Delegation of Kingdom of Norway

Sava Tatiana
OPENING SPEECH on “Implementing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development -
Empowering people and ensuring justice for all. Ensuring justice in conflict zones”
Thank you Honorable Chair.
Fellow delegates,
It is very important to stress one of the major problems we have at the present moment in
the world, this being the lack of justice in conflict zones, especially in the case of women and
children.

I appreciate this opportunity to express the overall goals of the Norwegian development
cooperation, which are: eradicate extreme poverty by 2030, ensure good governance and respect
for human rights for all by 2030, contribute to rights-based implementation of the SDGs, ensure
that people in need receive the necessary assistance and protection, contribute to sustainable
development and help to make countries independent of aid.

In the regions where armed conflicts are present, women and children are the victims of
violence, and large segments of population are denied the most basic human rights. Children
living in countries at war have come under direct attack, have been used as human shields, killed,
maimed or recruited to fight. As for women, they are raped, forced to get married or abducted.

We urge the supply of technical assistance in order to conduct capacity development of

critical rule of law institutions, such as the Judiciary, the Ministry of Justice, the Prosecutor‟s
Office, Law-enforcement and Corrections in conflict zones. In addition, recruiting and assigning
UN/UNDP staff with proven expertise in rule of law programming in conflict and post-conflict
situations would be a tremendous step towards achieving our goal. In this way, we hope to
strengthen the capacity of rule of law institutions (formal and informal) to extend protection and
deliver basic justice and security services, especially for women and children, developing the
capacity of local rule of law institutions to shoulder their responsibilities under international law
and SC Resolution 1325 and Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Norwegian funding has helped to promote work in the area of women, children and security
all over the world. For example, special women’s units have been established in police stations in
Liberia for women who want to report rape. We have also sent police advisers with special
expertise in this area to UN operations in Liberia and Haiti to assist the local police in their efforts
to ensure that perpetrators of sexual crimes are prosecuted. Norway also supports Unicef’s work
on reporting and imposing sanctions on parties to a conflict that commit war rape and other forms
of sexual abuse of children.
The Kingdom of Norway has committed to helping countries affected by conflict. Since
2013, we have increased the overall humanitarian budget by more than 50 %. In 2019 we propose
spending almost NOK 5.4 billion to help victims of the world's humanitarian crises. We consider
that increasing the funding is an effective strategy, in order to be able to cover a wider range of
projects, since the protection of children and women requires serious commitment.
Finally, The Kingdom of Norway is ready to provide assistance and support for those
countries in need. We need to unite our forces in order to ensure justice in regions affected by
conflict, instability and injustice. Thank you, delegates. I yield my time to the floor.