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'Women Defending Peace' - the international gathering co-hosted by the Swiss Government and the Suzanne Mubarak Women's International Peace Movement, November 22-24 2004, Geneva

This working meeting brought together some 400 women and men -grassroots peace-builders, mediators, peace educators, first ladies and representatives of governments and intergovernmental organisations, to spend 2 days agreeing a Plan of Action.

A Global Coalition of Women Defending Peace will be formed, guided by the success of the campaign to ban landmines, to protect women and girls in time of war, stop human trafficking and support women in all stages of peace-building, including the implementation of UN Security Council Resolution 1325.
It became clear from the presentations, workshops and discussions that initiatives are underway in almost every country of the world, to build the foundations of peace from the bottom up. For every woman describing her work, we became aware that there are hundreds at home; this therefore appears to be a worldwide phenomenon. To make this better known, research will be commissioned for a 'Worldmap of Peacebuilding' website, with different coloured lights indicating all the known initiatives - click on one of these to see details of the work illustrated by photos and indications of how those in safer parts of the world can help.

The Coalition will develop a 5-year plan for three programmes


1.Women Defenders of Peace programme, to encourage and train local women in all levels of peace negotiation.
2.Custodians of Peace programme, working through improved early warning systems to protect women and girls from violence.
3.Women's Peace Watch programme, to bring media attention to trafficking in women and rape as a weapon of war.
Each programme to be monitored and evaluated against specific benchmarks.

Supporters of Women Defending Peace, either active at the gathering or sending messages of support or funding, include:


Micheline Calmy-Rey, Foreign Minister of Switzerland
Boutros Boutros-Ghali, former Secretary General of the UN
Jody Williams, Nobel Peace Prize 1997 for Banning Landmines
Jimmy Carter, former US President
Gertrude Mongella, President of the Pan-African Parliament
Shaikha Sabeeka Bint Ibrahim Al Khalifa, wife of H.M. the King of Bahrain
Bineta Diop, Femmes Africa Solidarite
Richard Gere, actor
Louise Arbor, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
Emma Bonino, former EU Commissioner
Patricia Lewis, director of the UN Institute for Disarmament Research

Extracts from the conference


'The participants list was a roll call for women leaders from the world's conflict hot spots: Great Lakes, Iraq, Israel, Palestine, Afghanistan, Serbia, Aceh, Nepal Liberia, Sri Lanka, Kosovo, Zimbabwe, Somalia, Sudan, Senegal, Syria, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Philippines, Guatemala, Angola, Uganda, Afghanistan, Burundi, Timor, Nepal, Nigeria, Columbia etc.

Women who have led successful peace initiatives are mostly in the informal sector such as NGOs and community groups. To give just a couple of examples from many:

Nobel Prize winner Jodie Williams described the tactics she used to mobilise the world to pass the treaty banning land-mines.

Gloria Isabel Montoya mayor of a small community in Columbia described her successful initiative leading and mobilising small local communities to resist aggression from armed groups.
Dr Simar Samar, Chair of the Afghanistan Human Rights Commission and former Minister for Women's Affairs described her work setting up a hospital for Afghan women and how when she was asked to set up the post Taliban Ministry for Women's Affairs in Kabul she had no office and was given a budget of a mere 20,000 US dollars. Her refusal to be cowed into wearing a head scarf plus her courage in speaking out against Taliban's version of Shari'a law made her a target for serious death threats. Dr Simar Samar concluded her talk by saying : "my greatest achievement is that I'm still alive."

At present there is a parallel universe. The people at the Peace Tables are from the formal sectors and mostly men. The clear message coming from this event is that women leaders in the informal sector are demanding to be included on equal terms with men in peace discussions and on setting any peace-building agenda. Women leaders have courage. Many of these women are in the front line in modern conflicts. At a modest estimate 90 percent of us at that conference at some point in our lives been shot at, bombed, rocketed or mortared or received death threats for working on human rights.'