Today the 53rd session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women gets underway for ten days of meetings, greetings, roundtables and interactive panels and dialogue. This afternoon two roundtables, each with representatives from more than 95 countries will begin the discussion on this year's priority theme "The equal sharing of responsibilities between women and men, including care-giving in the context of HIV/AIDS".
The ‘context' is that 33 million people worldwide are living with HIV/AIDS, and of the 10 million who are in need, only 3 million are receiving treatment. It's estimated that 90% of all HIV/AIDS related care is given by women and girls who are facing deepening poverty, stigma, discrimination and isolation in their communities. As is the way with the CSW, it has already published its ‘Agreed Conclusions' with more than thirty policy recommendations, and over the next ten days these will be debated and negotiated by the states.
But this session is taking place in the shadow of the financial crisis and climate change, something that is reflected in the titles of many of the parallel events that are sponsored by the Permanent Missions to the UN - for example: Iceland - Gender Equality and Climate Change, India - Women and the Financial Crisis, and Turkey - Supporting Women Entrepreneurs. And Japan, South Korea and the Pacific Islands Forum are all offering examples of national and local gender equality initiatives. It's only 16 years since women's rights were recognised as human rights and there's a real sense that these rights may be pushed further down the global agenda as political interests compete in the face of the current crises. One session, a joint UK/Netherlands sponsored event, bluntly named ‘Gender, Sex and the Power to Survive', feels as if it just about sums up the struggle this year....
Meanwhile across the road at the Church Centre more than 250 NGO's will hold sessions. It's a great place of meeting, much greeting and an eclectic range of topics up for debate. It also has the great advantage that we don't have to queue for up to an hour each time - in zero degrees - to get into the building. Here are just a few of the scheduled sessions that have caught my eye. With a particular focus on the men there is ‘Fostering the Caring Nature of Men', ‘Positive Masculinities' and ‘How Men Can Act Against Violence Towards Women'. Then there are sessions on ‘Digital Story Telling', ‘Women Victors and Heroines', and ‘Celebrating 30 Years of CEDAW'. Other sessions are based on the grassroots testimony of women's lives in the current crisis, such as ‘Perspectives of Rural Women on the Financial Crisis' and ‘Human Trafficking'. But the variety is vast because for instance there is also ‘The Grail Story: Healing Psyche, Patriarchy and the Planet......