« Cochabamba, night on the town... | Main | The President Speaks, the Vice Presidents Respond »

July 23, 2007

The Congress Opens, Sec Gen Report

The Congress began with a presentation by our host section, Bolivia. They welcomed us with an explanation of La Bolivianita, a unique combination of amethyst and citrine that only occurs in the region de la "Gaiba" Santa Cruz. They presented a bolivianita to each participant in Congress.

Roll Call

Each section was called by name and asked to say how many people were at the Congress as officially voting delegates.
Each section under 5,000 members is allowed 5 delegates plus the International Executive Committee member from their section. Any section over 5,000 members is given 3 additional delegates.
A section with only one person present gets 2 votes.

Sections present: I apologize, I was watching everyone stand to see who was from different sections, so I didn't write down the list. I will update this later today.

Sections not present:
Finland, Belarus, Burundi, Italy, Palestine, Peru, Phillipines, French Polynesia, Russian Federation, Sierra Leone.
The Irish Section asked to be dissolved; Bulgaria asked to be dissolved last year.

Secretary General Report
The full report will be available online at the Intl Website, /www.wilpf.int.ch
Structure of the Report

Peace Women
monitors and advocates 1325 in intl fora
Security Council Monitor - resolution report watch
women & UN reform
monthly PeaceWomen E-news
online advocacy
Advocacy for Implementation: within the UN system and with governments
present every year at the Commission on the Status of Women
training UN staff on gendered perspective in preparation of them going into the field
translation of the resolution: 78 currently. Looking for more and want to know how the translations are being used
Moving towards focusing on the Security Council itself: to help democratize the council
Women's participation and gender perspective checklist
Peacebuilding & Peacekeeping: peacebuilding is building sustainable peace in post-conflict situations
Committee of 34 that monitors peacekeeping situations
Gender Equality Architecture in UN Reform: what is it in this intl system that promotes gender equality?
Coordinating NY PeaceWomen work with the human rights work done at the Geneva office
CEDAW is moving from NY to Geneva

Reaching Critical Will
to increase quantity and quality of civil society engagement in multilateral disarmament processes
GA: 1st Committee, Conference on Disarament: only place mandated to make disarmament treaties, UN Disarmament Committion, Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
Recent book publications:
Model Nuclear Inventory: comprehensive review of all nuclear weapons capable countries and their fissile materials holdings
Nuclear Disorder or Cooperative Security: Review of the Weapons of Mass Destruction Commissions recommendations and suggestion on implementation in the US
Looking ahead


Jennifer Nordstrom completed her contract, Ray Acheson is currently filling in part-time while we search for a full time associate.

In Geneva
Information Hub: people are asking what is happening in other sections
Deadline for monthly update is the 12th of every month
Communications: looking to change the website and to get the money to do it.
Listservs are a great resource for keeping in touch between
Human Rights Council:
Instituion Building - first year just concluded.
Balance between Economic Social Cultural and Civil Rights
link between peace and human rights
Economic Justice: site linked through wilpf.int.ch
Disarmament: monitor all Geneva disarmament fora
Political opportunities


Cluster Munitions
Katherine Harrison from WILPF Norway has represented us at the first meeting in Oslo and the second meeting in Lima.
Biological Weapons, Gender Architecture
Commission on the Status of Women 2008: Women in Armed Conflict in regard to women's participation
CEDAW moving to Geneva

Coalitions
Conference of NGOs (CONGO) - recently nominate to the board

Staff
Marie Boroli, Intl Office Manager, Geneva
Sam Cook, Milkah Kihunah PeaceWomen Project Associate
Ray Acheson, Reaching Critical Will
In NY, many short term interns that facilitate the maintenance of the websites, do research and support the projects in innumerable ways
In Geneva, two long-term paid interns:
Disarmement: Katherine Harrison, Human Rights: Julia Federico; We encourage sections to nominate candidates for these internships
Swedish Cooperation: 10 weeks in Stockholm, 10 weeks in either NY or Geneva
Standing Committees: Finance, Communications, Personnel, Organizational Development
Working Groups: Peace and Security, Environmental Sustainability, Economic Justice

Our Sections
Losing sections in some sections, gaining members in other sections
Section Coordination:
3 days a year when all WILPF sections have an event
Section to Section Partnerships: Norway/Lebanon, Norway/Colombia, Sweden/Costa Rica

100th Anniversary
Mans van Zanderbergan, focal point

Advocacy - from the Local to the Global
Need to clearly articulate our goals and objectives

We are few but powerful, let us be many and unstoppable!

Posted by cj at July 23, 2007 7:27 AM

Comments

Post a comment

Thanks for signing in, . Now you can comment. (sign out)

(If you haven't left a comment here before, you may need to be approved by the site owner before your comment will appear. Until then, it won't appear on the entry. Thanks for waiting.)


Remember me?