The Pandemic Has Made The World Worse For Female Activists, The U.n. Says

UNITED NATIONS — Women seeking to participate in shaping and building peace and defending human rights face a “vastly worse” situation now than they did before the COVID-19 pandemic, the United Nations human rights chief said Tuesday. Michelle Bachelet told the U.N. Security Council that in 2020 her office verified 35 killings of women human rights defenders, journalists and trade union members in seven conflict-affected countries where data is available. “This number, which is certainly an undercount, surpassed the confirmed number of killings in 2018 and 2019,” she said in a virtual briefing. Bachelet said her Geneva-based office also documented patterns of attacks against women working on gender equality, sexual and reproductive health and rights, corruption, labor rights and environmental and land issues. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] “In every region,” she said, “we have seen women subjected to arrests and detention; intimidation; sexual violence, and harassment via smear campaigns” as well as intimidation and reprisals by government and non-government “actors” against people who cooperate with the United Nations. Despite the Security Council’s adoption in 2000 of a resolution demanding equal participation for women in peace negotiations and peace building, Bachelet said, “between 1992 and 2019 only 13 per cent of negotiators, 6 per cent of mediators and 6 per cent of signatories in major peace processes worldwide were women.” That was before the pandemic struck in early 2020, “and before a wave of intensifying conflicts, undemocratic political transitions and disastrous humanitarian crises took hold in many societies,” she said. Bachelet said the situation now facing women human rights defenders and prospects for women’s real participation in peace efforts is “vastly worse” and “harms all of us” because women’s participation is essential to promote peace. She singled out three examples: Afghanistan, Africa’s Sahel region and Myanmar. In Afghanistan, Bachelet said many women human rights defenders, journalists, lawyers and judges have been forced to flee or go into hiding after repeated threats following the Taliban takeover in August.