MEDIA RELEASE #3 ON BEHALF OF THE WOMEN PEACE AND SECURITY COORDINATING COMMITTEE (FIJI)

December 2, 2003 – (femLINKpacific) Participants at the 5 day training workshop on Conflict Prevention and Early Warning at the Lagoon Resort, Pacific Harbour, began discussions on Early Warning Conflict Signs and Early Response options as part of their training organized by the Women, Peace and Security Coordinating Committee (Fiji). The workshop is funded by UNIFEM Pacific.

Introducing the topic, trainer, Sanam Anderlini, highlighted that early warning signs, which have been initially used for disaster preparedness, is now recognized as a vital tool to anticipate conflict or potential outbreaks of violence:

“It is the systematic collection and analysis of information coming from areas of crisis for the purpose of anticipating the escalation of violent conflict; collecting information using specific indicators; analyzing information - attaching meaning to indicators, setting it into context, recognizing crisis development; formulating best and worst-case scenarios and response options and communicating to policy-makers for the purposes of decision-making and action,” she said. Since the early 90s, conflict analysts, including the United Nations, have focused on Early Warning models to anticipate violent conflict.

Anderlini further highlighted that so far, however, early warning models have ignored ‘gender’, even though the gender perspective enables:

• New set of indicators which highlight previously overlooked signs of instability and concentrate early response at grassroots level before it spreads to high politics.
  
• Gender-intergration in response options would also ensure discriminatory policies are not perpetuated in post-conflict situations, addressing political and humanitarian responses address vulnerabilities of women and men.
  
• Early Warning and preventive activities are more effective by utilizing untapped potential of women, women’s networks and women’s organizations as actors for peace.
  

The participants were involved in practical group work to incorporate the theory by reviewing the Fiji situation, and identified a critical challenge, to ensuring women’s full participation in conflict prevention, as well as formal and safe and practical channels of information delivery:

“ Where and who do we communicate our observations, on early warning? Who do we tell And who do we trust?”

The group also said that the current system needs to be reassessed and engendered as they are currently NO women involved in the National Security Structure, including divisional and district level.

This, as well as other strategies will continue to be part of the agenda of the workshop which continues until Friday with participants, which includes representatives of national and local women’s groups, as well as the security sector, formulating recommendations to the Women Peace and Security Coordinating Committee for implementation in 2004.

Tomorrow (Wednesday 03 December) participants will be provided with a comprehensive overview of the UN Security Council Resolution 1325, titled Women, Peace and Security.

Members of the WPS Fiji committee include: the Ministry of Women (Chair), Soqosoqo Vakamarama I Taukei, National Council of Women Fiji, the Ecumenical Centre for Research, Education and Advocacy (ECREA), Fiji Women's Crisis Centre, Fiji Women's Rights Movement, Young Women's Christian Association, Pan Pacific South East Asia Women's Association - Fiji Chapter (PPSEAWA Fiji), Fiji Association of Women Graduates, Catholic Women's League, Stri Sewa Sabha, National Council for Disabled Persons

About the trainers:

Sanam Naraghi-Anderlini was born in Iran and moved to England as a young girl during the Iranian Revolution. She joined International Alert in 1996, and co-authored Civil Wars, Civil Peace: An Introduction to Conflict Resolution three years later. In 1997 she joined the Forum on Early Warning and Early Response (FEWER) as Managing Editor, and was involved in advocacy efforts relating to early warning, the development of an early warning manual and editing of numerous field based reports. In 1999 she was commissioned by UNIFEM, the UN Development Fund for Women to research and author Women at the Peace Table: Making a Difference. Throughout 2000 she was the Senior Policy Advisor on the global campaign Women Building Peace: From the Village Council to the Negotiating Table, advocating for the UN Security Council resolution on women, peace, and security. She has authored numerous other publications on conflict early warning and prevention, as well as the Ford Foundation report on Women's Leadership, Gender, and International Relations. She joined Women Waging Peace in January 2002 as the Director of the newly formed Policy Commission. The Commission is developing the first ever comprehensive field-based case studies on women’s contributions to peace processes. In July 2003, she conducted workshops on conflict prevention and advocacy in Iran. She is currently drafting a study on women’s contributions to security sector reform in South Africa. Ms. Naraghi-Anderlini holds an MPhil in Social Anthropology from Cambridge University and has twin girls aged 2 _.

Sarah Maguire has been an activist on women's human rights issues for decades - particularly on issues of violence against women and women's relationship to the legal system. She is an active member of a campaigning NGO in the UK on domestic violence and legal reform particularly relating to women who kill their violent male partners. Sarah qualified as a barrister in the UK in 1990, working in the fields of criminal defence, family and immigration and asylum law for 10 years before joining the UK Department for International Development (DFID) as Senior Human Rights Adviser. Currently, she is an independent human rights consultant, working largely with UNIFEM, DFID and others on issues of women's human rights, children affected by armed conflict and forced migration.

Please direct your media requirements to WPS Fiji Secretary Sharon Bhagwan Rolls on 9244871

“Unless the moment is seized, the opportunity will pass. We are all advocates of Resolution 1325 and we must ensure that rhetoric becomes reality” (1325 Enews September 6 2002)
Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security was passed on October 31, 2000. For the text of the resolution please visit: http://www.peacewomen.org/un/sc/1325.html