PRST/28/1 Twentieth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women and of the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action

GE.15-06872 (E)

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Human Rights Council Twenty-eighth session

Agenda item 1

Organizational and procedural matters

Statement by the President

PRST 28/1. Twentieth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on

Women and of the adoption of the Beijing Declaration and Platform for

Action

At the 52nd meeting, held on 25 March 2015, the President of the Human Rights

Council made the following statement:

“The Human Rights Council:

1. Notes that 2015 marks the twentieth anniversary of the Fourth World

Conference on Women, held in Beijing in 1995 and the adoption of the Beijing

Declaration and Platform for Action, which have contributed greatly to the

achievement of gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, while

recognizing the importance of the implementation of these commitments and

translating them into effective action by all States, the United Nations system and all

other relevant stakeholders;

2. Welcomes the progress made towards achieving gender equality, but

also notes that major challenges and obstacles remain in the implementation of the

Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, the outcome of the twenty-third special

session of the General Assembly1 and the declarations of the Commission on the

Status of Women on the tenth and fifteenth anniversaries of the Fourth World

Conference on Women;

3. Stresses that the full, effective and accelerated implementation of the

Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action is essential to achieving the

internationally agreed development goals, including the Millennium Development

Goals;

4. Welcomes the inclusion of gender equality and the empowerment of

all women and girls as a stand-alone goal in the proposed sustainable development

1 Resolution S-23/2, annex, and resolution S-23/3, annex.

goals, and looks forward to the integration of a gender perspective into the post-

2015 development agenda;

5. Calls upon States to take concrete steps towards promoting and

protecting all human rights of women and girls, eliminating all forms of

discrimination and violence against women and girls and removing impediments to

the development of their full potential as equal partners with men and boys, directed

to achieve gender equality and the empowerment of women in all spheres of life,

including decision-making processes at all levels, bearing in mind that the equal

enjoyment of the right to education is one of the keys to the empowerment of

women and girls and for ensuring equality and non-discrimination;

6. Reaffirms that Governments bear the primary responsibility for the

achievement of gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, and that

international cooperation has an essential role to play in assisting developing

countries in progressing towards the full implementation of the Beijing Declaration

and Platform for Action;

7. Endorses the pledge made by States in the political declaration on the

occasion of the twentieth anniversary of the Fourth World Conference on Women

adopted at the fifty-ninth session of the Commission on the Status of Women on 9

March 2015, and looks forward to the global leaders’ meeting on gender equality

and women’s empowerment on 26 September 2015.”