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WAND
and the UN |
UN
Report: June 2007
Violence
Against Women in War -- and After
by Sayre Sheldon, WAND representative
on the NGO Working Group for Women, Peace and Security
It's not new, it's as old as history -- but maybe
for the first time we have a real chance to make it
history.
On my recent trip to the U.N.
for meetings on the new Peacebuilding Commission,
I listened to Goretti Ndcayisaba, the "peacebuilder"
our Working Group had brought from Burundi to testify
about what needs to be done if Burundi is not to relapse
into its twelve years of civil war.
Goretti was representing a
large women's network with a very long name which
in English is "Let's Reconcile." She spoke
to an audience of U.N. ambassadors and NGO's of the
failure so far to include local women in post-war
planning and decisions. One of the worst problems
was providing security for women so that girls could
once more go to school and women to their work. Arms
were still widely available. What's more if corruption
wasn't controlled, women would have no way of reporting
incidents of sexual violence.
The women Goretti helps organise
in Burundi are strengthened by their recently acquired
knowledge that international law exists to protect
them. But as she reminded us all, there are many steps
to be taken before women can be protected in war and
included in bringing about the real security that
must follow war.
Sayre
Sheldon, WAND president emerita
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A founding member of WAND and President Emerita
of the National WAND Board, Sayre has been a
long time political and social activist. She
is a college professor of literature and an
author of several plays and articles about women's
issues and peace issues.
She
edited the anthology Her War Story: 20th
Century Women Write About War, published
in 1999 by Southern Illinois University Press.
She represents WAND as an NGO at the United
Nations. |
