Women and gender issues

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks at the Empire State Building lighting ceremony for the Unite to End Violence against Women Campaign, in New York today:

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks at the launch of The Guardian’s Global Media Campaign to end female genital mutilation, in Nairobi today:

Following are UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s remarks, delivered by Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, Executive Director of the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN-Women), to the Security Council’s open debate on women, peace and security, in New York today:

Following is the text of UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon’s video message to the 131^st Assembly of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), held in Geneva from 12‑16 October:

The Meeting of States Parties to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women elected 12 members to its monitoring body today, replacing those whose four-year terms are set to expire at the end of 2014.

Gender equality and women’s empowerment must be achieved in order to realize the unfinished business of the Millennium Development Goals and accelerate sustainable development beyond 2015, the Commission on the Status of Women declared today as it concluded its fifty-eighth session by recommending the adoption of agreed conclusions outlining the most pressing areas for action.

Too many women and girls were forced to drop out of school, to toil in precarious jobs or to give up control over their own bodies, especially when harmful practices were carried out in unsafe and unhygienic conditions, sometimes in the name of culture, representatives of non-governmental groups told the Commission on the Status of Women today.

The importance of inspiring young girls to not only study, but to take up careers in science, technology, engineering and mathematics was the focus of two panel discussions in today’s meeting of the Commission on the Status of Women.

While attempts to level the gender playing field had already resulted in more robust development gains in the past decade, that element must be central to the post-2015 agenda, the Commission on the Status of Women heard today, as some 60 speakers took the floor, including several Ministers who detailed their countries’ successes and the challenges.

While countries were on track to meet several of the Millennium Development Goals by 2015, progress on those related to women and girls was uneven at best, ministers and other senior officials told the Commission on the Status of Women today, urging that more be done to accept women as equals in all areas of life.