The University of The University of Winnipeg’s Marilou McPhedran is in Geneva, Switzerland to present to UN council
UWinnipeg’s Marilou McPhedran, Director of the Institute for International Women’s Rights at Global College landed in Geneva today, to make presentations this week as the only invited Canadian on two thematic Round Tables at Palais des Nations Unis (United Nations headquarters in Geneva), as part of the NGO Forum preceding the UNECE* Regional Review of Beijing+20 being held November 5-7th.
The first part of this week is devoted to a women’s NGO Forum for Europe, the USA and Canada. The 12 critical areas of the Beijing Platform for Action (arising from the Fourth UN World Conference held in Beijing in 1995) will be reviewed for progress made and gaps remaining after 20 years.
McPhedran is also accredited as a delegate to the formal session of the UNECE later this week, at which recommendations from the NGO Forum will be presented and negotiated in the lead-up to the world-wide review of ‘Beijing plus 20’ being held at UN headquarters in New York in March 2015.
Reached in Geneva, McPhedran explained that she is speaking on the Round Table on Poverty – looking at ‘legal empowerment of the poor’ and how militarism is leeching substance from social and economic rights in Canada. She is also presenting on the Round Table on Violence Against Women and Girls (VAWG) to recommend more attention be given to ‘non-state torture’ for example, as a result of sexualized private rituals and abuse, and to questioning the efficacy of the current UN normative framework for countering VAWG and holding government members of the UN accountable. Both conferences in Geneva this week will identify emerging women’s issues brought on by a changing world and examine government accountability for their commitments made to women’s rights, through ratification of treaties and protocols.
The outcome of the NGO Forum will feed into the ECE Regional Review Process and contribute to the Global Beijing+20 Report, as well as the post-2015 version of the Millennium Development Goals, which expire next year. National & international women’s rights advocates, UN agencies, academic institutions, media and private sector actors will also be in attendance.
McPhedran has a rich history with the United Nations going back to 1997 when she directed the first ‘CEDAW Impact Study’ She teaches an intensive field course for Global College that includes a study tour of the UN in NYC. In 2012 she was seconded to the UNFPA (UN Population Fund) as a human rights fellow. Most recently, she hosted a UN delegation of ‘blue berets’ – more than 25 women peacekeepers in Winnipeg for the International Association of Women Police conference. With UN Police trainers from the Peacekeeping Office in New York, and support from more than 30 UW and community volunteers, the women peacekeepers were welcomed onto the UW campus to participate in a “gender toolkit” train-the-trainer workshop, mandated by the UN, hosted on Sept. 28 and 30 by the Institute for International Women’s Rights at Global College.
