Valji, Nahla

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     Edinburgh Research Explorer                                      UNSCR 2242 on Women, Peace and SecurityCitation for published version:Valji, N 2015, UNSCR 2242 on Women, Peace and Security: Summary of Critical Elements and Progress.Political Settlements Research Programme Briefing Papers, no. 6, Political Settlements ResearchProgramme.Link:Link to publication record in Edinburgh Research ExplorerDocument Version:Publisher's PDF, also known as Version of recordGeneral rightsCopyright for the publications made accessible via the Edinburgh Research Explorer is retained by the author(s)and / or other copyright owners and it is a condition of accessing these publications that users recognise andabide by the legal requirements associated with these rights.Take down policyThe University of Edinburgh has made every reasonable effort to ensure that Edinburgh Research Explorercontent complies with UK legislation. If you believe that the public display of this file breaches copyright pleasecontact openaccess@ed.ac.uk providing details, and we will remove access to the work immediately andinvestigate your claim.Download date: 05. Apr. 2019 The Political Settlements Research Programme | @PolSettlements | PoliticalSettlements@ed.ac.uk PSRP is funded by the Department for International Development (DFID), UK Briefing Paper 06 | Nov. 2015 Security Council resolution 2242 (2015) on Women, Peace and Security: Summary of critical elements and progress Nahla Valji, UN Women¹    On October 13th, 2015, the Security Council convened a High Level Review on implementation of Security Council resolution 1325 (2000), assessing 15 years of the women, peace and security agenda. The Review was informed by the annual Secretary General’s report which in turn this year included select findings and recommendations of the Secretary General commissioned report Preventing Conflict, Transforming Justice, Securing The Peace: A Global Study on the Implementation of Security Council resolution 1325. During this debate, an eighth resolution on women, peace and security was adopted unanimously with 72 co-sponsors, making it the most widely supported of any women, peace and security resolution to date. Below are some of the key new points of the most recent, and most comprehensive and far reaching resolution on this agenda to date. • Places the Women, Peace and Security agenda in a broader context. References are made to the Beijing Declaration and commitments made in relation to Beijing +20, CEDAW General Recommendation 30, and the 2030 Agenda for Development. The resolution also places the 15 year review of women, peace and security alongside the two other peace and security reviews undertaken concurrently – on peace operations and peacebuilding architecture – noting their WPS relevant recommendations and encouraging their implementation by all relevant actors. • Recognizes the changing peace and security context and need for women, peace and security to be mainstreamed across all areas. In particular the resolution notes the situation of rising violent extremism, the increased numbers of refugees and internally displaced persons, the impacts of climate change and the global nature of health pandemics. This is the most progressive language on the current peace and security context of any resolution to date, moving forward the Council’s agenda more generally, not only in relation to women, peace and security. In considering this context the Council reconfirms its intention to increase attention to women, peace and security as a cross-cutting subject in all thematic areas.  • Reiterates the key finding of the Global Study: the impact of women’s participation. The resolution notes the substantial link between women’s meaningful involvement in all peace and security efforts and the effectiveness and sustainability of these efforts. It references all three peace and security reviews in highlighting women’s and girls’ empowerment and gender equality as critical to conflict prevention and broader efforts to maintain international peace and security  • Identifies the barriers that need to be addressed in implementation. Greater resourcing, accountability, political will and attitudinal change, and concerted leadership, consistent information and action, and support, to build women’s engagement in all levels of decision-making • Participation – calls for incentivizing women’s participation in peace talks, technical and financial support not just to women but to mediators and technical teams to understand the impact 2  of women’s participation and how to strengthen inclusive processes. Encourages the Secretary General to review the obstacles to women’s recruitment and retention for senior level positions in the UN. Welcomes efforts to incentivize greater numbers of women in peacekeeping operations (military and police) and calls on a revised strategy to double these numbers in the next five years. • Countering Violent Extremism – This, and Security Council working methods are the two most substantive areas of focus of this resolution. The Security Council recognizes the differential impact on the human rights of women and girls of terrorism and violent extremism, including in the context of their health, education, and participation in public life. It acknowledges that women and girls are often directly targeted by terrorist groups, and that acts of sexual and gender-based violence are used as part of the strategic objectives and ideology of certain terrorist groups and as a tactic of terrorism. In this regard the Council calls for: o greater integration by Member States and the UN of the agendas on WPS and CT/CVE; ensuring the participation and leadership of women and women’s organizations in developing strategies to counter terrorism and violent extremism through creating counter narratives and other appropriate interventions, including empowerment of women o requests its own bodies – the Counter-Terrorism Committee and the Counter-Terrorism Committee Executive Directorate – as well as the UN’s CTITF, to integrate gender as a cross-cutting issue through activities of their mandates, including in assessments and reports and technical assistance to Member States, as well as to hold consultations with women and women’s organizations to inform their work o encourages Member States and UN entities, in collaboration with UN Women, to conduct gender-sensitive research on the drivers of radicalization for women, the impacts of counter-terrorism strategies on women’s rights and women’s organizations, and to develop targeted evidence based policy and programming responses   o notes the need to ensure all relevant bodies have the necessary gender expertise to fulfil their mandates, including relevant sanctions experts groups, fact finding and criminal investigations o encourages the forthcoming Secretary General’s Plan of Action to Prevent Violent Extremism to integrate women’s participation, leadership and empowerment as core to the UN’s strategy and responses o calls for adequate financing and for increasing the amount of funds from the UN’s CT/CVE efforts to be dedicated to projects which address gender dimensions and women’s empowerment • Security Council consistent implementation – The Council recognizes the need for more consistent and greater integration of women, peace and security in all aspects of its work, and specifically to address the challenges linked to flows of quality information and recommendations which can inform and strengthen Council decision making. As such, the Security Council expresses its intention to: o establish an Informal Experts Group on Women, Peace and Security to facilitate a more systematic approach to the agenda within its own work and enable greater oversight and coordination of efforts; o integrate women, peace and security concerns across all country-specific situations on the Security Council’s agenda, including through dedicated periodic consultations on WPS implementation in specific country situations.  o invite civil society, including women’s organizations, to brief the Council in country-specific considerations and relevant thematic areas 3  o invite UN Women’s Executive Director and the SRSG on Sexual Violence in Conflict to brief more regularly on country situations and relevant thematic areas of work on its agenda • Sanctions – expresses its intention, when adopting or renewing sanctions in relation to situations of armed conflict, to consider including violations of human rights, including sexual and gender-based violence, forced disappearances, and forced displacement (recognized as having specific gendered impacts in resolution 2122), and commits to ensuring that the relevant expert groups for sanctions committees have the necessary gender expertise   • UN implementation – Calls for a redoubling of efforts by all relevant UN entities to integrate a gender perspective into peace and security efforts, including in ensuring the necessary gender analysis and technical gender expertise is included throughout all stages of mission planning, mandate development, implementation, review and mission drawdown. Reiterates the need for consistent implementation of resolution 2122 by the system, which references the need to ensure all reports and briefings by senior leadership to the Security Council include information on the participation of women. • UN leadership and accountability – Calls for an addressing of deficits in accountability through the addition of a gender target as an indicator of individual performance in all compacts between the Secretary General and UN senior managers which would be used for monitoring and to inform decision-making by the Secretary-General, including for recruiting for future posts.   • UN gender architecture -  Encourages closer working relationships within the United Nations among all those responsible for implementing the women, peace and security agenda, including UN-Women, taking into account their role on women, peace and security coordination and accountability, and the Secretary-General’s Special Representative on Sexual Violence in Conflict. Welcomes the commitment to locate Senior Gender Advisers in the offices of SRSGs in missions, calls for these posts to be budgeted for and speedily recruited. Encourages greater cooperation between DPKO, DPA and UN Women to further more gender-responsive missions which have full access to the policy, substantive and technical support of these entities.  • Sexual Exploitation and Abuse – Urges troop and police contributing countries to provide robust pre-deployment training on SEA, to vet their personnel, and to conduct swift and thorough investigations and undertake prosecutions where needed of uniformed personnel. The decision by the Secretary General to exclude from peacekeeping operations all countries repeatedly listed in annexes of reports on Children and Armed Conflict and Sexual Violence in Conflict is welcomed as is the proposal to keep the Security Council regularly informed of developments in the implementation of the zero tolerance policy on SEA. The Council requests the SG to include a dedicated section on conduct and discipline including in relation to SEA in all reports on country-specific situations to the Security Council. • Humanitarian and WPS – The resolution contains some of the strongest language bridging humanitarian action and the women, peace and security agenda. Specifically, it encourages due consideration of the women, peace and security agenda in the context of the World Humanitarian Summit in 2016; recognizes the importance of integrating gender across humanitarian programming; reiterates the need to provide access to protection and the full range of medical, legal and psychosocial and livelihood services without discrimination; calls for women to participate meaningfully in humanitarian action; and speaks to the need for strengthened accountability to existing humanitarian frameworks which contribute to the implementation of the WPS agenda • Civil society – The resolution contains some of the strongest language on civil society and its role to date. The resolution reiterates the important contribution of civil society to implementation of 4  the agenda; encourages their meaningful participation in international and regional peace and security forums including donor conferences and consultations on national action plans; calls for increased funding; and encourages a cross-representation of civil society participation in various forums. It also calls for more frequent briefings by civil society to the Security Council as noted above. • Financing – Recognizes that the significant lack of financing for women, peace and security impacts on implementation and encourages Member States to increase funding for WPS, calls for increased aid to target women’s empowerment and gender equality; and invites aid providers to track the gender focus of aid contributions. The resolution also acknowledges the new Global Acceleration Instrument on Women, Peace and Security and Humanitarian Engagement as one avenue to attract new resources and accelerate implementation. • National action plans and planning frameworks – Notes positively the increased number of national action plans, and encourages national and regional bodies to continue to develop dedicated frameworks or to integrate WPS commitments into existing planning frameworks, encouraging broad consultations and sufficient resources are included in their design. _____________________________ ¹ Nahla Valji is Deputy Chief, Peace and Security, UN Women. She is an advisor on the Gender and Research Uptake components of the Political Settlements Research Programme.              © Nahla Valji 2015  This document is an output from the Political Settlements Research Programme which is funded by UK Aid from the UK Department for International Development (DFID) for the benefit of developing countries. The information and views expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the official opinion of DFID. Neither DFID nor any person acting on their behalf may be held responsible for the use which may be made of the information contained therein.  

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UNSCR 2242 on Women, Peace and Security:Summary of Critical Elements and Progress

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