What changed

K. whereas armed conflict, forced displacement, the consequences of climate change and humanitarian emergencies worsen inequalities and weaken protection systems, leaving women and girls at greater risk of gender-based violence, including forced marriage, sexual violence during transit, trafficking, gender-based violence in reception or asylum centres and sexual violence and torture used as weapons of war; whereas conflict-related sexual violence remains one of the most widespread human rights violations, used to terrorise civilian populations, suppress resistance and destroy communities, and may constituteconstitutes a war crime, a crime against humanity or acts contributing to genocide under international law; whereas the UN’s Women, Peace and Security agenda is central to addressing contemporary global peace and security challenges; whereas ongoing armed conflicts, as well as emerging and increasingly complex security threats, disproportionately affect women and girls and have led to a deterioration of their status, with detrimental consequences for the full enjoyment of their human rights globally;

(d) call for the establishment of monitoring and accountability frameworks to track the implementation of UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) commitments across all Member States and UN partners;

(d) ensure that EU and international instruments are complementary and ambitious, with robust and substantive provisions to empower women and girls and guarantee access to justice; stress that the right to legal aid and legal advocacy is essential to guarantee universal and equal access to justice for all and effective participation in relevant proceedings; stress, furthermore, that persons with disabilities, particularly women and girls with disabilities, face structural and practical barriers to accessing justice and public participation; emphasise the need for specific measures to guarantee their full inclusion and universal access to effective protection; ensure that the EU demonstrates strong leadership and adopts a unified position on inclusive and unbiased justice systems; advocate for comprehensive legal frameworks that protect women’s rights and ensure the full and equal participation of women, girls and people in all their diversity under both national and international law; call for ensuring and promoting victims’ right to timely offender-paid compensation within criminal proceedings and for exchanging best practice to prevent secondary victimisation, including through state subrogation mechanisms;

(e) ensure that EU and international instruments are complementary and ambitious, with robust and substantive provisions to empower women and girls and guarantee access to justice; stress that the right to legal aid and legal advocacy is essential to guarantee universal and equal access to justice for all and effective participation in relevant proceedings; stress, furthermore, that persons with disabilities, particularly women and girls with disabilities, face structural and practical barriers to accessing justice and public participation; emphasise the need for specific measures to guarantee their full inclusion and universal access to effective protection; ensure that the EU demonstrates strong leadership and adopts a unified position on inclusive and unbiased justice systems and explore the possibility of implementing specific specialised courts for gender-based violence; advocate for comprehensive legal frameworks that protect women’s rights and ensure the full and equal participation of women, girls and people in all their diversity under both national and international law; call for ensuring and promoting victims’ right to timely offender-paid compensation within criminal proceedings and for exchanging best practice to prevent secondary victimisation, including through state subrogation mechanisms;

(e) take action to fully implement existing commitments on gender equality and women’s empowerment, ensuring the protection of women’s equal human rights and fundamental freedoms without discrimination, to advance their participation in public life;

(f) take action to fully implement existing commitments on gender equality and women’s empowerment, ensuring the protection of women’s equal human rights and fundamental freedoms without discrimination, to advance their participation in public life; encourage and take action to ensure substantive gender equality and institutional gender parity at all levels of decision-making;

(f) emphasise the importance of supporting public policies that promote and support motherhood;

(g) emphasise the importance of guaranteeing women and girls effective access to justice at all levels, including clear reporting channels and the swift processing of protection and support measures; eliminate obstacles, particularly for disadvantaged and vulnerable groups of women, who often face barriers in accessing justice, owing to the multiplying effect of limited and underfunded resources within the justice system, as well as socio-economic and socio-cultural factors and intersectional discrimination; ensure adequate, victim-centred support and protection services in cases of gender-based violence, and prevent any form of secondary victimisation when reports are made to the police or during court proceedings; call for enhanced international cross-border mechanisms to ensure that victims of violence – especially migrants, refugees and people in need of international protection – can access justice across different countries; highlight that economic inequality remains a significant obstacle to accessing justice;

(i) ensure the exchange of best practices, including through judicial training, regarding the psychological, mental, physical, coercive and financial impacts of gender-based violence; strengthen and expand dedicated courts, divisions or specialised procedures for gender-based violence or designate specialised judges within regular courts; commit to and encourage the integration of a gender perspective in judicial decision-making; encourage the possibility of providing female lawyers for victims upon request; promote gender-sensitive, victim-centred training for officials coming into contact with victims, in line with their functions, including police officers, prosecutors and judges, to prevent secondary victimisation, tackle gender stereotypes and biases, and ensure respectful, trauma-sensitive, non-discriminatory treatment of victims;

(x) condemn, in the strongest terms, the use of rape and other forms of sexual violence as a weapon of war and recall that such acts may constitute war crimes or crimes against humanity under international law; actively work to ensure the prosecution of and accountability for these types of crimes at international level, including through the application of the EU Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime; strengthen support for international efforts to document these crimes in ongoing conflicts and for prevention measures; call, furthermore, for active support for all initiatives aimed at ensuring accountability for perpetrators and access to justice for survivors of rape as a weapon of war, recognising that in accordance with UN Security Council Regulation 1820 (2008), rape and other forms of sexual violence can constitute war crimes, crimes against humanity, or acts contributing to genocide; promote the close cooperation of Eurojust with the International Criminal Court (ICC) on the documentation of wartime rape, abuse and other forms of sexual violence in Ukraine, and call for the EU, Eurojust and the ICC to further strengthen coordinated, trauma-informed and victim-centred documentation efforts, and create cooperation frameworks globally for other conflict zones, to ensure that victims are identified, protected and able to access justice;

(aa) reaffirm the right of women and girls subjected to acts of persecution owing to gender-based violence to seek asylum; call on governments and international bodies to address specific risks faced by women and girls in migration and to implement gender-responsive policies, including the establishment of safe and legal routes, the strengthening of the protection of women from violence in reception centres and the improvement of age-assessment procedures; call for the recognition of gender-based persecution and gender apartheid as grounds for seeking asylum;