News

Pakhi Begum left Bangladesh for Dubai to work as a maid, only to find that her recruiter had sold her into domestic servitude. After months of hard labour and abuse she fell ill and was sent back to Bangladesh without being paid. UN Women has been working to protect the rights of women migrant workers [...]

To mark the 30th anniversary of the creation of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, UN Women and OHCHR will host an event to celebrate its work.  The event will highlight the Committee’s work on the protection and promotion of women’s human rights under the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms [...]

Women’s participation in political life in Mexico has yet to reach the international commitment  to women occupying 30 per cent of elected positions. But the country is at a critical time to change this. The upcoming elections on July 1, 2012 could increase women’s political representation, currently at  27 per cent in Congress, and 21 [...]

Since 2009, workshops by the Rainbow Women’s Network (RWN) have been training marginalized women in Fijian communities. Supported by UN Women’s Pacific Regional Facility Fund to end violence against women, it has helped more than 100 women deal with issues ranging from their sexual and gender identities, to HIV/AIDS awareness, violence and abuse. RWN members [...]

Individuals, non-governmental organizations, groups and networks are invited to submit written communications—including, but not limited to, complaints, appeals and petitions—to the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) with information on alleged injustices and human rights violations against women in any country. Examples of claims include arbitrary arrests of women, domestic violence, unfair employment practices [...]

When Thabita Mukamusana’s partner died shortly after the birth of their child, she raised their son without hope of connecting him to his paternal family, or his inheritance, in her village in south-west Rwanda. Because the boy had been born outside of marriage, she believed that any claim would be impossible. Yet things recently turned [...]

On 21 June the Women Leaders’ High Level Summit gathered women Heads of State and Governments who pledged their support and urged governments, civil society and the private sector to prioritize gender equality and women’s empowerment in the sustainable development agenda. Calling on global leaders to accelerate actions and policies for a sustainable future, the [...]

On the sidelines of the Rio+20 Conference this week, UN Women and the Latin American Development Bank (CAF) signed an agreement with the aim of strengthening the work developed by both organizations in the area of poverty reduction. In recent years, Latin America has achieved significant gains in poverty reduction. However, there is still a [...]

In a dynamic panel discussion at the Rio+Social Summit, UN Women’s Executive Director, Michelle Bachelet spoke of women’s pivotal role in  sustainable development, to an offline audience of more than 600 bloggers and key digital influencers, and an online audience of many thousands more. “The Gender Impact: Women Making Development Sustainable”was streamed live during the [...]

The Women Leaders’ Forum, a discussion between civil society, government and public sector representatives with UN heads of agencies, has broadened the dialogue on gender equality and sustainability at Rio +20, the United Nations Conference on Sustainability. Organized by UN Women in collaboration with the Government of Brazil and other partners, the day-long event highlighted [...]