Unofficial translation Madam President, Luxembourg congratulates the Nigerian Presidency of the Council for organising this open debate on women and peace and security, which gives us the opportunity to take stock of the implementation of resolution 1325 (2000) and its follow-on resolutions. We commend you for having chosen to focus this debate on the role of women in mediation and in conflict prevention. I fully align myself with the intervention of the European Union. We thank the Secretary-General and Under-Secretary-General Michelle Bachelet for their presentations of the efforts undertaken by the UN system over the past year in the implementation of the women, peace and security agenda. We particularly welcome the invitation to this debate extended to the President of the Economic and Social Council and to the representative of the NGO Working Group on Women and Peace and Security: their perspective and expertise are particularly relevant to this debate. The award of the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize to the Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf, to her compatriot Leymah Gbowee and to Tawakkol Karman from Yemen is highly symbolic and recognizes the crucial role of women in the establishment and preservation of peace. We pay tribute to all the Tunisian, Egyptian and Libyan women who have so decisively contributed to shaping the Arab Spring. Even if the participation of women in the recent elections in Tunisia has not lived up to all expectations, we are confident that the Tunisian women will be able to assume their responsibilities, in all institutions and at all political and economic levels to contribute to the renewal of their country and that they will thus serve as an example to other countries in the region and in the world. We invite the Libyan leaders to grant women full participation in the construction of the new Libya. Our solidarity goes to the women in Yemen and Syria who continue to fight against oppression and for their rights to freedom and democracy. Madam President, We welcome the Secretary-General’s conclusion in his recent report that the indicators that he proposed last year and that the Council endorsed in its PRST 2010/22 of 26 October 2010 have been “a major contribution to consistency and coherence in international efforts”. We appreciate the candor of the Secretary-General’s report on the challenges that lie ahead and we support the observations and recommendations that he makes. We have to concentrate our efforts even more on progress in the implementation of the normative framework created over the last 11 years. The strategic results framework is the right tool to measure progress or the absence of it. We encourage the Secretary-General to pursue the collection of data on the basis of the indicators of his 2010 report. At the same time, we encourage the entire UN system, as well as Member States, to help the Secretary-General to implement his zero-tolerance policy on sexual exploitation and abuse perpetrated by blue helmets. Beyond the suffering of women and children that we have the moral obligation to prevent, the credibility of our Organization and of our efforts in peacekeeping and peacebuilding in general is at stake. Madam President, Allow me, in my capacity as Chair of the Guinea Configuration of the Peacebuilding Commission, to highlight the role the Guinean women have to play in the establishment of democracy in Guinea and specifically in national reconciliation in their country hurt by decades of authoritarian rule and military dictatorship. The PBC is striving to assist Guinea to fully integrate women into all political processes as well as into economic and social life. In this context, I encourage the Secretary-General to push the UN system to pursue with an even stronger determination the implementation of his seven-point action plan on the role of women in peacebuilding. In his report on resolution 1325 under consideration, the Secretary-General outlines a few areas of progress, but he also acknowledges that progress is unfortunately slow in an area of particular interest for today’s debate, the participation of women in mediation efforts, as well as in the area of women’s economic integration. At this stage we also lack the necessary data to measure whether the objective to devote 15 % for all United Nations-managed funds in support of peacebuilding to gender equality and women’s empowerment in post-conflict contexts has been achieved. Madam President, Luxembourg continues to attach great importance to the situation of women in crisis situations and to mainstreaming the gender dimension into the work of international and regional organizations in this respect. In December last year, Luxembourg decided to finance a major project of the Department of Peacekeeping Operations, which aims to reinforce the leadership and participation of women in political life and in peacebuilding activities in countries emerging from conflict. With our support, concrete results are being achieved in three countries, Timor- Leste, Haiti and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, through partnerships between the national and local authorities and the UN missions and agencies. We are determined to maintain and to reinforce our national engagement in this area. It is indeed the situation of the entire society that we contribute to improve by strengthening the role of women in mediation and conflict prevention. I thank you for your attention. .