Mr President, Australia welcomes Azerbaijan bringing the Council's focus to the critical intersection between the rule of law and transitional justice, and the women, peace and security agenda. I thank the Secretary- General, and the High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ms Pillay for their determined efforts. And Ms Brigitte Balipou for inspiring struggle on the frontlines.

Local justice remains critical to the long-term healing and the reconciliation of communities, and affected States need to ensure accountability for conflict-related crimes. But to be effective, this must include justice for crimes of sexual violence.

In post-conflict settings, women's full and effective participation is fundamental to efforts to rebuild the justice sector and to security sector reform. In Solomon Islands for example, Australia supported, through the Participating Police Force, the post-conflict recruitment and retention of female officers to the local police force.

In post-conflict settings, women's full and effective participation is fundamental to efforts to rebuild the justice sector and to security sector reform. In Solomon Islands for example, Australia supported, through the Participating Police Force, the post-conflict recruitment and retention of female officers to the local police force.

In concluding, Mr President The High-Level Review of resolution 1325 in 2015 provides a necessary opportunity to take stock of our successes, and to address the ongoing challenges in implementing the women, peace and security agenda. The Council's dedicated field mission ahead of this will be important in providing us with direct insights to help inform these discussions.

For the Council to remain responsive, it is critical that timely and relevant information and analysis is provided systematically by all UN actors deployed on conflict resolution and peacebuilding efforts. We commend today's resolution for clearly articulating this.

Engaging women as leaders is critical to building sustainable peace. We must identify and address impediments that prevent women from participating in decision-making. We commend Mary Robinson's appointment as Special Envoy to the Great Lakes Region, and her long overdue approach to consulting early with women in the Democratic Republic of Congo.

We view this open debate as an opportunity to highlight the policies and programmes aimed at supporting national ownership and reform of justice systems that place women's rights and access to justice for women at their heart. As the recent declaration of the Peacebuilding Commission on women's economic empowerment for peacebuilding underscores, societies that invest in women see exponential dividends from such investments.

We thank the Secretary- General, the Executive Director of UN Women, High Commissioner Pillay and Ms. Brigitte Balipou, the representative of the NGO Working Group on Women, Peace and Security, for their active involvement and valuable contributions. We also welcome the unanimous adoption of resolution 2122 (2013) by the Council earlier today, calling for higher levels of women's involvement in peacekeeping and peacebuilding.

We also believe that without women's civil society strength and women's leadership, there will be no effective prevention. Women's experiences of violence during and after conflict are much broader, and effective protection from all forms of violence and violations will be possible only through their empowerment and participation.