Democracy should apply to all women and men stated participants from the Council of Europe at the Conference on 'Women’s political representation in the Eastern Partnership countries – a regional study and exchange of information' which took place in Kyiv (Ukraine) on 1st December 2016.
The event brought together more than eighty participants representing Parliaments, Central Election Commissions, journalists, feminist civil society organisations, and independent gender experts from the Eastern Partnership region to exchange facts and figures on the current situation, as well as on how to support measures and strategies to enhance women’s political representation in EaP countries.
In her opening speech, Ms. Iryna Suslova, Chair of the Parliamentary sub-Committee on Gender Equality and Non-discrimination, conveyed to the Council of Europe Ukraine’s continuous commitment to ensure better representation of women in politics and in elections.
“Despite of the difficulties in ensuring proper participation and representation of women in political and civic life, we are optimistically looking at our future and one of our key priorities is ensuring employment of IDPs women and their integration in host communities,” said Ms. Natalia Fedorovych, Deputy Minister of Social Policy of Ukraine.
Mr. Francois Friederich, Head of Division of Electoral Assistance and Census, stated that participation of women is not only an issue of democracy, it is also, and foremost, a human right, and invited Eastern Partnership states to continue their engagement in respecting and promoting this right.
The study shows that there is a direct link between the countries with high underrepresentation of women in political life and the level of violence against women. In the this regard, his Excellency Hugues Mingarelli, EU Ambassador to Ukraine, stressed that “we should mobilise all our resources to prevent gender violence and we need to stress the importance of the Council of Europe and in particular its Istanbul Convention which is a very valuable policy framework to fight violence against women and invited all states represented here to ratify it.”
The regional study made a number of country specific and general recommendations to political parties, governments and ruling parties to be addressed through specific activities under the regional project on “Reforming electoral legislation and practice and developing regional co-operation” conducted by the European Union/Council of Europe Programmatic Co-operation Framework for Eastern Partnership countries implemented by the Directorate General of Democracy of the Council of Europe.
Council of Europe regional study - Women's political representation in EaP countries
Media reports on the conference from EaP countries
http://www.1news.az/society/20161205011225116.html
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