Day 2 – APWLD conference – Bali 2013:
Session 1: Kate Lappin (from undp) – Post 2015 Civil Society Perspectives
Campaign for the peoples movement for feminist development – look them up.
The MDG’s don’t line up with the Millennium Declaration. MDG’s were created by a group of men in a smoke filled room, it is not in sync with the declaration.
Development justice model: has 5 transformative shifts. Demands basic shifts in approach.
Shanti: in the cedaw surveys, it tells us that govts are not collecting data on VAW, not consistently or systematically. Needs to be done.
UNDP is supporting global taxes on arms trade and financial speculation.
With the UNDP process, we are hoping that they will start promoting some of these targets soon. We are working on some lobbying efforts with some nations to take on.
Anuradha: “Percentage of women who have received remedies” the implementation of these is not good. When we frame indicators , the training is rubbish. Police are not well trained. This has to be addressed within the indicators. How many women seeking a remedy is not as critical as how many women are getting convictions.
(woman from Bangkok): There is no good data on trafficking anywhere. We need this data.
Shanti: the cedaw committee is constantly asking for number of cases that go on trial, number convicted, etc.
Kate: we could ask for the % of recommendations that are implemented by the cedaw committee.
The next agenda will be a targets and indicators agenda.
What are the empowerment indicators for VAW – let’s look that up.
States are saying that the failure of the last framework was that it was NOT an intergovernmental framework, rather, it was created by Jeffrey sachs and others in a vacuum.
There are currently various open working group meetings. In the spring this will address gender equality. There are 5 seats for Asia in the open working group, they are shared.
India, Pakistan, sri lanka share 1 seat.
Look up “scap”
The undp has small subgrants ($2k) for ngo’s to host small roundtables or small events to put pressure on their local governments.
Claire: In the phillipines: we have had problems with women judges, where they are acquitting rape offenders. Another case involving a military personnel, 3 women justices let the perpetrator go, they acquitted him.
There is research in the phillippines to show that male judges may be convicting more rape perpetrators than women judges.
Kamala: the next 2 years is a historical moment for us. What will be assessing at the Beijing platform ? the framework of security and peace is also relevant, started in the year 2000. There is a process of review for this. We have also had 30 years of cedaw.
Eleanor: what can be our objectives beyond influencing indicators and this 2015 agenda ? maybe ways to empower ourselves, innovatively, is status quo changing, I see the potential for us much beyond what is now on paper.
Geetha: I can see why using convictions as an indicator can be problematic. The criminal justice system can be very problematic. There are a lot of problems with women being threatened during the process of criminal justice. We need to look at this also.
Kate: there will probably be 4 indicators for each target. Not more.
The idea of empowerment has been polluted. It has been adopted to talk about women’s employment, access to finance, entrepreneurship currently.
The 5 transformative shifts was an attempt at what we may think an agenda may look like. The ‘developmental justice model.”
We actually don’t think that the gender equality model is what we are aspiring to address.
Nana: indicators are about the politics of numbers, we have to be clear about how we are playing that game.
Kate: 2015 Beijing Process- there will be regional intergovernmental meetings. Civil society will be consulted to some extent. Shanti and I are on the regional advisory committee for UN Women.
Kate: Lets open it to up to what should we be doing for the Beijing +20?
Nana, Kaye, Ivy: “This is the Age of Implementation”
Nana: there are several frameworks that are happening that are relevant to women.
Resolution 1325, so far there are 7 resolutions, sometimes they are piecemeal, each time they come out with another one to address something else.
The security council is the least democratic within the UN. The resolutions are basically a political commitment. They have tried to come up with reporting and accountability system.
The cedaw general recommendation on conflict is a very important one. It recognizes many diff forms of conflict, and the idea of extra-territoriality, which allows a means of holding accountable peace keeping forces and corporations.
Nana: apwld used to have the 3 big issues: globalization, fundamentalism, militarism.
Good to keep the focus on all 3 in relation to women.
Kate: Asia Pacific Feminist Forum of 2014 is coming up.
Look up www.pacta.fi – Asian peace and reconciliation council.
Yuyun: AICHR – ASEAN intergovernmental commission on human rights.
ACWC – look up. They have suffered from a lack of focus and direction.
ASEAN doesn’t care about womens issues, they only do it because the international community is asking for it no other reason.
Jelen: AICHR had a trafficking meeting recently: there was no gender perspective at this meeting. 1. In phillipines they don’t consider victims as criminals.
Look up “gender is my agenda campaign”
Asean commission on women and children vs AICHR are having a turf war. They both want to address VAW. This is a very political problem. We were hoping to have a framework document here to share with you – the one we saw was very incomplete and rushed, not narrowed down, no specific fields, no difference raised between VAW and VAchildren.
Yuni: I am also very pessimistic about ASEAN and what they can do about VAW. ASEAN is about their foreign ministers not about the leaders. Their meetings are usually very closed. They need to make the meetings and info more visible. All eyes on Burma next year – intl community will be waiting to see how Burma performs.
Eleanor: ICC, Intl Criminal Court – she listed off some of the countries who have ratified the ICC. Many have not.
Tay Tay: Burma is drafting a VAW law from 1988.
Ivy: closing thoughts on regional convention on VAW. These regional conventions must have the standards we are subscribing too like accountability mechanisms.
Claire: There is recognition of actual working mechanisms like CEDAW. We have a low level of access to complaint and inquiry mechanisms in CEDAW. Actual implementation regarding CEDAW, we need to look at the implementation and monitoring mechanisms in particular. Also opportunities related to ASEAN and AICHR. Regarding regional mechanisms could be asia pacific not just asean or aichr.
It is also important to take on the indiv complaint mechanisms – maybe incorporating mechanism for indiv complaints. Maybe in line with Africa, not just having a court but perhaps a special rapporteur on VAW for the Asia region.
There is still a need to have binding mechanisms in cases. We know CEDAW convention is binding. But we do need a clear monitoring mechanism. The asean mechanism must be aligned with international standards.
We need better indicators for VAW, they will measure things better.
Better implementation of what we have currently. Reduce attrition.
Eleanor: I am not opposed to the idea of a convention but given the current times, this is not the time for international convention. We are not close to supporting a convention given this moment, this is not the time.
We need to focus our energies in certain places including the asean standard setting.
Nana: our priorities are implementation and accountability. Our vision is that asean has the capacity to implement.
At the international level, we need to optimize our ability to use the whole range of mechanisms available to us. Because of this, a convention is not in our view for the next 10 years.
Yuyu: regional human rights mechanisms need attention and capacity building and institutional building instead of standard setting right now. We can use the council of Europe for example with the way they have addressed rights for LGBTQ. And use other non-binding rules to influence institution building for aichr and asean.
Behavior influencing norms are needed.
Ivy: can we also reiterate our position on the international convention – the rationale is not clear, quite a number of reasons were given, will not go into this again. Can we get a consensus on this? was asked repeatedly. The rational for an international convention is still not clear.
We should not have an international convention – that is a consensus.
Anuradha: what does it mean to hold the states accountable ? answered by Shanti: you can use cedaw to take your govt to court by using recommendation 19.
Humaira: we have been able to get Pakistan to use cedaw as leverage. The due diligence framework is very refreshing – the clarity of the words is strong.
Geetha: VAW is linked with all the articles in CEDAW, article 16 has the max number of reservations and declarations. Ultimately an international treaty body is the one to have conversations with govts. As activists we can take the pieces that we want to use.
Understanding the language of CEDAW is a process where lots more needs to be done.
A new treaty will have to borrow this language that we are using to not create problems for the future.
If there is an international convention, the CEDAW can become a policy document and all the work we have done can be lost.
Shanti: the strength of any intl law is in its ability to be dynamic not static. Based on the intention of the law, you can expand on the rights and obligations. The cedaw is a living, dynamic instrument. Its women who have been bringing issues of context. These are refugees, migrants, other women. This is a living document – its not possible to say that it is not in the cedaw therefore it cannot be addressed. This is not possible.
Every category of woman is included in the cedaw.
Our main focus should be on keeping the treaties as elastic as possible.
Claire: from yday I mentioned some reservations on specific conventions whether international or regional, it might tend to short change CEDAW. We should really envision CEDAW to address our aspirations.
I am now thinking of why we were pushing for an individual complaints mechanism. We could advocate for a court – it could be any regional convention – where complaints could be filed with that regional convention. If there is a mechanism where complaints could be binding, or if there is a asia pacific court – this could be helpful to gain accountability with implementation.
Ivy: what is our vision ?
Usa: we need more solidarity among muslim women in asean, for example. The indicators can help this.
Nana: how will we use the feminist forum to shape our vision, the APF meetings, etc.
Kate: we already have our CEDAW vision, we don’t need a brand new vision. We can try to imagine how we create workable governments around this.
Someone is calling for a new governance structure based on the UDHR. They are calling for a global governance review. We are calling for a global governance review here at civil society. A new convention on VAW is moving towards not seeing the interconnectedness between the work we are doing and the work we have done. For me, global governance is critical, a meaningful form of governance, means the age of implementation and accountability.
We need an agenda for an analytical process : a prep process for CSW is to further draw this together.
Michel Catuira: I feel alone because the language we are using here is very complicated for migrant workers. I don’t know if there was discussion on standards of support for victims ? Rate of attrition is very high for migrants because of no support from ngo’s, civil society, government, etc.
Ivy: wrap up:
Nana is asking for us to do a review of the past 30 years of what the gaps are, what have we learned ? before we articulate a vision for ourselves.
Kate: is talking about a global governance review.
Ivy: implementation is mentioned in the pre-amble of the Beijing Declaration based on the Nairobi declaration….etc. but implementation is still a problem from 1995, so something is still going wrong.
So the due diligence project will be very interesting since they are breaking down all the terms and words.
Nana: can we have a framework for review ? how do we review how far we have come ?
Shanti: ICPD – look this up. In prep for the first Beijing, each region had a separate document – The Jakarta Declaration precedes the Beijing declaration.
Zari: there is an Islamic Decl of HR, now they are thinking of drafting the Islamic CEDAW. We are not wanting to or revisit any norms, we don’t want to do any new norm setting. Things like this Islamic Cedaw, can create fragmentation among regions.
In Geneva, intl convention was raised but 2 governments were not in favor.
Last 2 days of May, 2014 – is asia pacific forum
What is the scat ?
Peace and security for women
Land rights for women
Decent wage, etc for women
Voice and accountability of /for women
Look up the trans-pacific partnership that corporations are signing on to.
Audrey: workd with Yale and Berkeley to create tools for grassroots, IFI’s – look this up.
Mestric tools on extra-territorial obligations – look this up.
Pakistan: Fouzia Saeed
Humaira Mumtaz
Jakarta: (Yuni) Yuniyanti Chuzaifah – chairperson – national commission on violence against women, Indonesia.
Cambodia: Ros Sopheap, GADC
Burma: Tay Tay, women’s league of burma
South India: Geetha Ramseshan, lawyer, Madras High Court
North India: Manisha Gupte
Thailand: Usa Lerdsrisuntad, foundation for women
Phillipines: Obeth/Joms, Gabriella
Sri Lanka: Dushi
Malaysia: Suriana (?)
Afghanistan: (Naheed, Lisa contact) pending
Burundi: Pascal
Somalia: Fartun
UK: Jackie Jones