Women

Generations of progress stands to be lost on women and girls' empowerment during the COVID-19 pandemic.
ILO

Generations of progress for women and girls could be lost to COVID pandemic, UN chief warns

31 August 2020
Global

Highlighting the disproportionate and devastating socio-economic impact of COVID-19 on women and girls globally, The UN chief António Guterres called on Monday for a major push to prevent “years, even generations” worth of progress on women’s empowerment, from being lost to the pandemic. 

The chieftainess has led her community to embrace the empowerment of girls.
© UNFPA Zambia

One step at a time: UN women’s health agency helping shift dangerous social norms 

24 August 2020
Global

One of the largest chiefdoms in Zambia’s Eastern Province is challenging harmful social norms, including child marriage, risky initiation and impunity for perpetrators of sexual abuse, according to the UN women’s health agency, UNFPA.

Women near the town of Kladanj, in Bosnia and Herzegovina (1995).
© UNICEF/LeMoyne

Bosnia and Herzegovina should recognise sex crime survivors’ rights, say experts

19 August 2020
Europe

In Bosnia and Herzegovina, tens of thousands of victims of sexual violence committed during conflict in the 1990s still await justice, UN-appointed rights experts said on Wednesday.

Sudanese refugees flee across the border to escape Darfur violence. Twenty-three-year-old Sudanese refugee fled with her children to Kartafa in Chad in July 2020.
© UNHCR/Aristophane Ngargoune

Violence in Sudan’s Western Darfur forces 2,500 into Chad: UN refugee agency

11 August 2020
Africa

Recent clashes in Sudan’s Western Darfur region has driven more than 2,500 people across the border into neighbouring Chad, the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) has reported.

A woman breastfeeds her newborn at a hospital in Belgrade, Serbia. Photo: UNICEF/NYHQ2011-1166/Holt
UNICEF

Breastfeeding link to COVID-19 is negligible, says World Health Organization

4 August 2020
Global

The risk of COVID-19 infection from breastfeeding is negligible and has never been documented, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Tuesday, in a call for greater support for the practice. 

Development workers hand over relief aid to a woman amid the COVID-19 pandemic in Dhaka, Bangladesh.
UN Women/Fahad Kaizer

Harness multilateralism’s power to urgently advance women’s rights amid COVID recovery

21 July 2020

With essential resources for women’s health being diverted to emergency COVID-19 response around the world, Governments, civil society leaders, CEOs and academic experts gathered virtually on Tuesday, to explore ways to accelerate the achievement of landmark targets set 25 years ago for gender equality and women’s empowerment.

UN Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed (file photo).
ECA

‘Women Rise for All’ to shape leadership in pandemic response and recovery

14 July 2020
Global

Although the COVID-19 pandemic has generated an unprecedented global health, humanitarian and development crisis, it has also revealed the power of women’s leadership, according to the UN Deputy Secretary-General.

Radio Miraya host, Irene Lasu, works out of the UN peacekeeping mission in South Sudan (UNMISS). (file)
UNMISS/Isaac Billy

UN expert calls for end to gender-based violence against women journalists

8 July 2020
Global

Women journalists face particular dangers while going about their work, an independent UN expert told the UN Human Rights Council on Wednesday, saying that Governments should do more to protect them. 

The UN Trust Fund in support of victims of sexual exploitation and abuse has supported women in the Democratic Republic of the Congo receive vocational trainings like sewing.
MONUSCO/Michael Ali

Restoring dignity to victims of sexual abuse and exploitation by UN personnel

6 July 2020
Africa

Projects supported by a UN trust fund for victims of sexual exploitation and abuse by UN personnel, are helping victims to regain their dignity, learn new skills, and improve their livelihoods.

Demonstrators take to the streets in the Sudanese capital, Khartoum on 11 April 2019,
UN Sudan/Ayman Suliman

FROM THE FIELD: Sudanese women ready to ‘break taboos’ and run for office

25 June 2020
Africa

Since the 2019 Sudan protests, which ushered in a transitional government, and the promise of more rights, over a thousand women have felt emboldened to enter politics in a bid to enact lasting democratic change.