CAWA Presents Updates From Beijing+5

CAlifornia Women's Agenda

United Nations Beijing + 5 Conference News June 5, 2000

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"We are not an organization that is networking, we are a network that is organizing."-- Roma Guy

A Note from Marilyn Fowler
The opening special session of the United Nations General Assembly Beijing +5 Women 2000 "Gender, Equality, Development and Peace for the Twenty First Century" opened this morning. You can follow the sessions on a webcast and get the negotiated outcomes document as it is updated from: http://www.womenaction.org (specifically: http://webcast.mediaondemand.com/united_nations/20000605/women2000live.ram
We will be getting updates from the President's Interagency Council on Women daily which we will pass on to you. CAWA is holding a caucus on Wednesday morning at the Planned Parenthood Federation of America, 9:00 a.m.
You are with us in spirit. As I write this in the CyberCafe at the Church Center across from the UN, the woman on my left is sending a message in Farsi and the one on the right in Japanese. There are many thousands of beautiful women on the street in their country costumes. I am reminded of Pat Buchanan's description of us at the Beijing Conference as "like the bar scene of Star Wars." I loved the bar scene of Star Wars and I love the women in their many costumes and languages. He has come no further in the past five years. WE HAVE.
And we will go further and overcome the Pat Buchanan's of the world.
Qianjin...zenshin...adelante....imua...a Ho,
CAWA and WIN delegation

From IWTC Women's GlobalNet #151
Activities and Initiatives of Women Worldwide
by Anne S. Walker
June 6, 2000
UN GENERAL ASSEMBLY SPECIAL SESSION OPENS IN NEW YORK
NEW YORK - UN Secretary General Kofi Annan said today that while there has been progress on the goal for women's equality since the 4th National Conference on Women held in Beijing five years ago, "much remains to be done." Addressing the opening of the five-day United Nations General Assembly Special Session on Women 2000, Annan noted that women still earn less, have higher unemployment rates,are more often unemployed, generally poorer than men, and that most countries have yet to pass laws in favor of women's rights to own land and other property.
The UN Secretary General also noted that even while these old challenges have yet to be met, new ones have already emerged. He cited the spread of AIDS particularly in southern Africa "where 40 per cent of pregnant women are HIV-positive and more than one child in 10 has lost its mother to AIDS."
Another problem is the trafficking of women and children which he said has now become a "worldwide plague." He cited, however, the following progress for women:

Violence against women is now illegal almost everywhere.
There is a worldwide mobilization against harmful traditional practices such as "honor killings" or "shame killings."
New health strategies have helped saved thousands of womenís lives, and more couples now use family planning than ever before.
A record number of women have become leaders and decision makers in both the government and private sectors.
Above all, he said, "more countries have understood that women's equality is a pre-requisite for development.
Annan called for the full implementation of the Beijing Platform for Action, which was passed by 189 member states during the Fourth International Conference on Women in 1995. "I believe that implementing the Beijing Platform will be crucial in achieving all the Millennium goals I have asked the world's leaders to adopt on behalf of all the world's peoples," he said. The Beijing Platform for Action contains the agenda for women's empowerment, spelling out the strategic objectives and actions to be taken by the year 2000 by governments, the international community, NGOs and the private sector for removing existing obstacles to women's advancement. The Beijing document identified twelve critical areas of concern, considered to represent the main obstacles in achieving the goal of women's advancement - women and poverty, education and training for women, women and health, violence against women, women and armed conflict, women and the economy, women in power and decision making, institutional mechanisms for the advancement of women, human rights of women, women and the media, women and the environment and the girl child.
Theo Ben Gurirab, Foreign Minister of Namibia, who was unanimously elected as President of the General Assembly, stressed the importance of the five-day conference. "We are charged with the sense of a new beginning," he said. "This Special Session must try to live up to expectations of millions of women all over the world." Entitled "Women 2000: Gender Equality, Development and Peace in the 21st Century" or Beijing +5 Review, the special session of the GA will review the progress made in the implementation of the Beijing platform. "The 23rd Special Session gives us the ideal opportunity to assess how far member-states have come to address problems, face new challenges and reaffirm new commitments," said Gurirab in his opening speech. "The General Assembly can then move forward to achieve women's goal of equality and empowerment in all walks of life." Gurirab praised the participation of the nongovernment organizations in the deliberations leading to the current session, also known as Beijing Plus 5.
Last Saturday, folowing the NGO Working Session at the UN, the NGO sector submitted its own report titled Alternative Global Report for consideration by Member States which Gurirab acknowledged in his speech. The Beijing Conference was considered a "watershed event" as it resulted in a new international commitment to achieve gender equality and development and the general advancement of women into the 21st century. This conference had one of the biggest delegations, with some 17,000 representatives from government and civil society and another 30,000 attending the parallel NGO forums.

For archived news from the conference:
June 5, 2000