[Vision2020] Women & Thev Big Three

[Art Deco]

  [image: The New York Times] <http://www.nytimes.com/>

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March 11, 2013
Unholy Alliance

Some horrific events over the past few months, including the shooting of a
Pakistani schoolgirl and the rape and murder of a young Indian
physiotherapy student, should have been an alert for the world to unite in
preventing violence against women.

But if a conference now under way at the United Nations is any guide, that
message has not resounded with the necessary urgency. Halfway into their
two-week annual meeting, delegates to the Commission on the Status of
Women<http://www.unwomen.org/how-we-work/csw/>fear they will not be
able to agree on a final communiqué, just like last
year.

Who is to blame? *Delegates and activists are pointing fingers at the
Vatican, Iran and Russia for trying to eliminate language in a draft
communiqué asserting that the familiar excuses — religion, custom,
tradition — cannot be used by governments to duck their obligation to
eliminate violence.* The United Nations Human Rights Council endorsed
similar language just six months ago.

Conservative hard-liners seem determined to fight it out again. They have
also objected to references to abortion rights, as well as language
suggesting that rape also includes forcible behavior by a woman’s husband
or partner. Poland, Egypt, other Muslim states and conservative American
Christian groups have criticized one or more parts of the draft. The
efforts by the Vatican and Iran to control women are well known. It is not
clear what motivates Russia, although there is a strong antifeminist strain
in President Vladimir V. Putin’s government. He may also be trying to curry
favor with Islamic states.

In any case, the suggestion that traditional values justify the violation
of basic human rights is spurious. As Inga Marte Thorkildsen, Norway’s
gender equality minister, has noted, “Violence against women must be seen
as a human rights issue, and that has nothing to do with culture or
religion.”

Gender-based violence is an epidemic. A World Bank report estimated that more
women between the ages of 15 and 44 were at risk
<http://www.un.org/en/globalissues/briefingpapers/endviol/index.shtml>from
rape and domestic violence than from cancer, car accidents, war and malaria
combined. According to the United Nations and other sources, more than 600
million women live in countries where domestic violence is not considered a
crime and more than 3 million girls are facing female genital mutilation.
Women in all social, economic, ethnic and religious groups are affected.
The conference will be a failure if it cannot produce ambitious global
standards that will deliver concrete results to protect women and girls.


-- 
Art Deco (Wayne A. Fox)
art.deco.studios at gmail.com
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