Joint Press Statement by signatories of the Shared Commitments on Women and Peace and Security (Denmark, France, Greece, Guyana, Panama, Republic of Korea, Sierra Leone, Slovenia, and the United Kingdom), delivered by the Permanent Representative of Slovenia to the United Nations, Samuel Žbogar, ahead of the annual open debate on Women, Peace and Security

On the 25th anniversary of the adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security, we reaffirm our unwavering commitment to advancing the Women, Peace and Security Agenda.

In this respect we, the representatives of Denmark, France, Greece, Guyana, Panama, the Republic of Korea, Sierra Leone, Slovenia and the United Kingdom, signatories of the Shared Commitments on Women, Peace and Security of the Security Council:

1. Reiterate our determination to uphold international law, including international humanitarian law and international human rights law, and to implement in full all Security Council Resolutions on Women, Peace and Security across all conflicts and situations on the Council’s agenda.

2. Call for the full, equal, meaningful and safe participation and leadership of women in peace processes; join the Secretary General’s call for women to constitute at least one-third of all participants in UN-led or co-led peace processes; and urge all stakeholders, including the UN, to make women’s participation the norm at every stage of peace processes, with a target of reaching 50 percent.

3. Invite UN department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs jointly with UN Women to provide regular and real time updates on the progress of women’s participation in all relevant peace and security processes, including peace negotiations and transitions.

4. Express deep concern over the growing weaponisation of gender by State and non-state actors and call for a gender-responsive approach to our response to transnational threats. 

5. Call for the adoption of the longstanding 15-percent minimum funding target for gender equality as a core objective in UN peacebuilding funds, as well as by all donors in their official development assistance, humanitarian aid, post-conflict reconstruction, transitional justice and counterterrorism funding, and to ensure that such funding is tracked separately.

6. Urge all relevant UN sanctions committees to convene dedicated meetings on gender-related issues, including briefings by gender experts and to ensure that their mandates and designation criteria explicitly address systematic violations of women’s rights and sexual and gender-based violence.

7. Call for full integration of the Women, Peace and Security Agenda in all peace operations, and to ensure the continuity of work on this Agenda in mission transitions and withdrawals, including through retaining or further deploying gender and women’s protection advisers.

8. Commit to enhance protection and support for women human rights defenders, including through dedicated flexible funding for specialized mechanisms for their protection and underline that the risks they face must never be used as a pretext to limit their right to participate or to express their independent views.

9. Reaffirm our commitment to ensuring that victims and survivors of sexual and gender-based violence in conflict receive the care required by their specific needs and without any discrimination.

10. Underscore the importance of accountability for all violations of human rights of women and girls, and underline our support for the core international justice institutions, including the ICC and ICJ.

11. Affirm that reproductive violence constitutes a violation of international law, commit to ending impunity, and call for immediate and non-discriminatory access to medical support to victims and survivors of war, including access to sexual and reproductive health and rights services and psychosocial support for victims and survivors of sexual violence.

This is the time to deliver. We call on all current and future Council Members, to ensure that the decisions and deliberations of the Security Council continue to highlight the impact of conflict on women and girls, to strengthen their participation and to ensure that these decisions are implemented – not ignored.

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