National Action Plan: Japan commits to implementing its revised National Action Plan (2019-2022) on UNSCR 1325 and relevant resolutions.
Japan has steadily implemented our revised National Action Plan on WPS from 2019 to 2022.
Implementation updates from past years can be found on the website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Japan reported on WPS in its reporting on Beijing+25 (pgs.37-39)
Japan will also provide financial support to Sri Lanka including developing its National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security under the G7 WPS Partnership Initiative.
Progress has been made in the drafting of the National Action Plan in Sri Lanka since April 2019. In addition, Japan has provided a grant aid worth USD2 million through UN Women to carry out the second phase of the ongoing WPS project in Sri Lanka.
The effective implementation of projects can sometimes suffer because of the profound security issues and challenges. Forexample, Japan’s supported programming in Sri Lanka had to be postponed because of terrorism risks. It sometimes has limited budgetary terms (of 1-2 years) and is difficult when progress of that project is delayed.
The cooperation agreement between Japan and Sri Lanka can be found here – Signing of Grant Contract between the Embassy of Japan and UN Women Sri Lanka
Relief and Recovery: Japan will strengthen gender responsive humanitarian relief, rehabilitation and recovery assistance through international organizations such UNICEF, UNFPA, WFP, OCHA, IOM, including Japanese NGOs working on this area. As the G20 Summit Chair, Japan will strongly promote women’s economic empowerment and girls’ education at the Osaka G20 Summit in 2019
As an official side-event of the G20 Osaka summit in June 2019, Japan convened the Leaders’ Special Event on Women’s Empowerment, highlighting the importance and necessity of further efforts relating to women’s issues and the G20’s commitment to women’s empowerment. Japan has continuously provided gender responsive humanitarian relief, rehabilitation and recovery assistance through international organizations such as UNICEF, UNFPA, WFP, OCHA and IOM.
From 2016, Japan’s Development Strategy for Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment references 1325 in the context of sexual violence in conflict.
Peacekeeping: Continue to provide support for UN Women’s Female Military Officers Course, targeting peacekeepers from major troop contributing countries.
Japan co-funded conduct of the said course in Nairobi, Kenya in April 2019. Japan has also provided financial assistance to the UN “Senior Women Talent Pipeline”, a talent pool of external high potential female candidates for senior-level positions in UN peacekeeping and special political missions.
Financial commitments: Japan pledges to financially support 14 projects with UN Women worth USD 12 million and 3 projects led by the Team of Experts on the Rule of Law and Sexual Violence in Conflict in Kenya, Iraq and Jordan, CAR and DRC.
14 projects with UN Women and 3 projects with the Team of Experts on the Rule of Law and Sexual Violence in Conflict have been implemented from April 2019 and will be finalized by the end of March 2020.
In 2019, Japan was the seventh-largest government contributor to UN Women with USD 17.65 million and the fourteenth-largest regular resources contributor with USD 3.93 million.