Switzerland has published its first report on their fourth national action plan on “Women, Peace and Security”, which shows how Switzerland implemented UN Security Council Resolution 1325 between October 2018 and the end of 2019.
Also see: Women, peace and security in Switzerland
National Action Plan: Switzerland is prioritizing the implementation of its recently launched fourth NAP (2018-2022). Building on these experiences, Switzerland commits to collaborate with Chad in developing its first National Action Plan by undertaking a Needs Assessment that will establish concrete baselines and recommendations by mid-2020.
The first phase of the project started in April 2019 and was completed at the end of August 2019. It was implemented through our partner GNWP. The first phase entailed an analysis of the context and a mapping of key actors (and their level of engagement), the structures in place, the priorities and existing legislations.
Some of the main findings of this first phase are:
- There are numerous local initiatives relevant to 1325 in Chad;
- Chadian women often take or demand a leadership role in conflict prevention on the local level;
- The international community supports a number of initiatives related to 1325 in Chad;
- There is an interest and political will of national authorities to work on the WPS agenda in Chad.
Based on these findings, Switzerland decided to support the Ministère de la Femme in the elaboration of the NAP, which will be the second phase of this ongoing initiative.
However, as we are still discussing the continuation of this project with our partner, the starting date of this second phase still has to be determined.
Some challenges were identified during the mapping exercise which are now reflected in the prioritization of the second phase. Concretely, it is essential that the involved Chadian Ministries take the lead and commit to a pan governmental approach in order to guarantee a support from the concerned sectors. Furthermore, a particular attention should be payed to the dissemination and implementation of policies and laws adopted at the national level. Ensuring an inclusive and localized approach should be guiding principles throughout the second phase of this initiative.
Human Rights: Switzerland will also work with the Global Network of Women Peacebuilders on a policy brief on linkages between corruption, human rights and the women, peace and security agenda. In addition, Switzerland will update its Guidelines for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders with a strong reference to Women Human Rights Defenders and publish these Guidelines.
Global Network of Women Peacebuilders (GNWP):
- Switzerland provides financial aid to the project of the Global Network of Women Peacebuilders (GNWP) concerning intersections between Corruption, Human Rights and Women, Peace and Security. The objective of the project is to establish the linkages between Corruption, Human Rights and the Women and Peace and Security agenda through the conduct of case studies and the production of a policy brief. The case study reports could be finalized. The development of the research tools, including questionnaires, took more time, because the researchers had to ensure that the questions were appropriate and sensitive, since victims of violence were interviewed.
- The policy brief is in elaboration. It will complement the case studies by looking at the impacts of corruption through a gender lens.
Guidelines on the Protection of Human Rights Defenders:
Switzerland updated its Guidelines on the protection of Human Rights Defenders in 2019. The new version of the Guidelines entails a strong reference to Women Human Rights Defenders, the importance of their role and the specific challenges they face.
Financial commitments: Switzerland will support the Office of the Special Representative on Women, Peace and Security of the Secretary General of NATO with a Voluntary National Contribution.
Switzerland deployed an Advisor to the NATO SGSR for WPS in September 2019. As part of the team of the SGSR, the Advisor is supporting the implementation of the NATO WPS Policy and Action Plan.
Challenges: Being a Partner (and not an Ally) can sometime limit the access to documents etc. in an organization like NATO; there are still resistance to the WPS agenda internally; the collaboration between civilian and military is not always as smooth as we would hope.