Reconstruction and Peacebuilding

The United Nations must set an example in its advocacy of women's participation by the appointment of more women to senior leadership positions in the Organization, including in areas dealing with conflict resolution and peacebuilding. At the grass-roots level, we need to address the causes of the lack of women's participation in peace processes, and to empower women's groups socially, politically and economically.

Today's debate, however, is about the particular contribution of women to peacebuilding.

The Security Council has agreed that we need to focus more attention on the linkages between peacekeeping and peacebuilding. Ensuring the engagement of the local female population is one obvious such link: empowered women both make peace and build it. And incidentally, this is not a new insight — very far from it. The playwright Aristophanes dramatized it for war-weary Athenians in his comic play Lysistrata nearly 2,500 years ago.

In resolution 1888 (2009), the Council took further steps to end impunity for the barbarous perpetrators of sexual violence against women and children in conflict. We now need to identify practical ways to assure women a central role in peacekeeping and post-conflict peacebuilding. That is, we need to improve our record in implementing resolution 1325 (2000).

As a Council, we need to ensure that we are doing whatever we can to enhance women's vital role in conflict resolution and peacebuilding, a role without which real and lasting peace will often be unachievable.

It is important that the Secretary-General's reports to the Council dealing with specific conflict situations and developments in the field also incorporate gender perspectives in addressing various aspects of conflict analysis and conflict resolution.

At the same time, women are still underrepresented in decision-making with regard to conflict. Their initiatives and visions for peace and security are rarely heard during peace negotiations. In this regard, I would like to stress that women should not be viewed primarily as victims of armed conflict; the international community should use the potential of women as agents of preventive diplomacy, peacekeeping and peacebuilding.

Uganda's action plan focuses on the relevant legal and policy framework, improved access to health facilities and medical treatment for victims of sexual and gender-based violence, women in leadership and decision-making, the elimination of gender-based violence in society and, finally, budget allocations for the implementation of resolutions 1325 (2000) and 1820 (2008) and the Goma Declaration.

Uganda is committed to strengthening women's participation in the promotion of peace and security within the context of conflict prevention and resolution, eradicating sexual violence and ending impunity in conflict-prone situations. As Uganda is a country that has experienced an extended period of instability, the Government has set one of its priority goals as tracking progress on the implementation of resolution 1325 (2000).

It is for this reason that Uganda remains concerned that the contribution of women to peacebuilding is far from satisfactory, which can be attributed to their being excluded from the decision- making process on the one hand and, on the other, to inadequate financing of their requirements. This, in the long run, compromises efforts to attain sustainable peace and security.