The Solidarity for African Women’s Rights coalition (SOAWR), a coalition of 44 organizations based in 21 African countries, congratulates the Republic of Equatorial Guinea on its deposit of its instrument of ratification of the Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa (the Protocol). The Minister of Gender, Ms. Eulalia Envo Bela, deposited the instrument to the African Union (AU) Commission, represented by Chairperson Jean Ping, on June 29th prior to the 17th Ordinary Session of the Assembly of the AU being held in Malabo, Equatorial Guinea from 30 June. Download

The third African Union (AU) pre-summit on gender begun this Friday 22/01/2010 at the headquarters of the AU Commission in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The pre-summit will have two segments. The first will cover peace and security particularly building participants’ capacity on United Nations Security Council Resolutions 1325, 1820, 1888 and 1889. The second segment of the pre-summit will address the theme of the summit: ‘Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in Africa: Challenges and Prospects for Development’. We recall that resolution 1325 was the first ever to specifically address the impact of war on women, and women’s contributions to conflict resolution