Victoria Hernandez

7th Period
October 27, 2016

UNWomen Position Paper

Violence against women has sadly, been an ongoing issue for many years across the world. No matter
how much women accomplish or how hard they work or how much they go through, they are still
discriminated against. Violence against women doesnt always mean its physical either. There are
thousands of cases reported each year of women being harassed simply because they are a female. For
example, a woman being harassed because she got a promotion at her job over a male coworker.
However there are also cases where it does get physical, and these, along with every other case, need to
be stopped immediately. The UN has partnered up with other organizations in the past like the World
Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGS) and made a non-formal education curriculum
engage young people in hopes to prevent and eventually end violence against girls and women. The UN
has also teamed up with Partners for Prevention (P4P) to work with boys and men to help and prevent
violence through behavioral and attitudinal change.
I, as the delegate of Syria, feel that violence against women is something that happens too often there
and the issue needs to be resolved quickly. Violence against women includes a variety of different
things. Including prostitution, rape, female genital mutilation, honor killings, acid throwing, and human
trafficking. Syria has a known history with violence against women. A large part of why there is so much
violence towards women is because Syria largely relies on religion. In 1993 the UN came up with a
resolution called the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women (DEVAW). The DEVAW
establishes a comprehensive set of standards for international law for the protection of women against
sexual and gender-based violence. With Syria in the middle of their civil war right now, violence against
women is at higher rates. In 2012 a woman in Syria was having a conversation with her husband. Her
driver heard and brought her to a military security branch where she spent the night and was forced to
sign a paper stating her husband was a terrorist. While she was there, that woman was raped. She was
pregnant and that rape caused her to have miscarriage. Also In 2012 two girls were stopped at a
governmental checkpoint. While they were being searched, gun fire broke out between government and
armed troops. The commanding officer there pushed the two in front of him to use as a shield. They
were then threatened if they were to ever speak of it. Syria sadly hasnt enforced any policies
concerning these events or any others but I hope that we can all fix that.
I propose that Syria enforce many new laws for womens rights and protection, that they have
punishments for all the violence against these women, and that the government constructs a new
education system that doesnt show girls and women as second class or not important. While we know
this will take time and money, we are prepared for it all because we are positive it will be very beneficial
in the long run. Syria would work closely with its ally countries and hope to have support from the UN.
Syria also proposes that other countries dealing with violence against women like India for example,
follow in Syrias path and make many new arrangements so that both genders will be equal and equally
respected.