International Day of Women in Multilateralism - UNESCO

 On 25 January 2022, UNESCO inaugurates the International

 Day of Women in Multilateralism. Spearheaded by theAmbassador of Gabon, H.E. Ms Rachel Annick Ogoula Akiko, this International Day was adopted by the 41st session ofUNESCO’s General Conference in November 2021. 

 Women have been playing a crucial role in global governancesince the drafting and signing of the United Nations Charter in 1945. Historians remind us of several remarkable womenwithout whom this groundbreaking Charter would not have been as inclusive as we know it.

Watch here a UN video featuring women leaders, including Eleanor Roosevelt, who played an instrumentalrole in drafting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Since then, women have been joining more and more key positions in UN organizations, in the diplomatic representations of their countries and in a number of multilateral institutions and they have been advancing gender equality, peace, and human rights, advocating for equal access to health, education and participation in decision-making at all levels, including the right to vote. Ending violence, harassment and discrimination against women and girls remains a high priority on the United Nations agenda, especially after such incidents spiked during COVID-19 confinements around the world.

An International day of Women in Multilateralism is needed both to keep the memory of the crucial contributions of women leaders at the inception of the United Nations vivid and at the same time to make visible the role of contemporary women leaders and encourage the young generation. We are witnessing a rise in the number of women leaders in the sphere of global politics, economics and human rights. However, women remain largely underrepresented in many other spheres of power and decision. Women represent only 23% of delegates in peace keeping processes led or co-led by the UN. Only 28.6% of peace agreements included gender provisions in 2020 (down from 37.1% in 2015). Such evidence is startling, especially since it has been shown that peace agreements are more successful and more long-lasting when women participate in the negotiations and when they are gender-sensitive from the start.

Women’s leadership in multilateralism is a priority for UNESCO’s Director General, Audrey Azoulay. Together with the Prime Minister of Iceland, Katrín Jakobsdóttir, she issued a challenge to the international community to define a new kind of multilateral leadership to achieve gender equality. They argued that feminist leaders are not just instrumental to the achievement of gender equality, they are indeed designers of systemic change. They have the courage to create, educate, innovate.  Feminist leaders expose injustices and unequal opportunities. They know that gender inequalities stem from discrimination and exclusion and that it is only by lifting these barriers that real change can happen.

In her message for International Day of Women in Multilateralism 2022, UNESCO’s Director-General is re-launching this call for a “collective reflection to address the specific challenges of women in order to guarantee them a fair representation at all levels”. This will require actions endorsed multilaterally and addressing root causes of inequalities.  

UNESCO is committed to provide a global platform to open up horizons for new generations of women and enable them to co-shape multilateral decisions that will have an impact on the future of gender equality in education, sciences, culture, communication and information. UNESCO stands together with its international partners to work towards the Sustainable Development Goals for gender equality and to effect the change as called for by the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres “Today, women's leadership is a cause. Tomorrow it must be a norm. This is how we will transform international peace and security.”

Dozens of Chinese warplanes fly near Taiwan after US-Japan show of naval might

A Taiwan Ministry of Defense graphic shows where Chinese warplanes flew on Sunday, January 23.

Hong Kong (CNN)China sent 39 warplanes into Taiwan’s air defense identification zone (ADIZ) on Sunday, Taiwan’s Defense Ministry said, the largest such incursion this year.

The flights by the People’s Liberation Army aircraft came a day after the United States and Japanese navies put on a massive show of force in the Philippine Sea, putting together a flotilla that included two US Navy aircraft carriers, two US amphibious assault ships and a Japanese helicopter destroyer, essentially a small aircraft carrier.

Two US guided-missile cruisers and five destroyers were also part of the exercise. The Philippine Sea is the area of the Pacific Ocean east of Taiwan, between the self-ruled island and the US territories of Guam and the Northern Mariana Islands. The Navy did not say how close the flotilla was to Taiwan.

Aircraft fly over a US-Japan naval flotilla that included two US aircraft carriers in the Philippine Sea on Saturday.

“Freedom at its finest! Nothing reaffirms our commitment to a #FreeandOpenIndoPacific like 2 Carrier Strike Groups, 2 Amphibious Ready Groups sailing alongside our close friends from the Japan Maritime Self Defense Force,” Vice Adm. Karl Thomas, commander of the US 7th Fleet based in Japan, said in a tweet.

A US Navy statement said the mass of warships was “conducting training to preserve and protect a free and open Indo-Pacific region.”

Taiwan’s President: Threat from China is growing every day (October, 2021) 07:32

Chinese warplane incursions

Taiwan and mainland China have been governed separately since the defeated Nationalists retreated to the island at the end of the Chinese civil war more than 70 years ago.

But China’s ruling Chinese Communist Party (CCP) views the self-ruled island as part of its territory — despite having never controlled it.

Beijing has not ruled out military force to take Taiwan and has kept pressure on the democratic island over the past few years with frequent warplane flights into Taiwan’s ADIZ. The US Federal Aviation Administration defines an ADIZ as “a designated area of airspace over land or water within which a country requires the immediate and positive identification, location and air traffic control of aircraft in the interest of the country’s national security.”

Sunday’s incursions were made by 24 J-16 fighter jets, 10 J-10 fighter jets, two Y-9 transport aircraft, two Y-8 anti-submarine warning aircraft, and one nuclear-capable H-6 bomber, the Taiwanese Defense Ministry said in a statement on Sunday.

In response, the Taiwanese military issued radio warnings and deployed air defense missile systems to monitor the activities, it added.

The incursions on Sunday marked the highest daily number of Chinese warplanes entering Taiwan’s ADIZ this year. The highest number of incursions ever recorded was on October 4 last year, when 56 military planes flew into the area on the same day.

While the Chinese incursions Sunday were likely a reaction to the large naval presence Tokyo and Washington were putting in the area, they also served another purpose, said Collin Koh, research fellow at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies in Singapore.

“No doubt this is part of the broader campaign by Beijing aimed at eroding the will and ability of Taiwan to continue resisting,” Koh said.

Taiwan suspends F-16 fleet combat training after jet crashes into sea

He pointed to the recent crash of one of Taiwan’s best fighter planes, an F-16V, and the toll its taking on the island’s air force to respond to persistent PLA incursions into Taiwan’s defense zone.

“Certain politicians and retired military officers (in Taiwan) have raised the issue of possible pilot shortage and insufficient training in the face of operational requirements in responding to frequent PLA flybys,” Koh said.

The crash and those statements “would potentially sow concerns amongst the public regarding the island’s ability to stand its ground against the mainland’s repeated and avowedly increasing military provocations,” especially as Beijing has vowed to continue the incursions, he said.

Taiwan holds ceremony for advanced F-16V fighter jets (November, 2021) 02:11

“The latest major flyby, while obviously targeted at the allied show of force in the Philippine Sea, will definitely have some intended reinforcement effect on the ongoing debates in Taiwan,” Koh said.

Island disputes

Carl Schuster, a former director of operations at the US Pacific Command’s Joint Intelligence Center, said China is trying to keep Taiwan off balance and tired — “like a tennis player pushes his opponent to chase the ball across the court” — sending larger formations of aircraft toward the island from more distant bases on the mainland.

He also said the US-Japan naval exercises sent a message to China not only about Taiwan, but about Beijing’s actions in the South China Sea and near the Japan-controlled Senkaku Islands, which China calls the Diaoyus and claims, like Taiwan, are part of its sovereign territory.

US Navy warship challenges Chinese territorial claims in the South China Sea

The islands are closer to Taiwan than Tokyo, and Chinese ships have been an almost constant presence near them for months, Japan’s defense minister told CNN last fall.

The US says the Senkakus fall under the US-Japan mutual defense treaty, which obligates Washington to defend them like any other part of Japanese territory.

Schuster said while the large naval exercise sends a message, its location meant it wasn’t overly provocative.

The Philippine Sea lies outside what is called the first island chain, the waters within which are largely claimed by China. Schuster said keeping the US-Japan naval exercises outside the chain showed there was no threat to the Chinese mainland.

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Libyan PM wants constitution before elections

Libya’s interim Prime Minister Abdulhamid Dbeibah on Sunday called for a constitution to be established before holding delayed presidential and parliamentary elections.

“Now more than ever we need a constitution that protects the country and its citizens, and that governs the elections,” Dbeibah said.

Libya collapsed into years of violence after the 2011 overthrow and killing, during a NATO-backed revolt, of dictator Moamer Kadhafi who scrapped the country’s constitution in 1969.

Rival power bases and administrations arose in the country’s east and west.

After a landmark ceasefire in 2020, a United Nations-led process saw elections scheduled for December 24 last year, but the polls were postponed after months of tensions, including over divisive candidates and a disputed legal framework.

Libyans “want free elections that respect their will, not the extension of the crisis with a new transition”, Dbeibah told a symposium in the capital Tripoli titled: “The constitution first”.

“Our problem today is the absence of a constitutional base or of a constitution,” he said.

The event brought together high-profile figures from Libya’s west including Khaled el-Mechri, who heads the High Council of State — a Tripoli-based body that is equivalent to Libya’s senate and rivals the House of Representatives, based in the eastern city of Tobruk.

“Certain parties have worsened the crisis” with “tailor-made” laws favouring certain candidates over others, Dbeibah charged, referring to House speaker Aguila Saleh’s September decision to ratify a contentious electoral law.

Critics said the move bypassed due process and favoured a bid by Saleh’s ally, eastern-based strongman Khalifa Haftar.

Dbeibah, Saleh and Haftar all put their names forward for the presidential vote.

An official from the elected commission in charge of drafting a new constitution, Daou al-Mansouri, told Sunday’s symposium that the body had in July 2017 submitted a draft constitution to the House.

The draft was supposed to be put to a referendum, which has never been organised.

Saleh on Tuesday proposed establishing a new commission of Libyan and foreign experts to draw up a new draft constitution.

He also called for a new interim government to be established, and said that by the end of January, a “definitive” date for the postponed polls needed to be set.

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Ecowas warn Burkina Faso soldiers over ‘coup attempt’

Burkina Faso’s neighbours say that they are holding mutinying soldiers responsible for the wellbeing of President Roch Kaboré.

The West African regional bloc Ecowas has called Sunday and Monday’s events “a coup attempt” – in addition to reportedly seizing the president, soldiers have taken over the state broadcaster RTB.

Those mutinying have demanded changes in the military’s leadership and more resources in their fight against jihadists.

It is not yet known if a message published on Mr Kaboré’s Twitter account on Monday, calling for the country’s democracy to be protected, was from the president himself. He has not been seen in public since reports of his detention emerged.

The 15-member group has suspended Mali and Guinea from its membership and imposed sanctions on them after the military in the two countries seized power.

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Nigerians mock Buhari over Afcon loss

Some Nigerians on Twitter are making fun of President Muhammadu Buhari by blaming his video call to the national football team for the loss to Tunisia in the Afcon games.

Nigeria had won all their previous group matches, emerging as favourites in the tournament.

Tunisia won Sunday’s match 1-0, with their coach and several players out after contracting coronavirus.

Nigerians online expressed their disappointment albeit in a humorous way, and blamed their president:

Social embed from twitter

Social embed from twitter

Nigerians online have asked Ghanaians not to mock them as revenge for the trolling they experienced after Ghana crashed out of the tournament:

Social embed from twitter

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The President of Burkina Faso, Roch Kaboré, has reportedly been detained by mutinying soldiers.

The President of Burkina Faso, Roch Kaboré, has reportedly been detained by mutinying soldiers.

Some troops in the West African nation have demanded the sacking of military chiefs and more resources to fight Islamist militants.

Gunfire had been heard overnight near the presidential palace and at barracks in the capital, Ouagadougou.

The government, however, denied suggestions of a military coup or that the president was under arrest.

President Kaboré was detained at a military camp by mutinying soldiers, foreign media reports say.

Video from the capital appears to show armoured vehicles – reportedly used by the presidency – peppered with bullet holes and abandoned in the street.

Multiple cars apparently used by the presidency were found in the morning with bullet holes

Hundreds of people had come out in support of the soldiers despite a government-imposed curfew. Some of them set fire to the ruling party’s headquarters.

The unrest comes a week after 11 soldiers were arrested for allegedly plotting a coup.

But discontent has been growing in Burkina Faso over the government’s failure to successfully eliminate an Islamist insurgency in the country since 2015.

That escalated to new highs in November, when 53 people were killed by suspected jihadists. And on Saturday, a banned rally to protest against the government’s perceived failure led to dozens of arrests.

Similar troubles in neighboring Mali led to a military coup in May 2021 – one that was broadly welcomed by the public.

In Burkina Faso, mutinying soldiers have made several demands, including the removal of the army’s chief of staff and the head of the intelligence service; more troops to be deployed to the front line; and better conditions for the wounded and soldiers’ families.

On Sunday, Defense Minister Gen Barthelemy Simpore downplayed previous rumours of the president’s capture, and the nature of the unrest at large.

State television, meanwhile, had characterized the sound of gunfire at military barracks as the actions of a small few disgruntled soldiers rather than a widespread fight or coup attempt.

Amid disruptions to internet service, much confusion remained in the capital, with no clear statement published by either side.

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