“It is important to build bridges, not only to connect different government ministries or women's organizations but also across all the sectors and areas of responsibility to connect different stakeholders in different countries to reach our goal for the full implementation of the Resolutions on women peace and security.”

Thirty years after an international treaty banning discrimination against women came into force, women and girls are still suffering from the scourge, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon warned today.

The US Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women's Issues Melanne Verveer said on Saturday that Burma's military junta must be held accountable for human rights abuses against the country's women.

“We have said over and over that there must be accountability for these human rights violations,” she said, adding that those guilty of crimes against women should be prosecuted.

A landmark UN treaty on women's rights, which will be 30 years old next week, is in danger of being politically undermined by a slew of reservations by 22 countries seeking exemptions from some of the convention's legal obligations.

"A reservation must not defeat the object and purpose of a treaty," Ambassador Palitha Kohona, a former chief of the UN Treaty Section, told IPS.

Women in the Middle East have made notable advances over the past five years, with modest overall improvements in women's rights, literacy, educational attainment, political participation and economic role, an extensive multinational study has found.

On the eve of Iraq's second nationwide election, a car bomb killed at least three pilgrims and wounded more than 30 near a Shiite shrine.

Violence has dropped dramatically since the first election, and the type of candidate running for office has changed too, reports CBS News Correspondent Elizabeth Palmer.

On this International Women's Day, it is fitting that we reflect upon United Nations Security Council Resolution 1325, adopted almost ten years ago. With this resolution, the United Nations recognized that conflict disproportionately impacts civilians, and particularly women.

What do women fishing, school building and better farming skills have to do with U.S. national security? A lot — and that's a bipartisan consensus.

Today, International Women's Day, marks the economic, social and political achievements of women.

The theme of this year's International Women's Day is ‘Empowering Women to End Poverty by 2015'.

Removing discrimination and actively supporting women's full participation in economic, social and political life is a key factor in reducing poverty and increasing the general wellbeing of women.