Every Voice for Peace Counts: New Perspectives on the Women, Peace and Security Agenda

Excellencies, distinguished delegates, colleagues, and friends, good afternoon and welcome to this high-level event titled Every Voice for Peace Counts: New Perspectives on the Women, Peace, and Security Agenda. And we meet during Women, Peace, and Security Week. 26 years after the adoption of Security Council Resolution 1325. And we are 11 years on from Resolution 2222 on the protection of journalists and media professionals as civilians in situations of conflict, a principle that was helpfully reaffirmed in the Pact for the Future. And today we focus on women journalists and media professionals working in conflict and crisis. And I just want to mention that in 2024, UNESCO recorded the highest number of killings of women journalists since 2017, two-thirds of them killed in conflict zones. Also, we have another form of violence that is really disturbing, and that is online violence. It's very widespread, affecting 75% of women journalists, including very compellingly, Maria Ressa has talked a lot about that. I'm sure we'll hear more, but also how it affected her personally. 75% of women journalists surveyed said they had experienced online violence. And increasingly, it spills into offline harm too. 42% linked online attacks to offline abuse or assault, which was up from 20% in 2020. These women inform us, and they also hold power to account. They are reporting on the reality of societies and conflict and crisis, and they bring forward perspectives that are too often left out, and that's probably what makes them subject to attack. They're telling stories of women, of civil society, of the many actors who are making a difference in their communities. And they're doing themselves and playing their part in sustaining resilience and building societal cohesion for peace. So today we'll hear from them directly, and we will ask Member States also what they are doing. to protect them and ensure their meaningful participation. So I want to thank especially the Permanent Mission of Greece, UN Women, and UNESCO for bringing us together, as well as other committed partners. So to open our discussion, I am very pleased to be joined by three distinguished speakers for the opening segment: Her Excellency Ms. Aglaia, did I say it right?

Yes.

My colleague, Katerina, who is Greek, practiced with me, but I'm not sure if I did it right. And Balta, and she is the permanent representative of Greece to the United Nations. And then we have the Deputy Executive Director for Normative Support, UN System Coordination, and Program Benefits, Program Results from UN Women. She has also one of the names that are the most hardest to pronounce in the system. So, before I mangle it, you say your name.

Melissa, you can call me Naratsai. The rest is patriarchy.

Naratsai. Naratsai. And then we have Ms. Bigonia Lazagabaster, Director of the Division of Gender Equality at UNESCO, and each of them are going to share a few opening words. with us, and it is my honor first to give Ambassador Ball to the floor.

Thank you, distinguished guests. It is a privilege to stand before such an inspiring group of women. I wish to thank our organizers, UNESCO and UN Women, as well as our co-sponsors. A special word of thank you goes to our moderator, who whose tireless work ensures that reliable information reaches audiences around the world. I'm particularly pleased to share the opening segment of this event with two distinguished women, and I will follow your suggestion, Nira Raji and Begonya. I also extend a warm welcome to our keynote speaker, Maria. Maria Reza, you need no introduction. And we are truly honored to have you here with us. I would also like to thank our panelists who will share their insights and personal experiences. Organized on the margins of WPS Week, this side event seeks to highlight critical dimensions of the WPS agenda that too often do not receive the attention that they deserve. Thank you. The immense challenges faced by women journalists are a poignant example of this critical gap. Greece has long been steadfast in its commitment to the protection of journalists. During our previous term as an elected member of the Security Council in 2006, Greece and France presented the first Security Council resolution to bring the protection of journalists in armed conflict to the Security Council's attention. It established that the Council would address the issue under the agenda item "Protection of civilians in armed conflict." This year marks the 20th anniversary of Resolution 1738 of 2006, and it is a distinct privilege to commemorate this milestone with all of you today. Building on Resolution 1738, France and Lithuania in 2015 presented the second Security Council resolution on the protection of journalists in armed conflict. That resolution, Resolution 2222, also recognizes the specific risk faced by women journalists. As a follow-up to these two Security Resolutions, France, Lithuania, and Greece have established and co-chaired the Group of Friends for the Protection of Journalists here in New York. Moreover, every two years, Greece presents the Third Committee resolution on the safety of journalists and the issue of impunity. Besides, the 2023 iteration of this resolution placed particular emphasis on the situation of women journalists. Clearly, the frameworks and tools for the protection of journalists and for women journalists in particular exist. Their implementation, however, remains inadequate. Around the world, the safety of journalists and the exercise of media freedom remain under unprecedented pressure. Today's media professionals, particularly women, operate in a high-risk environment. Traditional threats, including direct physical violence, are compounded by legal and political harassment, digital attacks, and psychological trauma. Women journalists also face specific and disproportionate risks and are increasingly targeted by coordinated online smear campaigns, mainly on social media. These campaigns aim to discredit their work, undermine their credibility, or incite physical violence against them. Women journalists also face specific and disproportionate risk, including sexual harassment, gender-based discrimination, and violence both online and offline. Persistent impunity for crimes against journalists remains one of the greatest threats to their safety. As we approach the International Day to End Impunity for Crimes against Journalists on 2 November, we must renew our commitment to ensuring that women journalists are protected, supported, and empowered to carry out their work freely and independently. With this in mind, I look forward to hearing from women practitioners with long-standing expertise on two key questions. First, how can we guarantee that reliable, verified, and independent news reaches audiences worldwide while safeguarding freedom of expression and tackling misinformation, disinformation, and false narratives? Second, how can we enable journalists, particularly women, to work in a safe and secure environment, free from violence, intimidation, and harassment, through effective, adequately resourced, and gender-responsive protection measures? I thank you.

I thank your Excellency, and also especially for your and your country's leadership on this issue. And now it is my pleasure to give the floor to Nairat Saad Zai, and she is representing UN Women today, and she is really so personally committed to this issue, and so we're so glad to have your voice here today. Over to you.

Thank you. Thank you so much, our moderator, Melissa, our USG. We always celebrate when women have significant positions in the UN, and also so passionate and committed that you are. Thank you so much, Melissa. I also want to recognize the Ambassador of Greece to the United Nations. We continue to celebrate when we have women in diplomacy in the positions that you have. So thank you so much also for your leadership. Excellent. from the member states here, colleagues, friends. It's such an honor to also be here with Begonia, my sister, who we know you've been in the trenches for a long time and never giving up. Thank you so much for us to co-sponsor and co-organize this event today. Maria Reza, there are people in life that you know, you read about, you follow what they are doing, and you just wish to meet them in person. And we just want to say congratulations and thank you. Congratulations and thank you to you, but also to other many, many other female journalists who dare. Thank you. Thank you so much. Today, like now, this is so essential because we are also together. Going back to 1995, I was there in Beijing. When among the 12 critical areas that were identified by the member states and with the push from the media and women in the media was section J of the Beijing Platform for Action. Of the 12 critical areas, women in the media is a priority of Beijing. And that priority did not just happen, it came from the stories and the realities that change does not happen until the story is told. It's more than just participation, it's also about perspective. And therefore, as we look into Security Council Resolution 1325, it is for us an imperative to continue to carry Section J into the women, peace, and security agenda. And therefore, today we are saying, who tells the stories of conflict? But also, how are those stories told? And who protects those who tell the stories? And what is the reality of women journalists when they dare to tell the crucial story, even against people in power? And how do we protect the storyteller. Melissa runs a podcast called What Keeps Me Awake at Night. What is it called?

Do listen to my interview with this wonderful woman. Awake at Night.

Awake at Night. So today, we are talking about Awake at Night with the journalists on the front lines. in the stories that I had to tell. We know that last year marked the highest number of recorded conflicts since 1945, affecting the lives of tens of millions of women and girls worldwide. The number of conflicts hasn't just gone up, the intensity of those conflicts is also rising. And the complexity is increasing, with, of course, an increase in civilian deaths, in conflict-related sexual violence, in forced displacement, the trauma, the mental health at times is untold nor seen. More than 750 million women and girls now live within 50 kilometers of an active conflict. For them, war is not something that they can scroll past. For many, this is just at their doorsteps, this is here. For some of us, this is what we have lived in our own experiences. And that makes the question of whose stories are told and who gets to tell them even much more urgent. Violence against journalists is also increasing, and with that, an increase in targeting of women journalists. The impact that this has on how the stories are reported and told cannot be underestimated. When it comes to what is reported on in conflict, Women are portrayed almost exclusively as victims needing to be saved, but we also know that women are not only survivors of war. Women are preventing conflict, holding communities together, negotiating peace, rebuilding societies. And when those stories go unreported, we see only half of the picture of the war and half the picture of peace. Because the story of women building peace and weaving peace will never be told. When it comes to who is reporting on conflicts, women journalists are a vital voice, often bring a completely different lens to conflict reporting, building trust with women whose stories they are telling as role models for other girls and women, and as earners of income that sustain themselves and can contribute to their families. Because they are also visible in the public space, and because women generally have the power to bring broader public attention to conflicts and crisis, they become targets. Those who stay to report do so at great personal risk, including through digital violence, and great risk to families, but many are forced to flee. depriving us of yet another source of vital information. If women are not safe to be reporting, they also need to think about their safety. When women journalists are silenced, the women whose stories they are telling is also silenced. So it's not just the silencing of the journalists. the silencing of our collective story. That is why protecting women journalists is not only about protecting an individual. It is about protecting the collective voices, the experiences, the realities that become part of the public record. Today we are going to hear some of those stories, and I'm really looking forward to the conversations and to the discussions. You remind us again that protecting women journalists requires us to consider the broader changes shaping conflict media landscape, as these are happening at the same time and rapidly. The online violence, the need to focus on issues of power. The question that we were asked today and that I was asked yesterday by the press, why do we know the names of the survivors by name? But why is there a hesitancy to name the perpetrators of violence, to name those who are creating and disrespecting international human rights law? because our safety is also at risk. Once you name, we are also targeted. Therefore, how do we protect so that there is adequate information? The online violence that has been talked about is important, and we need to continue to build on how we can have a robust AI governance and online protection. As UN Women, we are working on the ground. We are, in many countries, as the United Nations, working with you. We are going to listen to what else we can do to support the protection of women journalists for their voices to be told, because you also hold the evidence. I am a lawyer. When you report, when you tell the truth, that story, you put in record that information. that can be followed up by the prosecutors, that can enable us to fight impunity. So you carry the weight, the women journalists carry the weight of us having to deal with access to justice in a world with the highest level of impunity. So I'm looking forward to CSW71, next March, for us to continue the conversation as we focus on the SDGs, but to continue to stay, we stand together. As UN and as UN women, we also stand with you. And I really want to appreciate the member states, the governments, and the donors who are putting resources to this work with the journalists, because military expenditure is increasing. But our governments can buy one drone less, one military helicopter less, and put resources to the women's networks and to the work of the female journalists so that we can build peace together with the resources that are available. Thank you very much.

Thank you, Naira Zai, and for that also very passionate appeal. and all of the context and the information you gave us from your perspective at UN Women. And I think those questions you asked are the fundamental ones, who tells the stories of women, who tell the stories, and whose stories are told and who gets to tell them. So, I think that's very good framing for the next speakers. We have the Director of the Division of Gender Equality at UNESCO, Begonya Lasagabaster. The floor is yours.

Thank you very much, Melissa, and thank you very much, Ambassador, because I know that, thank you to Greece, but your personal commitment and your team to be here. And of course, it's a pleasure to work together. I don't know why they say that UN agencies do not work together. We work very much together, at least on the gender perspective with UN Women. And to be with Maria is always contagious, her energy, her passion. Every time I sit besides her, I feel like I'm much better. So anyway, thank you to all of you. Let me start by a reference of one exhibition we organized last year in UNESCO. we hosted the exhibition called "They Told the World About It." This exhibition tell the story of almost 200 women journalists from more than 25 countries who went to the front lines of the Spanish Civil War 90 years ago. Years of archival work have brought to light the courage of these pioneering women and the impact of their work. While much of the world counted battles, these women counted lives. They went into hospitals and refugee shelters. They wrote about hunger, about displacement, about what war does to a mother, a father, a child, a city, a country. And this is what it means to be agent of change. These women did more than describe the military. and political strategies of war, that's what we used to read at that time, changed the way the world sees war. Today, you, their successors, our dear panelists, and all the women journalists covering conflicts at home and abroad stand on the same front lines, but you pay an even higher price. As the UN agency coordinating the UN Plan of Action of the Safety of Journalists and the issue of impunity, UNESCO is publishing in a few days its biennial report on the safety of journalists and the danger of impunity, November 2nd, which will show and shows that the proportion of journalists killing conflict zones has reached its highest level in five years. For the first time in five years, 67% of all journalist killings were in conflict zones. And we are now recording the highest number of killings of women journalists since 2017. The report also identifies two emerging trends in conflict zones. First one, the use of drones. 50 journalists were killed by unmanned aerial vehicles. And the second, a significant number of journalists were killed in groups. We suggest they may have been deliberately targeted. Yet, even miles away from any front line, journalists are not safe. The danger now also comes from our screens. Artificial intelligence has given misinformation, disinformation, and misogyny new forms. Faster, cheaper, harder to detect, and with long lasting impacts. Yet, fewer than one in 10 companies assess the human rights impact of the AI they use. This is not only an attack on women, it's an attack on the very foundations of peace. 26 years ago, Resolution 1325 told us that peace cannot be built without women, and yet, all of the media coverage of conflict over the past decade, only 5% has told the story of women's experiences in conflict, only 5%. But women journalists are not alone in this struggle. We were just talking with Maria that taught us that defending democracy is a person-to-person responsibility, and this responsibility shared by many other women who are often left out of the official agenda: artists, cultural professionals, educators, and scientists, at least from UNESCO perspective. And I know UN Women, women politicians, and women candidates, and women electors, and from OHCHR, human rights defenders, and climate change activists. But these women, they are the first to work within their communities on crisis prevention, response, and recovery. This is why UNESCO, we have just launched the survey, the result of the survey, Voices of Courage, the first global survey on women, culture, and emergencies. It found that in crisis setting, 69% of the women artists and cultural professionals surveyed lost their livelihoods. And yet, three out of four took part in rebuilding their communities' heritage and cultural life. And you, women journalists, are the only ones that write about them. And indeed, today UNESCO is also launching a global survey on the experience of women scientists in time of crisis. We know the two areas of science that are more attacked are climate change and gender equality. We need to hear every voice, measure every risk, make every woman who stands up for knowledge and human rights visible and acknowledged. We all know, as you have said, that what is named counts, and what is not named is erased. And I think Hamida will talk a lot about that in Afghanistan. Today is why we're recognizing every woman's contribution is at the heart of Women, Peace, and Security agenda, because every voice for peace counts. Thank you.

I think that was an applause for all of our three speakers. Let's have one more round.

Thank you.

Thank you so much, Begonya. And now we have our keynote speaker, who I guess needs little introduction, but I'm gonna do it anyway. Maria Ressa is a journalist, the co-founder and CEO of Rappler, a laureate of the UNESCO-Cano World Press Freedom Award. What year was that?

2021.

2021, so the same year you got that, you got the Nobel Peace Prize.

So if you get that award, you get a Nobel after.

That's right, okay, I was gonna ask which preceded, so yeah. And what was she awarded for? Her efforts to defend freedom of expression as a foundation of democracy and lasting peace. For her reporting, she has faced relentless attacks, legal cases, arrests, threats. And throughout it all, she's never stopped reporting. She has never stopped growing her media organization and adapting to the digital space that is so challenging. She has never stopped speaking up also for every journalist who is targeted simply for doing their job. And she's become a global voice for the truth and a powerful reminder that defending journalists means defending all of us. Also, defending our information environment is essential for truth, for democracy. and for our collective human rights. So, the floor is yours, Maria. Thank you so much.

Thanks, Melissa. Thank you. Oh my gosh, Minister, I'm going to do the No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, the women in this room if we hadn't had the help. And I think that's the first part, is the radical collaboration. But I'm going to start with the good news first, which is that if you look at the Philippines, Brazil, sorry, let's go Philippines, Hungary, Brazil, and Serbia, what do they all have in common? They are people who moved from the virtual world to the physical world and created change, right? So you would have seen a lot of my work is about how we're manipulated online and how women are substantially, in the Philippines in 2017, women journalists were attacked at least 10 times more than men. So that's the first, right? Is that the technology that rules our lives literally. We can overcome it by coming together in the physical world. That's how Rappler survived. I was getting an average of 90 hate messages per hour. Let me, that's before I began, but let me just say, I'll start with this, which is, you know, what does courage look like? And you will hear it from the women journalists who are around here. On February 13th, 2019, it was my Valentine's Day gift, plainclothes officers walked into the Rappler newsroom, and I was arrested. My entire team was there. And right before, like just a little bit before, we had gone through this where every member of Rappler figured out the workflow, so they take their cell phone and go live. I had a young 24-year-old reporter who went live, and then two plainclothes officers And you can see, you could hear it in the video, she was threatened, and you can see the video shaking, but she kept live streaming. Her name is Aika Ray, and I always put it, that's the way the fight back, my latest book begins, right? Because the fight back shows you what an agent of change, what we look like, what you look like. It is, it's, you're not fearless. It's frightening sometimes, right? But she still kept live streaming. Courage isn't the absence of fear, it's the decision that something matters more, and then you fight through it. Today, I want to talk about the women who make that decision every day in places that are far more dangerous than the Rappler newsroom, and what it will take from the member states in this room to keep them alive, alive, and in the fight. 26 years ago, Resolution 1325 told the world there is no lasting peace without women at every stage, prevention, response, recovery, reconstruction. And you've heard how the world tells the story of war. Between 2013 and 2023, conflict coverage grew more than sixfold, but only 5% of those articles focused on women's experiences. Only 0.04% even mentioned women leaders. And this is huge in the Philippines, where women were the ones who led the battle against Duterte. And we didn't go out punching, we just held the line, we just stood up, right? Look at that, 4 hundredths of 1%. We're not invisible. Look at this room. We're not invisible because we're not there. We're invisible because the people who tell those stories, very often other women, are being silenced. hunted, exiled, and silenced. If you know our story, it's because I've repeated it so many times in the last decade, and I wouldn't be here without your help. For certain, the UN, right? At the peak, I received an average of 90 hate messages per hour. ICFJ and UNESCO analyzed more than 400,000 attacks against me. 60% were meant to tear down my credibility. That's the first step, right? Kill the trust. And then 40% were very personal. They were meant to tear down my will, right? To tear down the will to keep going. That's the playbook. Kill the messenger to kill the message. And when the messenger is a woman, it is sexualized. It's dehumanizing, and it is relentless. The online and the physical world are the same thing. Melissa gave you numbers from the tipping point. It's a UN women study that's led by Julie Pacetti and our team at The Nerve. Three in four women journalists attacked online, 75%. 42% linking it to offline harm. That's huge increase, double the rate five years ago. But here's a number that should keep you up at night for the podcast. Nearly one in four women in public life has already faced AI-assisted abuse, deep fakes, synthetic sexual images, cloned voices. It's going to get worse because what happens online doesn't stay online. You know, I watched, I went through this. In the verbs I used, by the time I got to the Peace Prize in 2021, Online violence is real world violence. Let's not make a distinction, right? That isn't an accident. That's the design of the products. That's the design of the public information ecosystem ruled by the technology, run largely by men, run by men. Hello, men, right? So everywhere we look, these two fracture lines get pounded open first. It is gender and race. She persisted research in Brazil a few years ago with forensics from the nerve. We worked with them, and in Moldova, found the same pattern. Gender disinformation is the weapon of pro-authoritarian networks. That's part of what helps the far rise, right? Rise, and the lies keep spreading long after they've been fact-checked. You cannot fight back against this. In the fight back, I call them the two dictators. It is state and tech, the traditional authoritarian and the tech oligarch. They're symbiotic. The authoritarian needs the platform, the tech to spread propaganda at lightning speed. The platform profits from the outrage. Misogyny is profitable, guys. Right? We shouldn't make it so. And the next phase is going to get worse. This January, more than 20 researchers and I published a paper in science that showed malicious AI swarms. Right? So what is now being done manually, imagine AI swarms, thousands, tens of thousands of AI agents, personas, whatever we want to call them, that coordinate, adapt, and fabricate consensus that attack. It's going to get worse than social media. By the time anyone can prove it, the target may have already withdrawn from public life. So that's the point. Not to make you believe a lie, to make you, you the woman, leave. And every woman journalist driven out of a conflict zone is a peace process that loses its witness. I'm looking forward to hearing at the women that are beside me here, right? Hamida Amin, Zainab Mohamed Salih, Ynet Bedoya, Marianne Selak. One woman who can't be here, who is in the sixth chapter of my book, Mzia Amaglobeli from Georgia, right? She founded Batumilebi, Anet Gazeti in Georgia. I say her -- I bring her up because she's the first woman journalist imprisoned in Georgia since independence. She was locked in a glass box in court, unable to speak freely, and all she could do was hold up a book and have someone else speak for her. That book, the title was "How to Stand Up to a Dictator." We share a lawyer now, Keelan Gallagher, whom Karen just saw this weekend. But the thing is, she's still behind bars, right? So what she said from her cell is, fight before it's too late. We're getting there. This is it. This is the moment, right? So all of us, what we share is something simple, and we talked about it when we walked in. We refuse to be the victim. We're not victims, right? This is an ecosystem that has something fundamentally wrong. So we refuse to be victims. The women here turned the attack into the story, and every time one of us stood up, others stood with us. Courage is contagious, but courage isn't a protection strategies. the nations of the UN are. So I'm going to be specific about four points that the UN and UN Women, actually, i think, have pushed forward, but I'll call them out. The first is something simple. These aren't words, they're not technology that is like, sometimes like TFGBV. Does anyone know that? Sorry, I shouldn't say things like that, right? Technology facilitated gender-based violence. It's attacks on women, right? So first, treat online violence as violence. It's a simple thing. When you get 90 hate messages per hour, you know what that is. Resolution 2222 already names the specific risks women journalists face. Resolution 2467 already calls on the nation states to protect those who report on sexual violence in conflict. Apply them online. Put online attacks into your early warning systems, because they come before the physical attacks. We literally can see it coming. Build emergency visas, relocation, and legal aid that move at the speed of a mob. Second, end impunity for the attackers and for the tech platforms that enable their amplification. These platforms are not neutral pipes, and they're getting worse. And we've seen this from the report of the UN's Independent International Scientific Panel on Artificial Intelligence, which I co-chair, and you will see it is roughly 50-50 men and women. 37 countries, 40 people on that panel. The technology are not neutral pipes. Please don't fall for that PR, sorry, propaganda. They are design choices that reward lies and hate. And the same companies with the same culture are now rolling out chatbots and agents with impunity, no accountability, right? So my state, the dictator who tried to jail me for the rest of my life, He's actually now in detention at The Hague, about to begin his trial for charges against, for crimes against humanity, three charges. But my other dictator, Mark Zuckerberg, he's just gotten more power, right? So there's no accountability for the other. I think we need to make sure that's there. So demand transparency, open the data to independent researchers, require AI companies to stop their tools being turned into weapons against women. I will calm down. Voluntary promises, which is what they've used to push us back, they haven't worked, and it's been a decade. Third, fund women-led journalism. Information is a public good. You fund, the UN funds peacekeepers, fund the women who keep the record. There's a market failure that is making it near impossible to keep going. We at Rappler know this firsthand. Put money behind the words. And fourth. Put women journalists inside the process. 1325 promised women at every stage. That includes the women who document, verify, who remember, who live it in their bodies, in the briefings to the council and at the negotiating table. And then the last one, please, really important. Free the journalists you can free. That's Zia Amaglobeli and every woman behind bars for doing her job in my country. There's Frenchy May Kropio. To the shared commitment holders who speak next, Latvia, Colombia, Denmark, France, Liberia, Panama, the UK, thank you, thank you for being here. My ask is this, don't tell us just what you believe, tell us what you will fund. what you will pass, and who you will help free. The three sentences I've said over and over for a decade, because the social media attention economy has made lies facts, right? Without facts, you can't have truth. Without truth, you can't have trust. Without these three, we don't have a shared reality. Without that, there is no peace to build, let alone keep. Women journalists are holding that line. Every voice for peace counts, but a voice only counts if it is heard, if that woman survives being heard. So, thank you for all you do. Thank you for helping us. It's time for radical collaboration. Thank you.

Thank you, Maria, for that call to action and outlining these really concrete steps that can be taken, a way forward. And just to let everybody know the title of your book so that everybody can go out and get it.

It's called The Fight Back, right? And actually, I rushed it because When I hear people say, "I can't do anything. I'm only one person." Like, it begins with us. Learned helplessness is not an option at this moment, and these women know it.

And the algorithms will also let you think that, or give the impression that the majority are the haters, and in fact, the majority are those who believe in gender equality, in women's rights, and dignity for every human being, and that's what we need to take back. Thank you so much, Maria, for everything that you do. I'm now pleased to welcome our panelists. We are joined, as flagged, and everybody knows, by three exceptional women journalists who work and report from some of the most difficult contexts in the world. We have Hamida Aman, who is an Afghan. journalist, media entrepreneur, and founder of the Begum Organization, which runs Begum TV and Radio Begum. Do I pronounce that right? Yeah, good. And one of the main radio stations in Afghanistan, led by women, for women, reaching more than a half a million women and girls. And I'm going to introduce the other two as you speak, so I'm just going to ask you to speak in the interest of time.

Thank you very much. Thank you for giving me the floor and the opportunity to speak today. When we launched Radio Begum in March 2021, our ambition was simple. It was to create a space where Afghan women could speak, share their experience, and access to relevant information to their lives. But five years later, the situation for women journalists in Afghanistan is devastating. According to the International Federation of Journalists, the number of employed women journalists has fallen from approximately 2,800 before the Taliban takeover to less than 700. Nearly three out of four women journalists have lost their jobs. And this is not simply a consequence of economic collapse of the media sector. Women journalists face restrictions that make the profession increasingly difficult and sometimes impossible. They are excluded from press conferences, denied access to officials, restricted in their movements, and required to cover their face in front of a camera. In some provinces, women voices have been banned from radio broadcasts. So it means in those areas, Radio Begum is not broadcasting at all because we are just not allowed to, and nobody want to hear our voice. Women have been excluded from state media, and all journalists operate under strict editorial controls with severe limitations, et cetera, et cetera. The cumulative effect of Of this is clear, women are being progressively pushed out of journalism, as many as other jobs. Even media organizations willing to employ women face so many obstacles that maintaining staff, female staff, becomes a daily challenge. Radio Begum is still allowed to broadcast in Afghanistan. But being allowed to operate doesn't mean being free to operate. Because we are a woman-led organization, and because we address women concerns, we face constant administrative obstacles, excessive controls, and scrutiny. Like many Afghan media organizations, we have been threatened and temporarily shut down. And also some of my colleagues have been to jail for more than six months for that. But we have made the deliberate choice to remain, to continue employing women journalists and to keep women voices present in the media. Because when women disappear from journalists, their stories and concerns disappear from public discussion as well. The authority may choose to ignore women's life, but those lives and their needs do not disappear. This is also where Begum Mission has evolved. We started as a radio station giving women a voice. Today, we have become a provider of essential services, using media to reach women who are increasingly excluded from public life. Radio Begum broadcasts six hours a day of educational programs, alongside with programs on health, psychological well-being, and women's daily concerns. But we also knew that our activities inside Afghanistan could be stopped at any time. And this is why in March 2024, we launched Begum TV, a satellite channel broadcasting from Paris directly into Afghanistan. We wanted to bypass censorship and ensure continuity. Even if the radio were shut down, we would still be able to reach Afghan women and girls from France. Alongside these two channels, we developed also Begum Academy, our digital educational platform, offering more than 8,000 educational videos covering the secondary school curriculum. Together, this platform provides different ways for girls to continue learning and for women to access information. We are expanding, but our work goes beyond education, as we are expanding also into health information, psychological support, climate change information, and women economical empowerment. Everything, but no politics, because this is the only way for us to stay alive and to keep broadcasting. We are trying to respond to the needs that the authorities are increasingly unwilling to address. And we have not done this alone. Thanks to the support of UNESCO and UN Women, this support has been essential in helping us to develop Radio Begum and TV Begum, and to continue to reach Afghan women despite the restrictions. But today, international funding for Afghanistan is declining year after year, while the needs remain huge. And this raised a broader question: how do we protect the Afghan civil society and the women journalists who are still struggling to do their work? In a society as conservative as Afghanistan, women journalists play a key role. They are the only ones to have access to women, listen to their concerns, to tell their stories and make their voice heard. If these journalists disappear, who will speak about the lives of Afghan women? Who will make their voice heard? The silence would not simply mean the loss of a profession, it will mean that millions of women become even more invisible, they concern absent from the public discussion. And this is precisely what the current authorities are seeking to achieve. So I would like to leave you with one question. Is this the future that we, as an international community, are prepared to accept? This is my question, and thank you very much for your attention.

I think I would speak for all of us to say full support, and this is not a future that any of us here would want to accept. For Afghanistan, for the women and the girls of Afghanistan, thank you for what you do. for keeping Afghan women informed, educated, and their voices alive. Thank you. Our next speaker is Juneth Bedoya. She's a Colombian journalist and the voice behind No Es Hora de Callar. De Callar. De Callar. And it is, which is in English, it is not time to be silent, one of the most powerful campaigns against sexual violence in armed conflict, and she is also a laureate of the 2020 UNESCO Cano World Press Freedom Award, Freedom Prize, and the winner of a landmark case before the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. So we, you're going to be speaking in Spanish, so for those of you who don't speak Spanish, please, there is interpretation, and thank you for taking the floor.

Thank you so much. I am going to speak in Spanish. It's an honor to be among such amazing women. Maria, yours. I am a Colombian journalist who on May 25th, 2000, faced kidnapping, physical and psychological torture, and sexual violence. All of this simply for doing my job, exposing networks of corruption and organized crime. Being a journalist and being a survivor is an immense responsibility. Society trusts that a free and responsible press can guide them in understanding in how to understand this world that is increasingly polarized. Therefore, when I became aware that something had died inside me, that I was in fact alive, I took on that responsibility. That is why 10 years ago, i agreed to be part of my country's peace process. Exactly a decade ago, an agreement was signed between the guerrilla of the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, FARC, and the Colombian government. More than 15,000 men and women laid down their weapons, left their work behind, and returned to civilian life. But that has not been enough. The criminal threat in Colombia continues, and the women who communicate, we, women journalists, remain at risk. These are the challenges faced by a country like mine, and the challenges faced by women journalists anywhere in the Americas, in Ukraine, the Congo, the Gaza Strip, or any other place in the world. But there is something that makes a difference. Our voices through radio, social networks, the written press, or television. continue to change the reality of millions of people. And that is the recommendation and reflection I want to leave with you today. Our work does transform lives. It does save lives. Today, I remain under threat, and I carry out my work guarded by bodyguards and in an armored car. But if I had censor myself, thousands of other victims like me would not have had the chance to speak out, tell their stories, and seek justice. For this reason, it is crucial to understand that the risks faced by women journalists are not confined solely to physical intimidation. Digital violence also destroys and it has jeopardized the fundamental right to be informed. We are talking not only about threats of physical elimination, we're talking about judicial persecution and the erasure of women's dignity when they are subjected to public shaming to attack them because, specifically because they are women. This is some of the greatest threats to freedom of expression and press freedom in the world today. Likewise, the lack of commitment from states and governments, which fail to understand or maybe choose not to understand that violence against women journalists is distinct due to its gender-based nature, as highlighted in reports by UNESCO and international courts like in our hemisphere, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, this further fuels impunity. If we don't acknowledge the problem, this fuels impunity. And I want to talk about something that we haven't mentioned. This is the space to mention, harassment and sexual violence that women journalists face within their own working environments, in their own newsrooms. This is a crisis today, and nobody wants to talk about it. Therefore, it is necessary to surround them, to create tools that give them safety. In 2020, amidst the pandemic, I had the fortune of receiving the UNESCO Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize. It was a great responsibility, not just a recognition. Since that day, I began working on a protocol to provide guarantees for women journalists in their workplaces. We need to give them tools. working hand in hand with UN Women and UNESCO, who I think, I know this will become a reality for guarantees and women human rights. This is our draft of the protocol. We will continue working it together with UNESCO and UN Women this year, and we hope that by 2027, media around the world will have no excuse to continue to allow violence against women who report. I will go back to my country. I don't know how much these violent people will allow me to leave, but if I am able to leave this behind for women who report, I have done my deed. And this we do amongst each other. Thank you.

Courage, your powerful voice, your your advocacy for not giving in and also for not giving up. And please stay safe. We'll be all thinking of you. Our next speaker is Maryan Selak. She's a Somali journalist who began as the only woman at Radio Baidoa and went on to found SOMWA, the Somali Women Media Association, which supports women journalists across the country. And through SOMWA, the Somali Women Media Association, hundreds of young women journalists have been trained in Somalia. So we'd love to hear about that and your work, Maryan. Over to you.

Thank you, Melissa. I'll start with a simple message. When a young woman sees another woman reporting news, leading newsroom, or speaking truth to power, she too starts to think that she has a place in public life. I know from my own experience what it means to be a woman journalist working in a conflict-affected environment. When I first began my career as a journalist in Beidwa, south-west Somalia, as the only female journalist in my town, working in a male-dominated profession brought many challenges, but the greatest challenge was working at the dangers of reporting in a conflict-affected country. In September 2006, During the assassination attempt against the former president of Somalia, Abdullahi Yusuf, I survived life bullets while my colleagues were taking shelter from the explosion and the bullets. That experience showed me how journalists can face life-threatening situations simply for doing their jobs. Yet, I never stopped believing in the importance of journalism and women's right to have their voice heard. That conviction led me to establish the Somali Media Women Association, SOMA, in 2006. Through SOMA, we have trained hundreds of women journalists, strengthened their professional skills, created leadership opportunities, and advocated for their safety and protection. The change is not that more women enter journalism. It is that women begin to see themselves as leaders, decision makers, and agents of change. Women journalists report on conflict, displacement, sexual and gender-based violence, and the experiences of marginalized communities. They bring neglected issues into public discussions, challenge harmful stereotypes, and hold those in power accountable. This matters because peace is not simply the absence of fighting. It is about justice, dignity, reputation, and the ability of people to influence decisions that affect their lives. However, women journalists in conflict-affected countries, including Somalia, continue to face threats, arbitrary arrests, intimidation, harassment, gender-based violence, and exploitation, including increasingly organized online attacks, as some of the speakers already mentioned. Digital abuse does not remain online. It can threaten physical safety, damage reputations, undermine livelihoods, and force women out of public debate. When a woman journalist is silenced, the entire community loses access to information, accountability, perspectives essential to inclusive peacebuilding. This is why women's leadership in media must be recognized as part of the Women, Peace and Security agenda. Security Council Resolution 1325 calls for women's full, meaningful participation in the peace and security process. Women journalists contribute by informing the public, amplifying women's experiences, and creating spaces for debate and accountability. But we cannot expect women to contribute to peace while leaving them unprotected. We need government to investigate attacks against women journalists and hold perpetrators accountable. Media organizations must ensure women's safety and equal opportunities for leadership. Digital platforms must respond effectively to coordinated harassment and wrongful account suspensions. International partners must invest, as Maria Reza already mentioned, in women-led media organizations, supporting not only training, but also long-term protection and sustainability. We must also ensure that young women journalists are represented not only in newsrooms, but in editorial leadership, media ownership, public institutions, and peaceful discussions. My message is this: When we protect a woman journalist, we protect more than an individual. We protect the people's right to know, the voices of communities affected by conflict, and the possibility of more inclusive and sustainable peace. Every voice for peace counts, but for every voice to count, women must be safe, heard, and able to influence. Thank you.

That is really incredible what you and your organization are doing to boost women journalists. Thank you very much. I think we need this in every country. Thank you, Marianne. And thank you to our panelists. And now we're going to move to the interactive part of the dialogue. And first, we'll hear from the rest of the shared commitment holders on Women, Peace, and Security, Latvia, Colombia, France, Liberia, and the United Kingdom. I thank these delegations for their support for this event, and each delegation has two minutes. And we're going to ask you to share with us one concrete measure your country has taken or commitment it will make to support women journalism, women journalists and media as actors of the Women, Peace, and Security Agenda. And so if time allows, which I'm not sure it will, we will open the floor to all participants here in the room, but it doesn't look like it will. No. So let's try to keep to time, and I am going, do we have the first? the Deputy Foreign Minister of Latvia. Yes, yes. Really nice to have you here, Deputy Foreign Minister.

Thank you very much. Thank you, Ms. Fleming, and let me express my appreciation to Her Excellency Ambassador Aglaya Balta for organizing this event, and also let me use this opportunity to thank our briefers from UNESCO and UN Women. And of course, I'd like to express my gratitude to Maria Reza and all other courageous journalists being present in this room and sharing their experience. I would like to begin with a quote from a woman of remarkable courage, Russian journalist Anna Politkovskaya. who was murdered by the Russian regime in October 20 years ago. And she said, "People sometimes pay with their lives for saying out loud what they think." And indeed, this is what today's meeting is about. Every voice for peace counts and must be protected. My country, Latvia, firmly upholds the freedom of expression as one of the fundamental pillars of human rights. Latvia ranks among the world's top 20 countries in terms of press freedom, according to Reporters Without Borders. And we take this commitment seriously, which is why Latvia has been a founding member of the Media Freedom Coalition since its establishment in 2018. We have provided refuge to more than 200 journalists, protecting them from repression in Russia following the launch of Russia's war of aggression against Ukraine in 2022. Latvia also addresses gender-based disinformation in the information space. Over the last decade, female journalists have been increasingly exposed to hate speech, violence, and harassment. In Latvia, women make up over 67% of the journalism profession, making their safety a crucial priority for us. Latvian Journalists Association established an online alarm button allowing journalists to report violations anonymously. Latvia's Memorandum on the Safety of Journalists has established a dedicated contact person within the state police. to ensure a rapid response in emergency situations. And as a member of UN Security Council, Latvia will continue to champion the Women, Peace and Security agenda so that women journalists can carry out their work without fear of violence or self-censorship online or offline. Thank you.

Thank you, Deputy Minister, for those remarks and for your support. I now give the floor to the distinguished representative of Colombia.

Thank you very much, Madam Moderator, for giving me the floor. I would like to start by recognizing all of the speakers that have joined us today, and of course, all the women journalists out there risking their lives for doing their jobs, but I want to pay special tribute to Ms. Ginette Beloya. Just to say that her courage and her tireless fight over more than two decades brought to light a reality that was long kept in silence. And I think that, as you very well say, after such a tragic and painful experience, if you had remained silent, what would have that meant for so many other women, so many other women journalists in Colombia? what would have that meant for them? And just to remark that what began as a personal search for truth and justice became a regional and a global cause, particularly for women journalists facing gender-based risks, not only in Colombia, but in the world. And her leadership shows that women voices can drive institutional change. So, because I know that time is very short, I will skip a lot of my remarks and just go straight ahead to one national experience that is what I would like to share. which is the example of the data and figure systems on violence against journalists and gender-based violence against women journalists. This is an initiative in Colombia that is led by the Office of the Ombudsperson currently, and it collects and analyzes information and generates evidence to guide public policy. This is a type of measure that seek to strengthen institutional capacities to prevent violence, identify risks, and protect women journalists. And thus, it aims to go beyond individual reparation, because to write from a sentence from the Inter-American System, and seeks structural change. And I think that we've all heard from you today how important it is to act based on facts. and to shed visibility and light on how women journalists suffer the differentiated impacts based on their work, but also on their gender. So Colombia remains committed to act with a human rights-based approach so that no one is silenced for reporting. And lastly, just would like to reiterate that Colombia is very conscious that protecting journalists is protecting democracy. that guaranteeing their freedom of expression strengthens our institutions, and concrete change is the best guarantee of non-repetition that we can offer for future generations. Thank you.

Thank you so much for outlining those concrete actions and those commitments. I would now like to give the floor to the distinguished representative of France.

Thank you very much. Thank you to all, Ambassador Aglaia Balta-Efraristo. Thank you for sharing this event, which France is honored to co-sponsor at the heart of the Women, Peace and Security agenda. I would like also to commend UN Women and UNESCO for their work and commitment on this important matter, and yourself, Excellency, and the Secretary-General, Melissa Fleming, for your presence and moderation today. Last but not least, on behalf of my country, I would like to pay a special tribute to the four journalists joining us today for this event, including Mrs. Zainab Mohamed Saleh from Sudan, a country that I know very well as I served as Ambassador of France during the war from 21 to 23. Allow me to highlight the three actions that France is taking to support women journalists and media in the Women, Peace, and Security framework. First, we have funded projects supporting women journalists in their own country, as we did in Yemen, but also after they have been forced to flee, for instance, through our program, Voices in Exile. This program also supports men journalists specializing on women's rights and gender-based violence. Secondly, we have made online and technology-facilitated gender-based violence as a priority of our feminist foreign policy. We pay particular attention to the safety and protection of activists and journalists, like yourself, Excellency, in the digital environment. France, as you know, is a longstanding advocate for an ambitious language in multilateral fora and promotes strong measures in the field of regulation, reporting, and moderation of hateful content and online violence worldwide, in line with European regulations. Thirdly, France is fully committed in the fight against impunity for conflict-related sexual violence and for crimes against journalists. Next week, we will commemorate the International Day Against Impunity for such crimes. This is a core French initiative, and that is a call for action. And you know France is addressing impunity in its foreign policy. as well as in our support to the judicial remedies, including the International Criminal Court. To conclude, let me reiterate on behalf of my country, my country's strong commitment to implement the Women, Peace and Security agenda, especially in the current geopolitical tensions. I have a special thought for all women fighting for their own advocacy, as you said, all three of you today, in the Horn of Africa, in Ukraine, in Latin America, in Afghanistan, in Africa. Thank you so much.

I thank the distinguished representative of France for those also very powerful commitments. And I'd now like to ask the distinguished representative of Liberia to take the floor.

Liberia thanks Greece, UNESCO, and UN Women for convening this very important discussion today, and thank especially the distinguished women journalists for the incredible and courageous work that they continue to do. When a woman journalist is silenced, as we've heard, the loss reaches beyond one voice. Communities lose a witness, abuses become harder to expose, and those working for peace lose information they need to act. For Liberia, protecting women journalists must therefore be understood as part of the Women, Peace and Security agenda itself on a daily operational basis. Liberia's experience offers a clear lesson that women's leadership can change the course of conflict, but their contributions must first be heard and taken seriously. Journalism can help make that possible, bringing women's experiences, proposals, and leadership into public view. Yet, women journalists face threats directed both at their reporting and at their identity as women. sexual violence, intimidation, and targeted online abuse can drive them from their profession and narrow the public record of the conflict, as we also have heard from our distinguished journalists today. Therefore, we should ask whose experiences disappear from the view when women reporting them are forced into silence. Today, Liberia emphasizes three points. which are also important to our own approach in the work for women journalists. One, make protection accessible before threats become attacks. Governments, media organizations, and international partners should continue to support confidential reporting channels, digital security, emergency assistance, and medical and psychosocial care for women journalists. These measures must reach local and freelance journalists whose access to institutional support may be limited. Protection must preserve women's professional choices. It should never become a reason to exclude them from assignments or restrict independent reporting. Second, we should make accountability more credible. Attacks and threats must receive prompt, impartial investigation. Responses to technology-facilitated violence should protect freedom of expression while platforms provide accessible reporting system and timely responses to targeted abuse. Third, let's strengthen women's influence over the public understanding of conflict and peace. This means supporting women as editors, correspondents, and decision makers, and ensuring that coverage reflects women as negotiators, experts, and leaders. Their presence should help shape which questions are asked, whose testimony is heard, and which solutions receive attention. The courage required to report a war should never include having to face its dangers alone. Liberia calls for protection that preserves independence, accountability that earns trust, and support that allows women journalists to continue their work, because their safety matters in its own right. The freedom to report matters to all of us. Thank you.

Thank you so much, distinguished representative of Liberia. And our last speaker is the United Kingdom.

And thank you to everyone in this room for all of your comments, specifically Greece, UNESCO, and UN Women, and our panelists for your powerful contributions. Thank you for bringing your experience and your expertise to this discussion. As we reflect 26 years of 1325, we should remember that women, peace, and security is not just about protecting women from conflict. It's about recognizing women as leaders and agents of change. Women journalists embody that ambition. They expose abuses, challenge injustice, and ensure women’s experiences and expertise shape how we understand and respond to conflict. But as we have heard today, that comes at an unacceptable cost. Protection and participation therefore go hand in hand. Our collective responsibility is to ensure that women journalists can work safely, independently, and without fear. And the UK is acting. At CSW in March, in collaboration with UN Women, we launched an initiative to prevent and mitigate reprisals against women civil society representatives, briefing the Security Council. This provides a model for good practice: anticipating risks, putting protection measures in place, and ensuring women can participate free from fear of reprisals. And just to meet your challenge of what the example is, on the ground in Somalia, the UK is supporting to help women rights organizations engage security actors and alongside work supporting journalists safety and media freedom. Women journalists help us understand conflict differently and respond to it better. Lasting peace cannot be built on silent voices. Thank you.

Thank the distinguished representative of the United Kingdom, and thank you, everyone. especially our panelists and our distinguished speakers, but also all of you for being here and participating. I think I saw one or two men in the room, so I'd like to thank you, especially to, we heard clear recommendations from our panelists. We have marching orders with strong commitments. from commitment holders. Every voice for peace counts, so let's all join forces. Special thanks to the Permanent Mission of Greece, to UN Women and UNESCO. And the event is now closed, but our work on supporting women journalists continues, and it has just begun. Thank you.