WO=MEN in New York

It is now half past 12 at night, and negotiations on the agreed conclusions have gotten really tense. Some  agreements made thus far bring the women’s rights agenda some considerable steps forward. Which is a great accomplishment of governments, NGOs and individual activists striving for progress. However, the  contentious issues are still on the table. Which include sexual and reproductive health and rights, and the undermining paragraph on sovereignty. The delegations have begun to discuss them late this evening, and since then it has been going downhill fast. The atmosphere in the room has gotten tense, people are getting exhausted, but not giving up. It has become increasingly clear that the conservative countries are not really committed to having agreed conclusions. It is as if they want to send out a signal to the world that the international community can not agree on women's rights. There is even a push backwards on previously agreed language in the Beijing Platfor...

[If you have not done so yet, please read the previous blogpost first] Reuters quoted the Arab Caucus statement in tonight's article about Egypt, including a shout out to CSBR. It also repeats the unholy alliance theme.  http://news.yahoo.com/egypt-warns-giving-women-rights-could-destroy-society-215809115.html Egypt warns giving women some rights could destroy society   By  Michelle Nichols  |  Reuters  –  57 mins ago By Michelle Nichols UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) -  Egypt 's ruling  Muslim Brotherhood  warns that a U.N. declaration on women's rights could destroy society by allowing a woman to travel, work and use contraception without her husband's approval and letting her control family spending. The Islamist party of  President Mohamed Mursi  outlined 10 reasons why Muslim countries should "reject and condemn"  the declaration , which the U.N. Commission on the Status of Women is racing to negotiate...

This statement was released by civil society organisations from the Middle East and Northern Africa region. Hurray for these courageous women and men standing up for women's rights! We, the undersigned organizations and individuals, as represented in the Arab Caucus at the 57th Commission on the Status of Women (CSW), are deeply concerned with the role of the leadership of our countries in the negotiations on the crucial issue of violence against women and girls. At this session, our governments are increasingly using arguments based on religion, culture, tradition, or nationality to justify violence, discrimination and allow the violations against human rights and continue with impunity. This violence is particularly targeted against women, girls, ethnic and religious minorities, people who dissent from or challenge normative gender identities and sexualities. The current positions taken by some Arab governments at this meeting is clearly not representative of civil society ...

Please click her e for the new (and last before final) version on the agreed conclusions. A total of 41 paragraphs have been agreed. That is about a quarter of the text(!). This implies that about 3/4 of the text is still under negotiation! = Joni van de Sand =

It is close to midnight and the government delegations have just finished the full reading of the 3rd draft. This means that they went though the complete text, negotiated positions and made amendments per paragraph.  There are around 105 paragraphs. It is rather unclear for pretty much everybody, how many of those have really been agreed. The full day it has been going back and forth. Not much information can be shared yet, but one strong paragraphs has already been tweeted about extensively today: Reformulated (j, j alt and t quat)  [...]  prevent, investigate and punish acts of violence against women and girls that are perpetrated by people in positions of authority, such as teachers, religious leaders, and law enforcement officials, in order to end impunity for these crimes.  However, the "controversial" paragraphs have been skipped.  For example 9 ter; 9 quat; n; and o - which all address sexual and reproductive health and rights. The same goes fo...

Artikel over de CSW57 vandaag in Volkskrant door Rob Vreeken! Vrouwentop: Vaticaan op de rem Klik hier  om het artikel direct te lezen.