Women and gender issues

The United Nations team in Myanmar remains alarmed by deteriorating humanitarian conditions amid continued fighting, particularly in the country’s south-east and north-west.  Across Myanmar, more than 900,000 people are displaced, including more than 560,000 people who remain uprooted since the military takeover in February 2021.

Increasing reports of sexual violence and human trafficking in Ukraine — allegedly committed against women and children in the context of massive displacement and ongoing fighting — are raising “all the red flags” about a potential protection crisis, the Executive Director of the United Nations gender agency warned the Security Council today.

Following is the text of UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed’s video message on the launch of the Zambia Chapter of the African Women Leaders Network, in Lusaka, Zambia, today:

The Commission on the Status of Women approved the first‑ever set of agreed conclusions focused on empowering women and girls in the context of climate action, as it concluded its sixty-sixth session late tonight.

A crisis, whether it is the COVID-19 pandemic or the devastating effects of climate change, can be an opportunity to empower women and advance gender equality by putting women in the centre of the recovery process, speakers told the Commission on the Status of Women during a panel discussion today.

The following statement by UN Secretary-General António Guterres was issued today:

On the heels of International Water Day, which was yesterday, humanitarian staff in the Horn of Africa say millions of people face severe water shortages and are going hungry due to the devastating drought in that region, which risks becoming one of the Horn’s worst climate-induced emergencies in the last 40 years.

Despite progress in bringing women to the table when shaping climate change responses, more must be done to ensure equality in local to global decision-making roles, delegates and civil society representatives said today, as the Commission on the Status of Women concluded the general discussion segment of its sixty-sixth session.

Following is the text of UN Secretary-General António Guterres’ video message to the Group of Friends Commission on the Status of Women event, “Role & Responsibility of Men and Boys in Eliminating Gender-Based Violence”, in New York today:

The United Nations Palestinian Rights Committee will organize a virtual event on the margins of the sixty-sixth session of the Commission on the Status of Women on “Impact of forced displacement on Palestinian women” on 23 March from 10 a.m. to noon, via WebEx.