Speech

Speech: Women and girls must live lives free of violence in all spaces, everywhere

Remarks by UN Under-Secretary-General and UN Women Executive Director Sima Bahous at the Commission on the Status of Women high-level meeting on violence against women and girls (morning session), on 12 March 2026, at UN Headquarters.

UN Women Executive Director Sima Bahous

[As delivered.]

It is an honour to join you this morning at this High-level meeting on violence against women and girls. This meeting is a direct result of Commission on the Status of Women revitalization. It is a direct result of a recognition to elevate opportunities for exchange on issues that intersect all of our efforts, and permeate all of society.

From the Sustainable Development Goals and across the Beijing Platform for Action, ending violence against women and girls is its own imperative and an accelerator for all others. It is also a challenge that evolves ever faster. Conflicts are ever more prevalent, technology ever more utilized to facilitate and amplify forms of violence, both old and new.

UN Women Executive Director Sima Bahous at the Commission on the Status of Women High-Level Meeting on Violence against Women and Girls (morning session), on 12 March 2026, at UN Headquarters. Photo: UN Women/Ryan Brown.
UN Women Executive Director Sima Bahous at the Commission on the Status of Women High-Level Meeting on Violence against Women and Girls (morning session), on 12 March 2026, at UN Headquarters. Photo: UN Women/Ryan Brown.

Women’s organizations, on which so much of this agenda depends, are seeing their resources decline as prevalence rates go up. Even the gains of the past turn out to be more fragile than we had hoped, with measures to address violence against women and girls being actively rolled back.

That is why we must ensure that your achievements, innovations, and successes serve as an inspiration:

  • Your strengthening of global norms and standards
  • Your whole-of-government, whole-of-society, evidence-based, and long-term prevention approaches
  • Your engagement of men and boys
  • Your guarantee of survivor-centred justice and services for survivors
  • And your embrace of strong and autonomous women’s rights movements

Our successes—your successes—are transformative.

Through the EU-funded ACT Programme, UN Women and the UN Trust Fund to End Violence against Women and Girls have supported 757 women’s rights organizations around the world.

Through the Spotlight Initiative, UN Women and sister agencies have advanced over 540 legal and policy reforms to strengthen protections for women and girls, reaching some 384 million people.

From 2022 to 2024, UN Women invested USD 278.2 million across 100 countries; as a result, two billion women and girls now live under enhanced policy environments to end violence against them.

I thank our Member State partners for their role at the heart of these initiatives.

We have shown what works. Women and girls have lived the difference we have made. But far too many remain unreached. Far too many wait for promises to be kept.

We must draw unreservedly on the knowledge, lessons, and experiences in our hands. We must finally bring the necessary resources and energies to bear to end violence against women and girls.

And women and girls must, finally, live lives free of violence, in all spaces—public and private—everywhere.

I thank you.

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