Women's Rights Caucus CSW70 press release

 

The voting results on the CSW70 Agreed Conclusions

The Women’s Rights Caucus (WRC)—a global intersectional feminist coalition of more than 800 organizations, networks, and individuals convened by Fòs Feminista, Outright International, African Women’s Development and Communications Network (FEMNET), Asia Pacific Forum on Women, Law and Development (APWLD), and Young Feminist Caucus, that advocates for gender equality at the United Nations—welcomes the adoption of the CSW70 Agreed Conclusions under the priority theme: “Ensuring and strengthening access to justice for all women and girls, including by promoting inclusive and equitable legal systems, eliminating discriminatory laws, policies and practices, and addressing structural barriers.” WO=MEN and several of its members are actively engaged in the WRC. 

The close of the seventieth session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women marked an unprecedented procedural departure. For the first time in the Commission’s history, consensus proved unattainable, forcing Member States to proceed to adoption by vote.

This outcome followed sustained efforts by a few delegations to reopen previously agreed language, with the United States leading the charge and proposing a package of amendments aimed at removing references to sexual and reproductive health and rights, intersectionality, and other established human rights standards.

When those amendments were ultimately rejected by the majority of Commission members, the Commission proceeded to a vote on the full resolution. The Agreed Conclusions were adopted with the support of an overwhelming majority, few abstentions, and the United States standing as the sole Member State opposing their adoption.

This sequence of events underscores both the breadth of global commitment to gender equality and the extent to which attempts to dilute longstanding human rights standards failed to gain traction. The Commission’s resolve in moving forward affirmed the strength of multilateral processes and demonstrated that coordinated efforts to weaken protections cannot override the collective will of the international community.

At a press conference held on Tuesday, 10 March, the morning following adoption, WRC members outlined their CSW70 priorities: 

• recognizing the indispensable role of feminist civil society; 
• defending the rights of women, youth, adolescents and girls in all their diversity; 
• advancing gender-responsive justice systems; and 
• ensuring accountability and reparations for violations of human rights, including sexual and reproductive health and rights.

In line with these, the WRC commended the Commission for delivering an outcome with the following commitments:

• The inclusion of reparations as a landmark acknowledgment of structural and historical injustice and of states’ obligations toward those most harmed.
• The explicit reference to women in detention, which, although located in the chapeau rather than consistently throughout the text, represents meaningful progress on language long resisted in negotiations.
• Recognition that policies and programs must respond to the needs of survivors of gender-based violence, centering survivor agency and lived experience within justice responses.
• References to flexible, multi-year core funding for civil society organizations and protection against reprisals, which are vital to sustaining the ecosystem of organizations advancing gender justice on the ground.
• Recognition of the impacts of climate change and of traditional and community-based justice systems, affirming diverse legal and cultural pathways through which communities pursue accountability and redress.
• The explicit call for states to consider acceding to or ratifying the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women and to limit or withdraw reservations.
• A landmark commitment to comprehensive legislative review to identify and amend discriminatory provisions, including a direct reference to family law and discrimination in family relations, representing an important step toward dismantling legal systems that entrench inequality.

Areas requiring further improvement and vigilance include:

• The absence of explicit naming of LGBTIQ+ communities, despite inclusion of references to multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination.
• The exclusion of agreed formulations on bodily autonomy.
• The proliferation of caveats compared to earlier drafts, creating openings for states to narrow obligations, restrict protections, and evade accountability.
• The risk that such qualifiers may weaken the resolution’s integrity and undermine its capacity to deliver meaningful protection and redress.

Outstanding concerns that remain unresolved include:

• Attempts to introduce regressive amendments targeting sexual and reproductive health and rights, fundamental freedoms, intersectionality, and reparations, reflecting coordinated efforts by anti-rights actors to erode decades of hard-won commitments.
• The continued vulnerability of agreed human rights standards to organized opposition within multilateral spaces.

Despite these challenges, adoption of the outcome document by an overwhelming majority of Member States signals the continued resilience of multilateralism and affirms the United Nations’ role as a central forum for advancing gender equality.

The Chair, Bureau, and Secretariat maintained steady leadership throughout the session, navigating complex negotiations with preparation, resolve, and commitment to the Commission’s mandate.

Feminist civil society organizations across regions played a decisive role in defending agreed language and safeguarding commitments secured thirty years ago in the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action.

The outcome serves as a reminder that progress within multilateral spaces is neither automatic nor permanent, and that gains require sustained defense, accountability, and vigilance.

   This post was originally published on the website of Fos Feminista here.