The sixty-fifth session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW65) took place between 15-26 March 2021 and had as priority theme the “Women’s full and effective participation and decision-making in public life, as well as the elimination of violence, for achieving gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls”.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the sixty-fifth session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW65) is scheduled to take place virtually/online .
One of the online sessions was “Advocating for peace during a pandemic: The impact of COVID-19 on WPS implementation in Eastern Europe, South Caucasus, Central Asia and Africa” and our member, Valentina Bodrug, represented Moldova.
Women peacebuilders have acted as first responders in the COVID-19 pandemic around the world. However, at the same time, they have sustained their advocacy and work towards inclusive peacebuilding and effective implementation of WPS. The proposed panel discussion, featuring women peacebuilders from Eastern Europe, South Caucasus and Africa, aims to explore good practices and lessons learned from addressing the COVID-19 pandemic through a gender and peacebuilding lens, and discuss concrete recommendations for gender-responsive and conflict-sensitive COVID-19 recovery, which emerged from regional consultations held by the Global Network of Women Peacebuilders.
Moldova’s experience with the impact of COVID-19 on women peace and security agenda implementation:
- In 2018, the National Program on Implementation the UNSC Resolution 1325 on WPS for 2018-2021 and the National Action Plan regarding the implementation of the Program were adopted;
- Ministry of Interior Affairs, Ministry of Defence, Custom Service, Intelligence Service are implementing the institution’s plan;
- The Working Coordination group was established.
Implementation of NAP: good practices
- Localization of WPS Agenda / NAP in Cahul and Balti / capacity building of local authorities and multi-sectional specialists – supported by GNWP and ADA in the framework of the project “Local communities build and sustain peace: strengthening women and youth participation in building sustainable peace in Armenia, Georgia, Kenya, Moldova, Ukraine”;
- Inclusion of WPS subjects into training program in educational institutions in security sector / Police Border College training OSCE;
- Cooperation between CSOs (Gender-Centru, Platform for Gender Equality, NATO Center ) and Central and Local Public Authorities;
- Regional cooperation – sharing experience – best practices (Georgia and Ukraine / GNWP / ADA support / + UN Women).
The crisis induced by COVID-19 pandemic worsened living condition for women:
- Women keep being involved in the household that requires most effort and time, such as taking care of children and dependent adults, cleaning, cooking, etc;
- Elderly women are stuck in circumstances of marginalization and exclusion;
- The closure of educational institutions overloaded the parents, especially women.
„In the first place, I think in Moldova we need to establish strong dialog between all actors, including Parliament, central authorities, local authorities, NGOs from different fields. Secondly, it’s very important to mainstream gender into an all recovering action and also gender budgeting is crucial because we discuss a lot about women’s peace and security agenda implementation but without money, without resources… Most actions are implemented by NGOs and we have colleagues from governmental level who are very active but there is no money, there is no budgeting focused on these issues.
I would like to address a special message to our development partner: please continuously support our effort , our cooperation between two banks of the Dniester river, from the Transnistrian region, Gagauzia, and of course from all Moldova. It’s very important to be connected , to be gender sensitive, and to address all gender needs of our population and all action plans. ” mentioned Valentina Bodrug during the event.
You can listen the conference here.
