their children and grandchildren. Their expertise is very much needed during the planning and execution of rebuilding.

To enhance women’s well-being, planning must be attuned to the complexity of social relations and gender issues. For instance, women’s inability to access services after conflicts often stems both from physical insecurity and social norms depriving them of equal opportunities. All too often, however, plans fail to account for the range of women’s needs, whether in terms of policies, programs or resources.

There is much evidence that large-scale investment in women’s economic empowerment generates immediate and long-term social benefits, including in post-conflict situations. Compared to men, women tend to spend much more of their income on family and community well-being. Typically, however, they are marginalized from employment programs and other recovery opportunities. This occurs despite the rise in female-headed households during and after conflict.

Women need equal access to resources, technologies, education and training. Women are powerful actors if their rights are respected and if they are fully empowered to also participate in policy-making. One major obstacle to women's empowerment which should be also mentioned here is their access to, use of and control over land. Women produce a great share of the world’s food, but own only a fraction of all agricultural land.

This would contribute directly also to overall food security and the restoration of arable land as has been evident in my work as UN Drylands Ambassador. I have worked much together with Monique Barbut, who is the Executive Secretary of the UN Convention to Combat Desertification. She has pointed out that almost 100% of the immigrants and refugees arriving to Europe come from dry areas or areas in threat of degrading.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

Peace operations need women. The importance of including women and gender perspectives in the planning and implementation of peace operations is increasingly recognized. However, many critical gaps remain, both at the local and international level. Women are still significantly underrepresented in most areas of UN peace operations, in peace negotiations and in national governance, particularly at senior levels. Women’s issues are still often given low priority and inadequate support. The percentage of UN field missions headed by women has varied between 15 and 25 per cent since 2011. Women composed only 3 per cent of UN military peacekeepers in 2016.

4

The full implementation of the UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on women, peace and security and the subsequent resolutions adopted later to support it, is essential. The historic resolution called on all actors involved in peace negotiations, peacekeeping and peace- building to adopt a gender perspective that included the special needs of women and girls during repatriation and resettlement, rehabilitation, reintegration and post-conflict reconstruction.

Reaffirming the important role of women in the prevention and resolution of conflicts, the resolution also supported measures to promote local women's peace initiatives and indigenous processes for conflict resolution. It also supported measures to ensure the human rights of women and girls in conflict situations, as well as in the post-conflict development of constitutions, electoral systems, police and judiciary.

The normative basis of the “Women, peace and security” agenda is strong and we need to keep up the momentum, strengthen our commitment and press for more results. But normative basis is of course only as strong as its implementation.

One aspect that is particularly problematic is the lack of women in peace talks. The most cost-effective way to work for peace is to engage in preventing conflicts through diplomacy and negotiations. Yet formal peace and mediation processes lag behind in effectively engaging and meaningfully involving women, whether as parties to a conflict or as members of the teams facilitating and leading peace processes. Too often, the presence of women remains at best symbolic. For example, women made up just 2 percent of mediators and 9 percent of negotiators in official peace talks between 1992 and 2011.

Stronger implementation requires at least two elements: skills and tools required for better inclusion of women as well as support for the concrete implementation of the “Women, peace and security” agenda. If peace is only negotiated by men, the injustices experienced by women and children can easily be overlooked. Women - especially local women - must be included in drafting the terms of peace and reconstruction. They know in practice how the society works in times of peace and war.

A growing body of research shows that more inclusive processes result in better, more inclusive and more durable peace agreements. Agreements that are more inclusive tend to be more sustainable; less likely to collapse within five years of their signing. This is an important finding, given that roughly half of all peace agreements do collapse within five years.

Nordic countries have strong experience in mediation efforts, both operational and normative work. We remain interested in gender and mediation overall, with specific attention to the gap in women appointed as mediators. Referring to the lack of competent women can no longer be a valid excuse for all-men mediation teams. A Nordic network of women mediators aims to reach out to actors engaged in peace processes, transitional processes and post-political settlement processes. Interacting with other similar women’s networks – such as in Africa - is an important component of this work.

Finland’s former President is a well-known mediator. He established an organization – The Crisis Management Initiative – which has grown to a become a respected player in the field. and Helena Ranta are also known and praised for their work in Kosovo and many many other countries. Pekka Haavisto is very active and appreciated for his work in Darfur and the Horn of Africa, and he serves currently as the representative for

5

peace mediation of our Foreign Minister. There is thus a lot of expertise to be found – both men and women.

Women's participation in the military components of peace operations has also been recognized as a critical factor contributing to mission success. This is a view also shared by commanders on the ground. Women broaden the range of skills and capacities among personnel, enhance the effectiveness of all tasks, and improve the mission's image, accessibility and credibility in relation to the local population.

The UN has set an objective to increase the number of women officers serving in missions. Member states are also asked to ensure that all their training is gender-sensitive and where necessary includes training to advance specific skills of women officers. Every peacekeeping mission should have the ability to engage with women as well as men in mission areas.

Various countries wish to deploy more women officers but the women often lack adequate training to be nominated. Finland has recently offered to train up 30 women officers as Military Observers at the Finnish Centre for Peacekeeping. The women are expected to come from African, Asian and South American Member States. After the course participants will be deployed to UN Missions. This is a very welcome initiative from my own country.

Dear Friends,

Finland is celebrating her 100th anniversary of independence this year. We have much to be proud of. The beginning was not easy. We had been part of Sweden for 700 years until Sweden lost a war to Russia in 1809, after which we were an autonomous Grand Duchy of Russia for 100 years. When we gained our independence in 1917 a very bloody civil war was fought, followed by two wars against the Soviet Union in the 1940’s. However, in Finland women were given full political rights as the first country in the world in 1906. Gender equality has been a major factor in the development of our country and welfare state. I have used our experience as an example on numerous occasions about how a small backwards nation can turn its fortunes around. Today Finland is at the top of most of the lists ranking countries based on their welfare, education system, development, competitiveness, lack corruption or prosperity.

To conclude before we start the discussion - as said, much remains to be done. We are still not where we want to be. Peace – sustainable peace – is more probable, durable and just with the participation of all men and women. All efforts must be made to ensure that peacebuilding strategies and activities consistently and effectively include women and gender perspectives.

The transformation from a war society to a peace society needs us all and needs to respects us all.

Thank you.

6