Global Policy on Women Peace and Security in Practice: National and Regional Consultations on Resolution 1325

International Alert
May 2002

1. Introduction & Summary

This summary aims to distil some of the main findings and focus issues from three recent consultations. The first organised by International Alert (IA) in January 2002 in Nepal, the second also organised by IA in Russia for the Southern Caucasus region in March 2002, and the third jointly organised by The Africa office of the Urgent Action Fund in collaboration with the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) hosted by Kituo Cha Katiba (the Ugandan based East African Center for Constitutional Development) and facilitated by WILPF and IA in March 2002. Key crosscutting issues were identified in the different regional contexts at both micro and macro levels:

Micro-level
Violence against women
-Lack of protection of the human rights of women and girls in conflict and post-conflict situations
-Specific security needs of single women, pregnant women, widows, refugee, displaced and other war affected women in conflict areas
-Lack of profile of women's situation in the media
-Women's exclusion from political negotiations to advance the peace process and political participation generally
-Lack of access to international decision makers
- Survival prostitution

Macro-level
- Lack of early warning response mechanisms to prevent conflict
- Lack of protection for women in territories not recognised by the international community
- Trafficking of women
- Ineffective mechanisms for protecting the civilian population

These issues also highlight the need for improved interface between the global and regional, national and local policy and practice address of conflict.
In the context of Resolution 1325 women identified the following ’gaps’:
- No mention of early warning and conflict prevention
- No mention of the impact of landmines
- Lack of mechanisms for monitoring the implementation of the Resolution and benchmarks for this process
- Need for greater emphasis on mechanisms for protection of women and girls specifically in non-recognised states

These initial consultations have been successful in identifying the potential for the implementation of Resolution 1325 at a national and regional level. This was met by great enthusiasm by participants and has stimulated national and regional initiatives. They have also flagged a number of gaps between policy and practice, which need to be addressed and integrated into any revision of the Resolution.

2. Background
The Women Building Peace Campaign (WBP) of International Alert takes United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security as its current framework. It researches and advocates for the practical implementation of this broad resolution. The campaign works to highlight the relevance of mainstreaming gender in security and peacebuilding work to policy makers and practitioners from the humanitarian, development and security fields. It also aims to strengthen the use of the resolution as an advocacy tool and a basis for research.

3. Approach
The WBP campaign applies a ‘two-way advocacy channelling’ approach to the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace and Security. This involves the in-depth regional and national Gender Peace Audit work being integrated and communicated in such a way as to make it accessible and relevant to policy makers and practitioners. At the same time, the work of the campaign at the global policy level is disseminated to women's organisations at the local level through national and regional consultations. The campaign frames international policies on women, peace and security in the context of local, national and regional issues, which are relevant to local actors in peace building, to promote their implementation at the national and regional level. The consultations are also being used as a springboard for national and regional address of peace and security issues, integrating the perspectives of women. For example, increasing awareness and greater accountability through follow-up meetings between women, government representatives, donors and the media.

In the context of each national consultation, which WBP facilitates, a regional consultation is planned to inform the refinement of relevant regional instruments as well as national instruments for implementation of a gendered approach to peace and security.

Gender Peace Audits and Consultations
The national and regional consultations are part of a broader gender peace
audit project. The audits are conducted by:

1) Mapping the potential instruments and mechanisms, through which the resolution could become operational, in each geographical focus area. This is part of a feasibility study.

2) The consultation is then conducted with a broadly representative group of women's and human rights organisations in the diverse conflict and geographical regions. The initial aim of the consultations is to identify current contextual security issues, which Resolution 1325 and other related policies should encompass and address.

3) The findings are then disseminated through meetings and publications to policy makers and practitioners within UN and EU structures, to be incorporated in the review and implementation strategy development for Resolution 1325 and European policies on gender and conflict prevention.

The International Alert (IA) regional and national peace audits are currently being conducted in the Southern Caucasus, Nigeria - in the regional context of West Africa, and Nepal - in the regional context of South East Asia. The consultation in Uganda was the initiative of the Urgent Action Fund and IA was only involved in the facilitation.

Setting up the Consultations
In each country or regional context an in-depth feasibility study was produced prior to engaging with the consultation process. Preparatory work framed international policies on women, peace and security in the context of local, national and regional issues, that was relevant to local peacebuilding actors.

Impartiality is key to the functioning of IA’s conflict transformation work and was crucial to the effectiveness of the consultations. The two consultations organised by IA were preceded by in-depth background research and identification of local partners, who are regarded as representative and impartial in each specific conflict context. WBP worked alongside the partner organisations in each country or regional context to prepare the consultations. It was crucial to ensure the widest possible engagement through the participation of representative stakeholders.

In the situation of escalating conflict in Nepal, it was imperative that the consultation was not seen as favouring pro-Maoist or pro-government stances. Inclusivity of representative women leaders from 24 different districts was important, as was the process by which these representatives were selected by a range of participating organisations. In the Southern Caucasus it was important to include women from all the different recognised and non-recognised states to maintain impartiality. The consultation brought together 30 women representatives drawn from organisations based in Abkhazia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, South Ossetia, North Ossetia, Dagestan, Russia, Chechyna, Georgia and Nagorno-Karabkh.

Location was also important to maintain neutrality. In the Caucasus, the suggestion of the local partner and participants was that the consultation be held in Russia rather than having to select any where in the Caucasus which might generate contention from participants. Owing to the nature of the conflict in the Caucasus, which relates to the non-recognition of certain states it was also seen as crucial from the outset to take a regional approach. The neutral venue was chosen to facilitate the participation of women from both the North and South Caucasus as well as from Russia. This has been the operational approach of IA’s Eurasia programme working in the region.

4. Aim of Consultations
The aim of these initial consultations was to identify issues relating to women peace and security in each country or region. The consultations used Resolution 1325 as a tool to identify women's priorities regarding the address of security issues through local, national and regional instruments. They elicited women's views and perspectives on the relevance of Resolution 1325 and examined how it can be developed, beyond a policy framework, as an advocacy tool to address security issues relating to women and peacebuilding.

The consultations focused particularly on:
- Women’s views on the relevance of the 1325 for their work
- The links between the issues women perceived and agreed are currently affecting their peace and security and the Resolution
- The steps women could take in their differing contexts to ensure implementation of the resolution
- Recommendations to the international community on how to implement the resolution in a gender-sensitive manner to benefit women

5. Outcomes
The national and regional consultations with women's organisations developed plans for action and recommendations, which are being followed through by participants at a local, national and regional level by partner organisations and International Alert.

Key cross cutting issues include:
Micro-level
- Violence against women
- Lack of protection of the human rights of women and girls in conflict and post-conflict situations
- Specific security needs of single women, pregnant women, widows, displaced and other war affected women in conflict areas
- Lack of profile of women's situation in the media
- Women's exclusion from political negotiations to advance the peace process and political participation generally
- Lack of access to international decision makers
- Survival prostitution

Macro-level
- Lack of early warning response mechanisms to prevent conflict
- Lack of protection for women in territories not recognised by the international community
- Trafficking of women
- Ineffective mechanisms for protecting the civilian population

These priorities have different weight in the varied country contexts. The details of issues raised by women at these consultations will also contribute to the refinement of Resolution 1325 in different contexts and stages of conflict.

Gaps identified in the Resolution:
Women recognised the importance of Resolution 1325 as an instrument and advocacy tool. During the discussion about the relevance in the regional or national context, several gaps in the Resolution were identified
-No mention of early warning and conflict prevention
-No mention of the impact of landmines
-Lack of mechanisms for monitoring the implementation of the Resolution and benchmarks for this process
- Need for greater emphasis on mechanisms for protection of women and girls specifically in non-recognised states

6. Country or Region Specific Focus Issues & Outcomes
Follow on meetings in Nepal have included the development of a National Consortium for Women and Peace with a range of participating human rights
and women's organisations. Other follow-on meetings are planned with national partners and development agencies, government officials, donors representatives of international bodies; members of the security forces; national; regional and international policy makers; researchers and the international media.
Following the consultation in the Caucasus participants wrote a letter to the UN Secretary General, the UN Security Council and other relevant international bodies as well as national governments and regional security organisations in the Caucasus. The letter outlined their recommendations for securing women's participation in the peace building process. Participants also developed a plan of action for pursuing change in the status of women in the region and in women's role in the peace building process. One of their first steps was organising a campaign 'A Day Without War', appealing to local governments to marquate International Children's Day on 1st of June by holding a cease-fire. Three draft project proposals were developed, which focused on the critical issues for the region:

- Women and political participation in the Caucasus
- Women and peace building in the Caucasus
- The status of women in the states in the Caucasus

In Uganda the follow-up actions to be taken by the participants to further promote the implementation of Resolution 1325 included awareness raising of the existence and applicability of the resolution at a local and national level through the media, local leaders, religious and political structures. Capacity building was also planned at a local and national level focusing on peacebuilding networking, advocacy and mobilisation. During the meeting the participants created the Africa 1325 Network to engage in 1) sharing of information and experiences 2) monitoring of implementation and 3) to act as a pressure group nationally, regionally and internationally.

The general cross-cutting recommendations were that:
- The Resolution should be utilised primarily as a political tool and also as a tool for negotiation, accountability and leverage.
- Strengthening women's participation in politics, peace building and in post-conflict reconstruction should be done through building and nurturing alliances and support networks.

7. The Way Forward

These initial consultations have been successful in identifying the potential for the implementation of Resolution 1325 at a national and regional level.
The enthusiasm and energy with which participants have used the consultations as a networking springboard to further develop peacebuilding initiatives, also indicates the potential for such an instrument to be used as an advocacy tool in different contexts. There is a real need for on going fostering, support, encouragement and integration of local, national and regional initiatives, as well as taking the lessons learnt from these levels to be used as a resource in the refinement of global peace and security policy and practice.
The WBP Campaign has been asked by local partners to facilitate similar consultations in Colombia, Afghanistan, Zimbabwe, Sri – Lanka, Sudan, Somalia, the Great Lakes of Africa and in French West Africa. These are very diverse conflict situations and peacebuilding contexts. This diversity puts global policy to the test in terms of its applicability in practice. Yet lessons at this early stage have been positive.
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By Nicola Johnston, Senior Policy Advisor, Women Building Peace Campaign, International Alert