| International Women’s Day 2010 will no doubt produce from official sources, local and abroad, a predictable list of gains made by women. A cursory reading of the statement for International Women’s Day 2010 by the Secretary-General (SG) of the United Nations (UN) suggests that the advancement of women is a central concern of that organisation.While no doubt a genuine expression of personal sentiments,Jordan Sneakers Wholesale, there is little evidence to suggest they are shared by those who exercise power in the organisation.The low status of women at the United Nations, the premier multi-national agency, is a well-established fact, whether viewed from representational, funding or staffing perspectives.The over-all budget allocated to women’s activity in the UN is a pittance compared, for example, to agencies working with children. UNIFEM, the women’s fund, in fact, has no capacity to design, finance, implement, staff and manage its own programmes on major issues affecting women.The UN SG’s statement referred to above indirectly acknowledges this fact in stating that “…we hope soon to have a dynamic composite entity within the UN system to provide more coherent programming and a stronger voice for gender equality and women’s empowerment” – fifteen years after the Beijing World Conference on Women!Contrary to the notion that women’s rights and status are secure in the highest international fora,Cheap Jerseys From China, the reality is that women’s rights spiked in the 90s and have steadily receded since.As gender mainstreaming has replaced women’s rights, funding rights-based initiatives have become more difficult. In the context of the large numbers of women infected by HIV due to powerlessness to negotiate their sexual lives, it is scandalous that no UN Agency has specific responsibility for promoting reproductive rights of women.Moreover,Cheap Nike Air Max 97 Shoes, the UN gender parity date was postponed from 2000 to 2010 and hasn’t been heard of for a long time.The HIV/AIDS pandemic provides the most reliable indicator of where women figure in multi-lateral priorities. Persistent reluctance to unequivocally acknowledge women as the group most vulnerable to high levels of infection is not restricted to the United Nations. Ambivalence of UNAIDS, the World Bank and the Global Fund on the issue demonstrate that recognition of women as the major population affected by HIV/AIDS is a battle that women are currently losing, judging by major reports published by all these organisations in 2009.The striking feature of all three strategy documents is their unwillingness to talk about women and girls as a priority sector, or about women’s rights except in relation to men. Despite the long-standing and widespread evidence of heterosexual transmission being the primary driver of HIV,Nike Shox Clearance, UNAIDS could issue a statement in May 2009 to the effect that,Jordan Shoes For Sale Cheap, “a growing body of evidence shows that the majority of new infections in many urban areas are among men who have sex with men.”Indeed, this supposed ‘evidence’ provides the basis for the UNAIDS strategy for addressing women and girls which is stated to be, “intrinsically linked with and will be operationalised in conjunction with the UNAIDS Action framework on Universal Access for Men Who Have Sex with Men and Transgender people”.This leaves us with an extraordinary state of affairs in which the strategy for addressing HIV infection among 50 per cent of the population (women) is determined by the strategy devised to address the fraction of the population comprising men who have sex with men (estimated at 3% of the population) and the fraction of one per cent which makes up the transgender population.To state that women ‘have fallen through the cracks’ seems an inappropriate metaphor to refer to half of the population.Domestically, failure to bring the Sexual Offences Bill into law constitutes the most significant disappointment with respect to women. After nine months ‘Stamping It Out” in the long grass of the Select Committee, expectations and momentum are waning.Domestic violence continues to attract headlines and media attention due to the frequency of dreadful acts of violence against women and isolated official events of symbolic value involving men.No less than at the international level,NFL Jerseys From China, concerted national strategies, backed by significant resources and cross-party political support remain at the level of hopes and promises. |
