NETZWERK ARTIKEL 3 e.V. in Kooperation mit dem Sozialverband Deutschland e.V. (SoVD)

Results of the fifth session of the Ad Hoc Committee concerning the issue concerning the issue "women with disabilities"

Concerning the issue "women with disabilities"

A report about the 5th session of the Ad Hoc Committee and other documents have been published :

 www.un.org/esa/socdev/enable/rights/ahc5.htm 

In the report you will find the discussion of Article 12 Freedom from Violence and Abuse. Women are mentioned in note 45:

» There was also broad agreement that "women and girls" or "women and children" were particularly vulnerable to violence and abuse, but no agreement about where and how a reference to this issue should be included. Interested delegations were invited to confer about an appropriate way to deal with the issue. «

Otherwise you can’t find very much about the negotiations referring to women with disabilities in these official documents.

A report of Stefan Troemel, former director of the European Disability Forum (EDF) who is still attending the negotiations about the UN Convention, is more informative. He writes

• that the issue "women with disabilities" will be negotiated at the next session of the Ad Hoc Committee (1st - 12th of August, 2005 in New York);
  
  
• that the International Disability Caucus (IDC) has established a working group on women with disabilities;
  
  
• that there are three alternative options on how best to integrate women with disabilities issues:
  • a separate article
    gender mainstreaming (this means to mention women and their needs in all relevant articles)
    
  • a combination of both;
• that there is a strong opposition within the EU on having a separate article and even to have many gender references in other articles.

Stefan Troemel favours the third option, a combination: » There should be a short specific article to reinforce the mainstreaming of gender issues throughout the text «. Additionally there have to be gender references in a number of articles.

Current director of EDF Carlotta Besozzi complemented this report during her visit to German Disability Council on 21st of March:

• During its next session in August the Ad Hoc Committee will continue its work with draft article 15. As the Republic of Korea has proposed an article "15 bis: women with disabilities" it’s to expect that member states are going to discuss how best to refer to women throughout the convention.
  
  
• Carlotta Besozzi confirmed that there has been a discussion on how to refer to disabled women during the reading of draft article 12 "freedom from violence and abuse". There are mainly to opinions: either to refer to disabled women in this context within the preamble or to refer directly within article 12.
  
  
• Next to the Ad Hoc Committee’s session there was a seminar of IDC on the topic of disabled women taking place. But also so far NGOs do not have a common opinion on how to integrate the issues of disabled women in the Convention. Finally, with regard to Korea’s proposal an article "15 bis" on disabled women was drafted.
  
  
• United Kingdom, which will have the EU presidency during the 2nd half of the year, is planning a regional conference in July to prepare the European position for the August’s session of the Ad Hoc Committee. NGOs will be invited to this regional conference and EDF is preparing a position paper.
  
  
• Carlotta Besozzi considered that there is no Member State denying to include the women’s perspective at all. The issue would be if there will be a separate article on disabled women or a gender perspective throughout the convention or both.

Consequences: What should be done till the next session of the Ad Hoc Committee?

The proposals to complement the draft convention of the German women and Lydia la Riviére-Zijdel have to be promoted because a weak specific article referring to "women with disabilities" is counterproductive. It could be misinterpreted by States as if this is the only article in the whole convention that applies to women with disabilities.
EU member states opposing so far have to be convinced of the importance to include gender issues.
These proposals to complement the draft convention have also to be promoted within IDC, especially within IDC’s working group on women with disabilities.
Finally these positions should also be included in the paper EDF is going to develop with regard to the regional conference in July and the Ad Hoc Session in August.

Further informations to be found under:  www.un-disabledwomen.org 

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      updated:
  on  Friday, 2024.06.14, 11.03

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