Access to Justice for Women and Girls: Strategies, Pathways and Good Practice (CSW70 Side Event)

Okay. Well, good afternoon. Wow, it's great to see such a full room. And we're starting right on the dot and I think there were even some more people waiting to come. So this, I think is really wonderful.

And so, first of all, Excellencies, distinguished delegates, colleagues and friends, I'm Jan Beagle, Director General of idlo, and it's such a pleasure to welcome you to this discussion. Discussion. I'd like to thank first our co sponsors, Australia, Italy and the Philippines, and our partners, the American Bar association, the International association of Women Judges and Women Business and the Law at the World Bank. And I'd like to welcome our distinguished speakers and panelists and I'll introduce them to you in just a moment. Just a few introductory words for this session.

I think that the theme of CSW this year reminds us that equal access to justice for women and girls is central for gender equality and also a precondition for peace and sustainable development. And we're also reminded of the mutually reinforcing nature of SDG 5 and SDG 16. We know that when women and girls enjoy equal rights under the law and and can access justice without barriers, they gain the power to shape their own futures and contribute fully to their communities and economies. But we also know that the gender justice gap is dangerously large and continues to grow. Millions of women and girls worldwide continue to face legal, financial and societal barriers that prevent them from seeking or obtaining justice.

But experience also shows us that progress is possible and today we would like to focus on what works. Idlo's experience over the past 40 years in some 100 countries confirms that closing the gender justice gap requires a people centred approach. And this means placing the needs, experiences and rights of individuals and communities at the heart of of justice system design. And our experience has also shown us that targeted investments in justice systems can deliver tangible improvements in the lives of women and girls. And I'd just like to highlight three key priority areas for change.

First, legal reform is essential to remove structural barriers to equality. Laws shape the opportunities available to women and girls. And yet, in many contexts, discriminatory laws and legal gaps continue to undermine gender equality, particularly in areas such as property, inheritance, family law and protection from violence. Adilo works with governments, un, women and many, many other partners to conduct assessments that identify discriminatory provisions and provide practical recommendations to strengthen women's legal protections. And we've recently launched a new report that synthesized lessons from our work on promoting legal equality across multiple country contexts, which we hope will be helpful to policymakers and implementers.

Recommendations include strengthening enforcement mechanisms, improving and disaggregating data, supporting strategic litigation, and especially ensuring sustained political commitment and financing. But good laws and policies are just the start. We all know that the laws on the books are often not the laws on the streets, and ensuring that laws are implemented effectively requires institutions that are accessible, accountable and responsive to the lived realities of women and girls. So my second point is that we must make justice institutions work for women and girls. And that requires requires transforming how justice systems operate, both formal and informal systems and how services are delivered.

And we also need to challenge patriarchal views and persistent social norms that often limit remedies available to women. Community based dispute resolution mechanisms, legal aid services, mobile courts and digital platforms offer pathways to help ensure that that women are able to seek remedies safely and effectively. Because we know that when systems do function fairly and accessibly, they protect women's rights to property, inheritance, work, education and bodily autonomy. And the effects ripple outward, creating more resilient families and communities, more dynamic economies and more peaceful and inclusive societies. And third, legal empowerment is essential to ensure that women are able to use the law to claim their rights.

Justice systems cannot function effectively if people do not know their rights or how to seek remedies. So let me conclude with two concrete examples from our experience in Uganda. Idealo has partnered with civil society to engage with some 36,000 community members, including some 17,000 women and girls, through community barrages, mobile legal aid clinics, radio programs and public awareness campaigns. This outreach focused on women's legal rights, but also on the benefits to the whole community that come from women having equal access to resources and representation. Men and boys must be part of the conversation and of the solution.

An external evaluation of this program found a sizable percent increase in women taking legal action to claim their rights. And interestingly, there was also evidence of behavioural change in men and boys, including clan leaders, demonstrated by more recognition of women's rights and more equitable rulings from traditional courts. Finally, our experience in Afghanistan illustrates that empowerment can lead to positive results in even in the most challenging environments, despite severe restrictions on women's participation in public life. Between 2023 and 2025, legal professionals supported by IDLO provided over 800 legal consultations to women and represented more than 400 cases in court on behalf of women clients. Behind these numbers are women claiming inheritance rights, challenging child marriages and obtaining access to land and property.

There is clearly far to go, but it is encouraging that there is a strong coalition of partners across regions engaged in these issues from multiple perspectives, and we will hear from some of them now. So we are joined today by a very distinguished set of speakers to deliver special remarks. The Honorable Ruth Cross, Quencing Minister for Women, Youth, Sport and Social affairs of Karibas the Honorable Anika Granong, Under Secretary General of the Department of Justice of the Government of the Philippines His Excellency Giorgio Marcodi, the Permanent Representative of Italy to the United nations and Ms. Padma Rama, executive Director of the Office for Women in the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet of Australia. So I welcome all of our distinguished special speakers and I now have great pleasure to give the floor to the Honorable Ruth Cross Quonsin. You have the floor, Ma'.

Am. Thank you, Madam Moderator and warm Pacific greetings to all of you. It's really great to see such a full room. I have no doubt that there's some serious attention. We know the saying where attention goes, energy flows and I've got no doubts whatsoever that the attention is on this very important topic.

Now. This week my colleague ministers from the Pacific and I we had the really great privilege of participating in several high level meetings on the margins of csw. One of our four interventions has been on addressing gender based violence. In line with this year's theme, the Pacific region is committed to addressing access to justice for women and this includes reflecting, reflecting and evaluating strategies and pathways for good practice. We are guided by the 2050 strategy for the Blue Pacific and the Revitalised Pacific Leaders Gender Equality Declaration and the Pacific Platform for Action on Gender Equality and Women's Human Rights.

Significant investments in gender equality have been made in the region. So between 2008 and 2021, total official development finance spent on gender equality by all donors was around the amount of US$13 billion and that's 30% of all aid that's been spent on the Pacific. So financing regional GBV programs may have led to an increase in reporting due to higher levels of understanding of laws and available services due to the advocacy and support to key service providers within the referral pathway. And this is one of the ways that the Pacific has been able to strive towards access to justice for women and girls. For our women and girls access to justice, our response strategies have to work in tandem with the long term prevention focused strategies including as mentioned by moderator, engaging men and boys as allies and culturally grounded prevention and response approaches as reaffirmed in the revitalized plged, we need to proactively work with our informal and customary justice systems given our geographic, cultural and linguistic challenges.

This is especially important for the Pacific region for women and girls in rural, remote and maritime settings where often cases access to justice means a boat ride and travel to other locations. The revitalised PLGD calls for accelerated, necessary and innovative actions to prevent and eliminate gbv, including domestic violence, which takes survivor centered, whole of community and family approaches while ensuring perpetrators of violence are held accountable for their actions. Finally, access to justice for our Pacific women and girls in all their diversity will become a reality when we are contextually focused and have consistent funding streams. In closing, I just want to thank everybody in this room for the very important work that you are doing to advance justice for women. Thank you very much.

Thank you very very much Minister. Such a pleasure for me to have a fellow person from my region here this podium. I want now to give the floor to the Undersecretary General, Department of Justice of the Government of the Philippines, the Honorable Annika Grange Ong. You have the floor, Excellencies.

Good afternoon. Access to justice means every person, regardless of status or circumstance, has a fair and equal opportunity to obtain legal assistance, be heard and receive just remedies under the law. Women in particular face a range of overlapping barriers to access injustice. Gender bias in discriminatory laws among law and among law enforcement officers discourages victims from reporting crimes. Traditional gender roles also leave women unaware of their legal rights.

Further financial constraints, including the high cost of legal representation, further drains their finances with women bearing the burden in impoverished situations. In the Philippines, the Department of justice administers the criminal justice system as its prosecutorial arm. The DOJ actively works with relevant government agencies and civil societies to amend gender discriminatory laws and support the development of laws for gender protection and empowerment. Further, the DOJ maximize the use of its gender and development budget initiatives. This includes strengthening mechanisms for victim support, conducting capacity building programs, institutionalizing gender responsive justice services, issuance of gender and development, mainstreaming policies and promoting gender equality in recruitment and promotion processes.

We also launched a priority pass for women victims of violence and other forms of abuses. Recognizing the fear and lack of familiarity with legal processes that often prevent victims from reporting abuse. This initiative aims to empower women to come forward and seek justice. We also provide mediation services for family disputes and referrals to law enforcement agencies and the public attorney's office.

We have partnered with the integrated bar, the academe and private lawyers to enhance justice accessibility by conducting justice caravans, free legal consultations, case assessments and document assistance. The DOJ developed the guidelines in gathering evidence and case buildup of gender based online sexual harassment. This established clear procedures for receiving complaints, collecting digital evidence, and ensuring a Victim centered approach in investigating and prosecuting these cases. To further empower women, the DOJ partnered with Miss Universe Philippines through its lecture series educating candidates on their rights against sexual harassment. We also conduct lectures and trainings in universities to strengthen legal literacy among youth and vulnerable sectors.

Indeed, ensuring women's access to justice is essential, particularly given their heightened vulnerability to violence and abuse. Strong and effective legislation is crucial in institutionalizing the rights and remedies that protect women and guarantee their ability to seek redress. As implementers of the law, we bear responsibility not only to uphold these legal frameworks, but also ensure that they are applied consistently, fairly and effectively. In doing so, we help create systems where women and girls can confidently claim their rights. Therefore, our commitment to advancing equal access to justice, safeguarding rights and strengthening gender responsive governance must continue with even greater determination and resolve.

Thank you everyone and Mabuhay.

Thank you very much, Under Secretary. And just to say that Philippines is a valued member of idlo, so thank you for your partnership. I'm now turning to Ambassador Maripoti, the permanent representative of Italy to the United Nations. I have many reasons to welcome him. First of all, Italy is a founding member of Idealo and we have the pleasure of having our headquarters in Rome.

So I welcome him also as a representative of our host country and of course, as one of the few men in the room. I want to thank you, Ambassador Maripoti, for coming. I want to thank all the men who are here.

And I hope in the future that we will have more men in these discussions because as I said at the outset, we need men and boys in this conversation. So, Ambassador Maripoti, the floor is yours.

Thank you. Well, thank you. Thank you, Excellencies, the distinguished delegates, ladies and gentlemen. Well, let me also say at the beginning that I consider a privilege being here and addressing this panel on this, on this, on this subject. I'm glad that I'm one of the few men here.

I'm also father. I'm also father of a boy that is now 20 year old and that we have with my wife.

We have raised him in a way that it has to be very much aware of the importance of these issues. Let me say also that is not in the speech that I have known. I have known IDLO for decades and I have appreciated over the decades the important work that IDLO has been doing. But let me say also that IDLO, through the leadership of Mrs. John Bigle, has reached a much higher level of effectiveness. So belonging to the hosting country.

We are happy that you have been guiding ideal law in these years. Thank you, Mrs. Bigle, and of course I wish you all. And I would like to say that ensuring equal access to justice is a cornerstone of the international human rights framework and the fundamental component of democratic and inclusive societies, a kind of societies that we really need in today's world. Yet for many women and girls around the world, justice remains out of reach. Legal barriers, social norms, structural inequalities continue to limit their ability to claim their rights and seek protection from violence and discrimination.

Progress cannot be taken for granted and is not guaranteed. And in some contexts, we have also witnessed worrying setbacks, including the exclusion of women from judicial institutions and decision making process. Safeguarding women's access to justice requires sustained political commitment and international cooperation. National action plans on women, peace and security have become key instruments in this regard. And adequate resources and effective monitoring mechanisms are also essential to translate commitments into tangible results.

In this perspective, SDG 16 represents a vital, vital enabler of progress across the entire 2030 Agenda. Since 2019, Italy has promoted the Global Conference on SDG 16 together with the United Nations Department of Economic and Social affairs and idlo.

I'm proud to say that I was in that very first conference.

Building on the success of previous editions, including the 2024 conference held here in New York in the presence of the Italian President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, I'm pleased to announce that the SDG 16 conference will be convened again at the United Nations Headquarters in New York.

A gender responsive approach must be mainstreamed across development, humanitarian and peace efforts. In this regard, Italy considers gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls to be essential preconditions for sustainable development. This includes attention not only to protection from violence and discrimination, but also to economic empowerment, participation, leadership and access to services and opportunities. These priorities are also reflected in Italy's support for the women, peace and security agenda, including through the recent adoption of its fifth National Action Plan. We remain then committed to working with the United Nations, IDLO and all international partners to advance access to justice for all women and girls.

Thank you. Thank you to all of you.

Thank you very much, Ambassador, and thank you also, I think you raised another very important point and that's the role of parents. And I think particularly as the father of a son, but as a mother of three daughters, we are relying on the parents of sons. So just to say that I think all of us, wherever we sit, we have a role there. So thank you so much and thank you for all your support for idlo. I'm very happy now to invite Ms. Padna Raman, the Executive Director of the Office for Women in the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet of Australia, to deliver her remarks.

Australia is also also a valued member of Adilo. You're most welcome, ma'. Am.

Thank you, Chair. Can I just begin by acknowledging that we're gathered on the lands, the traditional lands of the Lenape people and pay my respects.

Australia has a really good story to tell. And the story is that when you deliberately put gender equality at the heart of decision making, it makes a difference. It makes a difference for women and men and all genders, and it makes a difference in terms of access to justice. Australia has a framework of gender responsive budgeting. In fact, we were the first country to introduce it back in 1983.

We had a few short years where it was suspended, but it was reintroduced in 2022. And that basically means that every decision that's made by government has to have a gender analysis. And that is about how a piece of government decision making affects all genders. It's not just about how it affects women. And that discipline in terms of government decision making goes right through the system and does get to access to justice as well.

We released our first ever gender equality strategy two years ago called Working for Women and that acknowledges that we will not get to a gender equal Australia until we make progress against five key areas. And those areas are eliminating violence against women, balancing paid and unpaid care, focusing on women's economic security, women's health and women's position in decision making and leadership. It also recognises that we have to make progress against these areas to achieve gender equality, but acknowledges that we have a foundation of very stubborn stereotypes and gendered norms in Australia. We also have a national plan to end violence against women and children that runs for 10 years. And we've recently released a separate plan called Our Ways.

Strongways are Voices for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Women, looking at how we can eliminate gender based violence against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women who experience rates of violence at a much higher rate than the rest of the community. We also have what we call a positive duty, which we have a Sex Discrimination act which implements our international obligations under CEDAW into domestic law. And what we've recently introduced is a positive duty on all employers to eliminate sex discrimination and sexual harassment in workplaces. So rather than requiring women still can complain, but it doesn't put the onus on the victim, it actually puts the onus on businesses and employers to have a workplace that is free from sexual harassment and sex discrimination. And I guess the other area that Australia has a really good story to tell is around tech facilitated gender based violence.

We had one of the first ever eSafety commissioners and the position and the office was created about a decade ago and the eSafety commissioner has incredible powers, sometimes very hard to implement those powers but to take down cyber abuse, image based abuse and other forms of abuse that again we know disproportionately affect women and girls, the online environment is not safe for women and girls. And re Safety Commissioner has played a really, really pivotal role. She is not very popular with our tech giants and continues to be taken to court, especially by the likes of Elon Musk.

But she's been an incredibly strong figure and has faced incredible harassment and continual online pressure for the stand she's taken. One of the other things that she's responsible for implementing is what we call our social media pause in Australia. As of last year, if you're under 16 you cannot have, create or have a social media account on age restricted platforms. Again, the tech giants told us that the world the sky would fall in and that it would not be possible. I'm here to tell you it has worked.

It has worked as far as anything that might work in terms of stopping teenagers accessing things that they're not meant to access. But most importantly, it gives license to parents, we're talking about parents. It gives license to adults in children's lives to be able to tell them that these spaces can be dangerous. And I think that's been a really important thing. I could keep talking but I just wanted to point out a few of the things that Australia has been really successful in achieving around access to justice.

Thank you.

Thank you so much, Ms. Rahman, and particularly for the very concrete tools that you've told us about like the gender responsive budgeting. And I think many of us who are doing that know how hard it is and how hard it is to to keep it going. It's so important. The e Safety Commissioner so interesting and so many others. Thank you so much to our speakers.

Let us move now to our distinguished panelists and I'm very happy to introduce to you some very impressive women who are close partners of idlo. I'm going to start with Justice Maria Philomena Singh from the Supreme Court of the Philippines who is also the president elect of the International association of Women Judges. Then we will have Ms. Thea Trumbisch, Manager for women business and the law at the World Bank, Ms. Doreen Keze, Regional Director for Sub Saharan Africa Penal Reform international, and then Ms. Michelle Bienke, President of the American Bar association, and then Professor Ringita da Silva de Alves, member of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women. So welcome to all of you. And please, I'd like to start with you, Justice Singh, as president elect and congratulations to you of the International association of Women Judges.

You represent an international body of women judges whose leadership is transforming both the delivery and the culture of justice. And I think I can use that word transforming because it's really true. I mean, that fact that women judges are doing this and so many more of them around the world. So often women judges serve as catalysts for change, not only by their decisions from the bench, but also through the credibility that they bring to the system. So could you tell us from your perspective, how women judges can collectively leverage that leadership and their visibility to reshape justice systems so they become more accessible and more attuned to the realities that are faced by women and girls?

Thank you

for the long partnership with the Philippines and good afternoon to all. I think our mere presence in the halls of justice is a big start. And that presence, when transformed to action, actually reshapes policy and the direction that the governing institutions take. In the Philippines, for example, we conducted a study on gender mobility and representation to trace the pathway of women lawyers in the judicial hierarchy. And in tracing that, we were very surprised to see that on the trial courts level and even in the three appellate courts in the Philippines, we have achieved more than gender parity.

In fact, in trial courts, 58% now of trial judges are women. And in the appellate courts, it's like 52 or 53%. But the real issue is in the Supreme Court where I sit, because in the 125 years of its existence, 195 justices have been appointed and sat on the court. Only 18 were women. And I'm one of those 18.

Right now, out of the 15 member court, there are only two women. I'm one. The other one is retiring in October. And there is no guarantee that she will be replaced by a woman. When I was appointed in 2022, it was because a woman left and there was strong clamor in society, in media, that a woman be appointed to replace the woman who was retiring.

And so people still question until now, was it her merit or was it because she was a woman? And that is what I seek to break down. At least in the Philippines, we want to show that we are appointed, we merit the appointment, not because we're women. And I always say this, and I said this at the reception for the IAWJ at the Rockefeller foundation earlier this last week, that that day should come when the appointment of a woman as a Chief justice in any nation will no longer be a cause for celebration because it's no longer extraordinary, because it is earned, because we deserve it. And that is what our voices can do.

No matter what part of the world we are in. If we raise those voices and raise them together, it is more likely that we will be heard in the Philippines because of that gender parity or inequality in the ratio. What we did was to conceptualize what we call the Her Story program. In the Her Story Program, I wrote a script for a video where I chose eight magistrates who suffered different gender based discrimination and issues, but managed to rise up and succeed despite these issues. And that video really went viral and it convinced a lot of of girls who did not even think of having a life in law to actually take up law and become lawyers.

So now in the IAWJ that is part of the Women in Law and Leadership Program of the iawj and we are taking it across the globe because we want everyone to see that we do not have to sacrifice any part of our lives and for our professions. When we did the study, the number one reason why women and girls did not want or were not ascending to the Supreme Court in the Philippines is that the women themselves did not want to put themselves up for the vacancies because they believed that they would have to sacrifice their personal responsibilities. And so until now, that stereotype is still there. These are empowered women, we will think, but they still believe that when push comes to shove, they have to prioritize their roles in the homes and they have to sacrifice their careers. And so that's what I'm trying to build, this advocacy within the IAWJ that we can rise to the highest positions not because we're women, but because we deserve to be there because we are qualified.

Thank you.

Thank you so much. Justice Singh, thank you for the work you are doing. It's my pleasure now to invite Ms. Trumbush, the manager at Women Business and the Law at the World Bank. And you have really produced some compelling global evidence on how legal and regulatory environments shape women's economic future. And congratulations on your latest report.

It was a great read. From your perspective, how does strengthening access to justice, particularly for women facing discrimination or gender based violence, intersect with the economic reforms that you track? And what are the most urgent legal or institutional changes that governments should prioritise to ensure that women not only have the rights on paper but but can actually claim them and enforce them in practice. Thank you, thank you, thank you for this question.

Talking about it so Women, Business and the Law is a World bank project that covers 190 countries and we look at how laws, regulations and policies shape women's economic opportunities. At its core, this report looks at how equality or inequality accumulates across a woman's life and translates into very real economic outcomes. Our framework is organized around 10 topics that follow women's life course from safety and mobility to work and pay to childcare, entrepreneurship, asset ownership, and ultimately pension and retirement security. And this life cycle length is important because disadvantages faced early accumulate over time. Our 2026 report, just released just a few weeks ago, goes beyond assessing the laws in the books to also look at for the first time whether those laws are actually implemented and enforced through institutions, policies and programs.

This matters because legal equality without implementation does not deliver economic opportunity. And the data are clear. And we have a big problem. Inequality persists across countries. Women are still less likely than men to work, to own and grow businesses, or to reach leadership positions.

As we just heard, despite often having equal or higher levels of education, one of the largest economic opportunities of our time in the coming decade is that we are seeing 1.2 billion young people entering the workforce in low and middle income countries. Half of them will be girls. Ensuring that women enter that workforce on equal footing is not only a fairness issue, it's an economic strategy. What works for women works for their economies as well. Recent research finds that if women globally had equal access to jobs, global GDP could rise by up to 20%.

And particularly in those countries where women's labor force participation is the lowest. That's where we could see the biggest gains. But realizing that potential requires removing barriers embedded in laws, institutions and systems. Our recent report, Women Business in the law 2026 shows how far we are still from this goal. Women globally enjoy less than two thirds of the legal rights of men.

We've been hearing this number 64%. Only 4% of women live in economies that are approaching full legal equality. That's only 14 countries globally that score above 90 on our index. And critically, laws alone are not enough. Even when legal equality exists, the systems needed to make those rights real are often missing.

Our latest report shows that only about half of the policies needed to implement laws are in place globally. And experts report that laws are only enforced half of the time. So even when we go through all the trouble of changing those laws, without those systems and enforcement, legal reform will fall Short, this is where access to justice becomes central to economic opportunity. Women need institutions that allow them to claim their rights, challenge discrimination and obtain remedies when laws are violated. Without that enforcement, equal pay laws do not translate into equal wages.

Laws protecting women from violence do not translate into safe spaces. Legal rights to start a business do not translate into access to finance or or markets. But the areas where these implementation gaps are the most visible we find are related to safety and gender based violence. Safety remains one of the lowest scoring areas globally. Even in high income economies, we find only one third of the laws necessary in place to protect women against child marriage, domestic violence, sexual harassment and femicide.

These laws are often incomplete and enforcement consistently trails legal guarantees. We find the enforcement to be at only 20%. That means it fails 80% of the time. This matters economically. Women cannot participate fully in labor markets or as entrepreneurs if violence and insecurity remain unaddressed.

And coming to entrepreneurship and access to markets is also another area where we see a lot of potential to improve women. Can we start businesses on nearly equal footing? In most countries today, which is progress. But the supporting ecosystem is very uneven. Less than 2% of government and corporate procurement goes to women led businesses.

Yet only 53 of 190 economies we've studied have some type of gender responsive procurement provisions. The message from the data is clear. Access to justice is not peripheral to economic reform. It is the mechanism that can turn rights into into real opportunities. Thank you.

Thank you so much. I now am going to invite Doreen Kaise, the Regional Director for Sub Saharan Africa for Penal Reform International. We know that legal empowerment is a powerful catalyst for change. And we know that it can take many forms from awareness raising to accompanying women through legal processes. From your experience, what forms of legal empowerment have been the most transformative in helping women to understand, claim and exercise their rights?

And how do you ensure that empowerment leads not just to knowledge, but to actual remedies and protection? Thank you.

I'll try to answer the question before me. It's big. But for me to start I need to give a background regarding women in detention in Africa. Currently we are witnessing at least approximately 24% increase of women in prison currently in Africa, which is much more than that of men at 6%. Although in most of the countries women represent just about 2 to 6% of the total prison population.

But majority of the women's prisons are currently operating beyond capacity.

One of the drivers that is leading many women into prison is the criminalization, the continued criminalization of poverty and status for Example, selling fruit by the roadside, failure to pay debts. All those account to the increase in the number of women in prison and also offences such as abortion and prostitution. In the context of the criminal justice system, we've witnessed that women spend longer in pre trial detention. There is limited use of non custodial alternatives and there is inadequate and and absence in most of the countries of gender sensitive criminal justice policies and laws. And yet most of the women enter the system with poor health, including mental health.

And women bear the highest burden of HIV on entry into the criminal justice system. Women often do not have access to legal aid, including legal representation. They spend longer in pre trial detention and because of the poverty, they are unable to meet most of the remedies at pre trial stage, including bail conditions or fines.

Of course, given that most of the women, almost 90% are illiterate, they are unaware of their legal rights. Most of them are because they enter detention and they fail to access health care and reproductive health care services. And also once they enter into the detention facilities, they are mostly rejected by their families and the community.

There is another impact of women being in detention that extends to the community. They lose employment, they lose their children and families and they face stigma pre and post their incarceration. So what do we think are the best practices to support women's empowerment once they encounter the criminal justice system? There's need to invest in gender sensitive criminal justice policies and laws. Most of the laws in Africa are neutral.

We need to invest in diversion programs that take recognition of the women's poor health and their caregiving responsibilities. There's need to invest in trauma informed rehabilitation and reintegration support services.

There's need to extend legal aid to women, including access to lawyers that can support them from arrest to reintegration. Of course, there is also need for legal reforms, revision of bail and bond guidelines, for example. We need to invest in mobile courts because in most of the countries where in most of the countries in Africa, courts are inaccessible to women. So mobile courts are a good option. And we need to revise the sentencing guidelines to accommodate gender responsive mitigation grounds that would keep many women out of detention.

We need also acknowledge that women that get into conflict with the law face intersecting vulnerabilities. There's therefore need for justice reforms that address poverty, trauma and gender equality. And above all, we need to expand non custodial alternatives to imprisonment that support women's well being. I thank you,

Thank you very much. It's now my pleasure to invite Michelle Bienke, the president of the American Bar Association. We all know that the legal profession plays a defining role in how justice is delivered. So from the ABA's vantage point, how can bar associations shift professional norms? Perhaps through model rules, ethics opinion, continuing legal education, mentorship and other means, so that gender responsive and survivor centered practice become standard across courts, prosecution, defence and adr.

Thank you. It's a pleasure to be here and I'm honored to be here speaking with all of the panelists today. And thank you to IDLO for bringing us together. I think the short answer to that is twofold advocacy and action. In the U.S. women constitute more than 70% of clients of legal service organizations, legal aid associations, and that's not surprising given the frequency with which the legal aid offices take cases that do involve discrimination, domestic violence and child custody.

As a bar association in the US with the largest, most diverse membership, and with our nationwide network of state, local and specialty bar association, the ABA takes those two actions, advocacy and action, and we use those to shift professional norms of legal practice. With respect to gender justice, the most evident way that we use is influencing advocacy. The ABA adopts policy in our House of Delegates, which is a body of about 600 bar leaders from across the country. The policies that are adopted by the House of Delegates enable the ABA to advocate with our governmental officials. We'll be headed to Washington just next week to advocate on behalf of behalf of the policies recently adapted.

Among the dozens of resolutions that were recently considered at our mid year meeting were three resolutions that I'll share with you. One resolution that we adopted was a new model ethics rule to clarify guidance on how lawyers can meet their ethical obligations when representing clients with decision making limitations. As we know, such clients are often women who have suffered abuse, so their ability to engage meaningfully in decisions regarding their care and prosecution may be diminished. A second resolution calls on government agencies in the US to implement survivor centered diversion programs in the criminal justice system. The resolution outlined why lawyers need to be trained on effective representation of women survivors and in criminal cases.

And the resolution calls for training with trauma informed and intersectional approaches. A third resolution urged Congress to adopt legislation that extends immigration and public benefits to survivors of domestic violence, sexual violence and other forms of gender based violence. Once we've adopted the policy, our advocacy, then the ABA works to connect lawyers with the work of our sections, divisions and forums and other committees so that we're actually activating lawyers on behalf of these issues. Lawyers that are interested in promoting equal justice for women and girls have a wealth of places to get involved, including our International Law section and its International Human Rights Committee. Another of our section.

Another is our Section of Legal Rights and Social justice, which has numerous intersectional committees on topics including international human rights, reproductive rights and justice and women's rights. Our ABA Rule of Law Initiative is another important resource. Although we have been hampered by the loss of many grants, we are still engaged in this important work. Through our decades long work in more than 100 countries, the ABA and our partners have strengthened legal institutions, supported legal professionals, fostered respect for human rights, and advanced public understanding of the law and of citizens rights. The Rule of Law Initiative incorporates gender considerations into all aspects of the work and our programs to counter discrimination and ensure equal protection under the law.

These are not standalone programs, but they're integrated into the work of our Rule of Law Initiative. Among recent programs of the ABA Rule of Law Initiative was Women and Girls Empowered, a global consortium to advance the status of women and girls, promote women's economic power, and improve the prevention of and response to gender based violence. Programs were based in Central America, Africa, the Middle east and the former Soviet republics in Central Asia. Another initiative is the ABA's Commission on Domestic and Sexual Violence which offers guides and training to enhance representation for survivors. Our work includes a Civil Litigation Skills project to provide training directly to lawyers who represent survivors of gender based violence and a project to help lawyers provide trauma informed representation and client centered representation.

Our Commission on Youth and Family justice and center on Children and the Law mobilizes ABA members engagement by addressing youth and family justice law topics in the legal profession. The ABA does all of this work more in the context of support for the all in addition to support for the professional advancement of women lawyers in all practice settings, including dispute resolution, our Commission on Women in the Profession leads us in this work. Equal treatment of Women and Girls is woven through all of the ABA goals and advocacy activities. More broadly, our work to promote access to justice, pro bono, equal opportunity and other work very much complements SDGs 5 and 16. We don't set our equality work aside as separate projects, but we have found that integrating them into all of the work of the ABA is the way forward this year.

We have also been very intentional in our discussions about equality as well as diversity, equity and inclusion as we face challenges in our own country as lawyers. Talking about these important issues is how we will find the solutions to address the ongoing inequalities. We need to use our abilities to dig into these complicated issues, use our ability to analyze and then find and implement the solutions. I am grateful to be here today and I am anxiously listening to all of the conversation so that I can take back the suggestions and implementation ideas.

Thank you very much. I'm now turning to Professor Rangita da Silva Dialgues, who is a member of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women. Thank you for all the work that you do in the Committee on our behalf. So, as we know, the CEDAW Convention has long been a cornerstone in guiding States toward eliminating discrimination and towards substantive equality for women and girls. And General Recommendation number 33 in particular sets out a powerful roadmap for ensuring women's access to justice.

So, professor, drawing from the Committee's experience, what are the most significant gaps that you continue to observe when it comes to States implementing their obligations under cedaw, particularly in the justice sector, and what promising practices or emerging trends give you hope that real progress is possible? Thank you.

Access to justice is inalienable and an indivisible human right. But the promise of gender equality under law remains elusive globally. I wish to begin my remarks with the stark reminder that at the heart of the Taliban's rule in Afghanistan are over 100 even edicts, including the 114 page law on the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice, which includes the denial of girls and women's education, corporal punishment of women for so called moral crimes, and the most recent edict which legitimizes domestic violence, which are all repugnant to the CEDAW and gender equality under law. The cedaw, the Global Bill of Rights, remains clear key to combating their jury and de facto discrimination. Articles 2F and 2G respectively calls upon state parties to both enact new gender equality laws, but also repeal existing unequal laws, including penal provisions which constitute discrimination against women and girls.

In my own global mapping, although equality before the law is enshrined in 134 constitutions, access to justice is enshrined in only 21 constitutions and legal aid in 34 constitutions. Your Excellencies. The subjugation of women is a threat to global security. Discrimination goes hand in hand with the political and economic stability of nations that you so well enunciated. Transformation in law is key.

This leads to transformation in economic and macroeconomic policy. As you so well stated, stereotypical assumptions in the law, such as overprotection of women or exclusion of women from certain categories of work, reinforce biases that women are fragile and have negative impact on the national and the global economy at a time of profound shifts in the global economic order. Secondly, unequal retirement laws over protections in the laws that restrict women's employment in terms of hazardous work work, nighttime work, impede women's equal access to the global markets while discriminatory husband obedience laws, male only heads of household laws, unequal inheritance laws, property rights, access to banking and credit not only subordinate women but impede a nation's full human capital. Women are often sacrificed at the altar of a family's honor and the law itself is complicit in this personal status codes which codify unequal laws on unilateral divorce, guardianship, virginity testing, exculpatory provisions for rape, husband obedience male heads of household stereotype definitions of consent in rape laws not only subjugate women's human security but impedes a state's advances in all categories. The law's power to construct women's inferior status can be both subtle and direct.

Now, what recommendations do I make to transform the jury laws into de facto practice? In order to pierce the veil of impunity, we must reaffirm once again our faith in the transformative power of courts both domestic and international, and that of women justices as Justice Shah so evocatively spoke about first, the domestication of CEDAW, the full domestication of CEDAW and its GR33 and the addendum to the Women Peace and Security Agenda which was adopted by the Committee last month and I was honored to be the author of, which calls for the domestication of all international laws, including international humanitarian law, and invokes the ICC's Natanga case which recognized sexual slavery, and the Ongwen case which recognized forced pregnancy and forced marriage as crimes against humanity. The decisions of the ICJ and the Inter American Court. They are advisory opinions on climate change which needs to be acknowledged in domestic courts. Second, GR40, our most recently adopted General Recommendation 40 calls for parity, including in the national courts.

The role of women justices is paramount to the cedaw. In the seminal Akayesu case before the International Criminal Tribunal of Rwanda, the only woman judge played a major role in changing the law to recognize rape as a tool of war. In 1994, the Guatemalan Sepurzako case is also a case in point. One of the first instances where a domestic court prosecuting sexual slavery as an international crime was marked by creating survivor centered trauma informed traditions within the formal court structure which constructed the evidentiary requirements to allow women to tell their stories and honor women's voices and to restore the dignity of the victim and most importantly, a court presided by three female justices helped in the transformative justice to the Abuelas, the Grandmothers of Sepurzako in Guatemala. And finally, while anti discrimination laws are part of the formal equality tradition, we call for the transformative access to justice and the implementation of international law and a shift from formal gender equality to substantial gender equality as a way to address the legacy of discrimination.

And I will share three important examples. One, from the South African Constitution which in Article 30 mandates that mandates. I repeat that courts, tribunals or forums must consider international law. Second, we spoke about the male involvement in addressing gender discrimination. The Laos law on preventing and combating violence against women enshrines men have responsibilities and shall take ownership in preventing violence and discrimination.

And finally, the German constitution in Article 32 reads, the state shall promote the actual implementation of equal rights for men and women and take steps to eliminate disadvantages that now exist. So this is a shift from formal equality to substantive equality, recognizing the active role of the state to eliminate root causes of disadvantage and discrimination. It is not enough to enshrine negative rights, but the positive rights of affirmative action and temporary special measures for women in constitutional guarantees. And I wish to conclude, Madam Chair, there were discussions on tech facilitated gender based violence. But as a postscript, I would like to add that we are at a point of an AI revolution.

AI has the promise of great good and great harm. We need to address data bias, algorithmic bias and developer bias. Large language models which are trained on historically biased and discriminatory data sets where women are underrepresented and in the development of AI where women are underrepresented, shape coded biases which will shape women's lives by normalizing digitized gender bias as omnipresent and ubiquitous. This is the new challenge of our time. Thank you.

Thank you so much. I think that was a really rich discussion. We have time for just a few points from the floor, so if you. Yes, I'll start with you. Could you push your.

It's okay, I have a question. Okay. Good afternoon and thank you for this important discussion. My name is Blanca Mujica. I am a lawyer from Peru.

I am a national representative charter of the organization Namyo. In Peru, indigenous women, including with disabilities, own special needs, face serious barriers to access justice. Courts are far legal information is limited and justice systems are often not adapted to their language, culture or abilities. Many women who experience violence risk reactimation when the institutions are asking about their cases and again and again while seeking help. My question to the panel is what legal and policy measures can ensure that

ingenious women, especially those with special needs, can access justice safely and without begin re Victimize it. Thank you very much.

We'll just take a couple more and then I'm going to turn back very briefly for like a minute each. This was on indigenous women.

Yes, I'll take you there. Yes.

Hello. Good afternoon. My name is Valentina. I'm 17 years old and I come from Iquitos in the Peruvian Amazon. In many communities in the Amazon, women

are the heart of their families. They care for children, protect traditions and support their communities. But many of them live far from courts, far from lawyers, and far from justice. For many women in rural regions, justice

is not only slow, it is distant and sometimes unreachable. When women cannot access justice, they cannot defend their land, their war, or even their safety. This is not only a legal issue, it is a question of dignity, equality and human rights. As a young woman from the Amazon, I believe justice should not depend on where you are born.

My question is how can governments ensure that justice treats women and girls in Vermont. Ryan. So that justice is not privileged for the few, but a right for all. Thank you.

Okay, thank you.

Yes, I see the lady at the back. White. Yes, thank you.

My name is Kiteria Gringana and I lead the Women Observatory in Mozambique, which provide legal assistance, pro bono legal assistance. My comment, my question would be.

Many women reports, at least in the case of Mozambique, that judicial decisions often face fail to reflect their real needs, particularly in case of sexual violence. Even when victims reject extrajudicial settlements and pusher justice, courts many times convert prison centers into fines, leaving the perpetrator effectively unaccountable and the victims only partially vindicated. I used to say that it's never been more challenging to reconcile the legal concept of writing rights with the experience of justice, especially when judicial processes are slow and opaque. So my question is, may you share a concrete experience of your country's judicial systems, ensuring that investigation, prosecution and trial process are responsive to the specific needs of victims without compromising the neutrality and generality of the law. But applying a gender sensitive lens, especially in the case of Philippines and also the Bar association of America.

Thank you. Thank you. The gentleman here.

Thank you very much. To our distinguished organizers, esteemed panelists, fellow participants, good afternoon. I speak on behalf of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines, the national organization of all lawyers in the Philippines with 85 chapters across the country. In our experience, advancing access to justice for women and girls requires moving from commitments to institutionalized action at the local level. Earlier this year, the Integrated Bar of the Philippines convened its first National Gender and Development Summit, which institutionalized gender responsive lawyering across our nationwide chapters and strengthen our role in delivering justice services to communities across the Philippines.

Our chapters implement practical access to justice initiatives including legal aid for women and child survivors of violence, jail visitation and legal assistance for women deprived of liberty, legal aid caravans in rural indigenous communities, and gender sensitivity training for justice actors. Our experience offers three practical lessons. First, global commitments such as SDG 5 and SDG 16 must be localized through community based justice institutions. Second, gender responsiveness must be institutionalized within the legal profession itself. And third, sustainable progress requires strong collaboration between bar associations, government agencies and civil society.

We therefore encourage greater recognition of national bar associations as key institutional partners in strengthening access to justice systems for women and girls. Thank you so much. Thank you very much. Okay, I'm just going. So little time.

Taking two more, so I'm taking one right from the back. Yes, you.

I'm Mari Isabella. I'm a public defender in Brazil.

Hello everyone. I'm Mari Isabel. I'm a public defender in Brazil. And in Brazil, the constitutions guarantees free full access to justice through the state founded public defender's offices in Rio de Janeiro. This begins at custody hearings where we

prioritize alternative measures for mothers of young children and those with disabilities. Our support continues inside prisons with weekly legal assistance. And after sentencing, we advocate for house arrest and charity guardianship.

This model is a practical application of gender responsive policy, acknowledging that the burden of care falls disproportionately on women. By formalizing shared guardianship, we ensure that while an external caregiver handles daily needs, the incarcerated mother remains legally responsible for her child's life. So my question is if any of the countries represented on this panel provide such state funded legal defense for all women.

My name is Gabrielle Demir and I am a sophomore at Harvard University, a part of the Harvard delegation. It's an honor to be here. Thank you guys for all you shared.

My question is how have your respective organizations and countries specifically sought to protect female maternal leave and empower young women to. To seek out male dominated industries, but typically don't due to what you kind of touched on earlier for fear of like experiencing informal or straight up discrimination.

And how do you guys deal with both institutional barriers but also societal pressures and stigma?

Okay, so thank you. So we have really key questions. We have like basically a minute for each member of the panel Just, just to say something. Let me say this is the beginning of a conversation.

We can't get into all of these things, but you will make your networks through this. You'll be able to meet people People can give you answers outside also of this meeting. So I'm going to go around and please, I'm going to ask everyone if you could just, you can give any thought in answer to any of the questions or anything that has come to view come to you by listening to the colleagues here, please. President,

I think. Oh, there we go. In many of the questions my thought would be twofold. One is education of lawyers, trauma based trauma informed education. You have very smart people but if they don't understand what the trauma actually visits, they won't be able to use those skills to effectively get appropriate remedies.

And the second also was talked about on our panel is more education of the people of women and girls. You can't access something that you don't understand exists for you. And so direct civics education is needed so that they understand that there are people who would be able to represent them and help them achieve the rights that they're seeking.

Thank you so much, Doreen.

Thank you.

Okay, thank you very much. The first question regarding the indignant women, I think it's similar to the experience of women in corrections. So I would recommend promotion of restorative justice approaches because they work better especially in communities that are far from justice institutions. And also the training of defendants to self represent, especially in low resource countries has really proven to be to work well for those women and to also establish communities of mentors that could support women at risk from getting in contact with the law, especially with the drug related crimes and crimes related to alcohol abuse and addictions. The other in relation to governments to ensure support where there is limited access.

Again, for the African context, what has been working well is the mobile courts because now the judiciary has taken it up and institutionalized mobile courts to reach far communities, especially on islands that is working well to support the poor communities and also investment in diversion programs, especially for minor offenders in the context of domestic violence. I think again it is for us in Africa. I think there's been an established, for example in Uganda there's been an establishment of SGBV special courts. And also the judiciary has been more proactive over the years to establish gender bench books which guide in dealing with cases of violence and sexual and gender based violence. Thank you.

Thank you very much. Justice Singh.

Two things. We started what we call the Justice Sector Coordinating Council. It's a council with the Department of Justice who's represented today by the undersecretary and the Department of the Interior. Why is that important? All the criminal justice system actors belong to these three agencies, including the judiciary.

And so why is that critical? Because for the longest time we've been delivering the services in silos. There is no coordination and so there is blame passing and the concern ends after you've rendered your services. So we do not look beyond, we do not look at the entire context of the delivery of the services. But now we work together in the sector.

And one of the programs that we recently launched is the victim sensitive guidelines. I think that addresses the three of the questions that were raised. Why is that important? Because it's an end to end guide on how to deal with victims of all crimes. So you may have trained your judges and court personnel to be victim sensitive, but if upon entry of the case into the system through law enforcement side, there is no equal training among law enforcement agencies, then they will suffer re victimization already.

So training the entire sector together, capacity building together, is the answer to that. And we're doing this through the victim sensitive guidelines. On the other hand, we don't want to neglect the rights of the women who are incarcerated. So we have developed a manual and a protocol for women in conflict with the law, which is the very first in the in the Philippines. It incorporates the Mandela rules and the Bangkok rules.

Why is this important? There was a much publicized case. A political detainee gave birth in the prisons immediately. Her infant was taken away from her. The infant passed away in a week's time.

So there is no protocol for pregnant women. When I visit our jails, I find out there is not even maternal vitamins. So there's no provision for maternal checks. Monthly maternal checks. If you want to get a checkup, you have to get permission from the court through an order.

Sometimes that comes after you've already given birth. So that means that that has terrible consequences on maternal mortality rates. And so all these things we are trying to do through the justice sector coordinating Council. I think now the whole of government approach is the way to go because simply one agency, even the courts cannot handle all these things. Thank you so much.

I'm sorry. Because of the security, we do have to leave very soon. So I'm going to ask the panelists. Very fast. Thank you.

Very fast. So one of the things around indigenous women, the thing that has worked in Australia is a program called Justice Reinvestment, which basically looks at diverting the money you might spend in a justice response to a community response and to be proactive, recognising that often when you end up in the justice system, it's because of a whole range of barriers that you might face. In terms of legal aid, yes, we do have access to free legal aid in Australia, but I think it is what our colleague from the Bar association said. If you don't know that you have access to legal aid, you won't seek it out. And our most marginalised communities, women with disabilities, women from migrant and refugee backgrounds, and indigenous women, often struggle to access the rights that they are entitled to.

Thank you. Thank you so much. Minister Clancy. Thank you. There's a divide and conquer responses, aren't they?

I'll talk more on the disability side as well, because when we talk about representation, of course, it's representation of whom. And women with disabilities remain almost entirely absent from legal professions and justice institutions. They're not sitting on the bench and in many cases they cannot even physically enter the courthouses. And of course, the exclusion of women with disabilities is not only a rights failure, it's a systemic impoverishment. And so if we're serious about inclusive justice, our efforts must be intersectional from the outset.

So thank you for raising that. In closing, I was actually really pleased to meet on one of the panels last week, MP that actually she's a woman, she's a lawyer and she had no hands and. Right. And this is the exact example of we're going to see real change when we actually see people that have experienced this that are actually leading part of the responses that we need. Thank you.

Thank you so much. Minister Graham. Thank you. I would just like to add to what Justice Singh said about the whole of government approach in the Philippines. In the Department of Justice, we just don't wait for, for cases to be filed in our department.

We go to the communities and then we educate them on their rights. And then in one experience, we went to this province in which the incidence of rape is prevalent, especially incestuous rape. So when our prosecutors went there, educated the people on their rights and then a lot of people came forward and filed cases. So that is very important. We don't only wait for the case to be filed, but also we bring access to justice to the communities.

Thank you. Thank you so much. Besta Mayor Party 2 infos about Italy that I think might be meaningful. In Italy, we have 10, 11 judges. Justice, 5,800 are women, which is 57%.

And the second, the second info is that the Italian parliament in December 2025 passed the law, especially specific law, femicide, that is recognizing as a specific crime the homicide of a woman as a crime of hate or for discrimination or just for being a woman. And with the okay, that's thank you so much. Ms. Trumbridge.

As for legal change is important, but I would just, having everyone said already a lot of important things, I would push for the need for data to continue to track progress and also shifting social norms through policies and programs and guidelines so that behaviors change and that includes also online and how we use technology because all of these formal ways will not change until our behaviors and the acceptance from both men and women for these rights change as well.

Thank you. Thank you so much. And professor yes, thank you. This is for the students from my alma mater, Harvard University.

I just wanted to address the fact that we are yet to acknowledge the role of private sector and non state parties in anti discrimination human rights. Due diligence obligations cover both state and non state actors, including the private sector. And under CEDAW's Article 2e, non state actors must employ due diligence guarantees to women's equality both in the public and the private sector. And then finally, I think in closing, I would call upon all of us in terms of call to action, to respect the rule of law, due process under law, that no one is above the law. What we see is a need to reaffirm this truth that no one is above the law at a time when the justice system system itself is at risk.

Thank you.

I want to thank all of you and of course all of our wonderful speakers and panellists for being with us today. I think that clearly we could be talking here for hours and I hope that many of you will make connections and you will continue this conversation. I'm not going to sum up this very rich discussion, but I, I think that we basically all know what we need to do. I mean clearly we need those issues that are right out front for us in the justice system, the discriminatory laws and the institutions that are not responsive. But we've also got to deal with those real barriers, those root causes.

And I think that all of you have mentioned them. Violence against women and girls and so pervasive and so many of you have talked about it in even in high income countries we heard that safety is a major barrier. Social and cultural norms that discriminate or stigmatize women and girls, the burden of unpaid care on women, women's economic participation, workplaces that are not free from sexual harassment, the lack of gender sensitive criminal justice processes, plural poverty of women in so many societies, including some high income societies, limited understanding of rights, need for more women in the justice system, the AI bias, the lack of really good data. But on the other hand, we have a lot of evidence about what does work. I think we have a lot of many good frameworks and tools.

We have examples of wonderful women leading in the justice sector all around the world. And we have some many good frameworks. I mean, the gender based budgeting I heard today about gender based procurement, I didn't know so much about that, but it's so interesting. We always learn something every time that we work. So I think that it's so important that we do put, as was said at the beginning, gender equality at the heart of decision making.

What it's all about really is sharing good practices, scaling them up, ensuring that we have the necessary investment, but also political will to make them accessible to women and girls everywhere and sustainable. And we've heard a lot about whole of government responses. I would say whole of community and whole of government is absolutely what we need and intersectional responses. So we look forward to continue to partner with all of you. And I just can do no more than just repeat what the professor said.

Please, all of us stand up for respect for the rule of law nationally and internationally. And we at IDLO look forward to seeing as many of you as possible at our SDG 16 conference where we will be partnering with VISA and the government of Italy. And you can be sure that I will be emphasizing the mutually reinforcing relationship between SDG 5 and SDG 16. So thank you all. Thank you very, very much.

Let me give this to this lady. I want to give.