Gender and Peace Operations
RESDAL hand over document in the background
of the next Defense Ministerial.
When a Peace Operation urges to be deployed in the current conflict scenarios, many considerations are taken into account. An increasingly important issue in the last years has been women participation in peacekeeping and peacebuilding processes.
The long way walked from the First International Women Conference in 1975 until today, show the efforts from different sectors of the international community to promote women inclusion and participation in every aspect of the political, social, economical and cultural life.
In the international peace and security field, women and children are the target of new threats that have to do with the current armed conflicts: mistreat and sexual abuse, rights diminished and political exclusion, are some of the situation they must face.
This new context has led to the design and inclusion of integral gender perspectives in the development of Peace Operations. Simultaneously, United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 has set a historic milestone in the sense of impelling and urging Member States to promote women participation in this kind of missions with positions like military observers, police and civil specialists. It has also urged to enhance women representation at decision making levels and to count with more representatives and special envoys of the Secretary-General.
Towards the increasing participation and preponderant role that the Armed Forces of the region has in the contribution to the international peace and security processes: What kind of diffusion of 1325 Resolution has been in the region? Which is the women situation in the heart of the armed institutions? How are they getting ready for these new challenges? What kinds of debates have arisen from society and institutions?
In this order, RESDAL with the support of the Global Peace and Security Fund from the Department of Foreign Affairs and International Trade (GPSF, DFAIT) of Canada has raised the need to try to answer these questions across the collection and process of information through project development: “Women in the Latin American and Caribbean Armed Forces: A Gender Approach to Peace Operations”.
With this objective in mind, the Network organized the International Seminar "Challenges And Opportunities in Peace Operations: The Incorporation of Women" last March 11th and 12th in Antigua, Guatemala. The congregation of key actors from the region was aimed at meeting, exchanging ideas, and making recommendations regarding women situation engendering before the Defense Ministerial that will be held in September in Banff, Canada.
• More information about the RESDAL – GPSF-DFAIT Project “Women in the Latin American and Caribbean Armed Forces: A Gender Approach to Peace Operations”.
• More information about the International Seminar “Challenges and Opportunities in Peace Operations: The Incorporation of Women”