Protecting the Rights of Women in the Arab Region in the Post 2015 Agenda, CSW59

This discussion will be presented by WLP and Equality Without Reservation as a parallel event from the 59th Session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW). Panelists from MENA regions will draw on experience working as human and women's rights defenders at grassroots, regional, and international levels. They will highlight key strategies likely to ensure that women's rights and entitlements are an integral component of the post-2015 agenda.

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is now in its fourth year post-Arab spring. Although hopes were high for a peaceful transition towards peace, democracy, participation, prosperity, development and inclusive citizenship, realities indicate backlash as well as rapid erosion of rights. Militarization, chaos, lawlessness and increased power of armed religious fundamentalist groups are threatening the mere existence of women. Women's freedom and agency is at risk, there is a reversing trend in women's access to health and education, and brutal exclusion from political and economic life. It is challenging to envisage a post 2015 agenda within current context, and a discussion of a potential Beijing + 20 will need to take into consideration potential losses on earlier gains that may occur, given rise of conservative forces in the MENA region and other parts of the world.

Panelists will argue that strategies combining strong analysis, grassroots action, and solidarity building, and a commitment to inclusive and participatory democracy are key factors to ensuring that women's rights are upheld during this critical period.