During this 56th session of the Commission on the Status of Women, we have witnessed passionate and dynamic discussion with a very high level of participation from governments and civil society.
Unfortunately we have also witnessed an inability to reach consensus on the agreed conclusions on our priority theme, empowering rural women. We have come to an impasse, which is deeply regrettable.
This situation is unfortunate and I would like to express disappointment, disappointment that is shared by many women around the world, especially rural women and girls to whom this session was dedicated.
The discussions during the past two weeks gave us hope that stakeholders were ready to provide both priority attention and much needed resources to further women’s empowerment and gender equality in all its dimensions, including sexual and reproductive health, and access to technology, and other important areas.
I sincerely hope that despite the failure to adopted agreed conclusions Member States will live up to their commitments and responsibilities to improve rural women’s and girls’ lives in all dimensions and ensure their rights.
UN Women stands ready, together with our partners in the UN system, to empower rural women, to provide strong and coherent support to turn the commitments that delegations have mentioned in this session and that remain despite the lack of agreement, into tangible results for women on the ground.
During the session, delegations agreed and adopted a number of resolutions on vital matters such as eliminating maternal mortality and morbidity, the key role of indigenous women, and gender equality and the empowerment of women in natural disasters.
I would like to express the hope that we move forward guided by the consensus that has been reached in international agreements over many years regarding women’s rights, as articulated in the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), the Beijing Platform for Action, the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development, and other agreements.