Written by Tamara Starr
On July 30, the WFWPI UN Office in New York hosted a webinar- initially planned as a CSW64 Parallel Event which was also co-sponsored by the Women Peace Pioneers Initiative entitled “Gender Equality: A forward looking, hopeful perspective.”
WFWPI recognizes and upholds the dignity of women and men and believes that, when they work together, in unity and in harmony, they are well suited to contribute to the advancement of gender equality in a manner that is both forward looking and hopeful.
In this parallel event for CSW64, there was a panel of speakers on the topic of how gender equality is advanced when men and women collaborate for a common purpose. The panel included Ambassador Isaiah Chabala (former permanent representative of Zambia to the United Nations and the European Union, and also the founding president of Visionary Empowerment), Zainab Al-Suwaij (Co-founder and Executive Director of the American Islamic Congress), and Carolyn Handschin (Vice President of WFWP Europe and the Director of the Office for UN Relations for WFWP, International).
During Ambassador Chabala’s keynote address, he stressed the importance for both men and women to speak up in order to help advance gender equality together and to help “correct the wrongs of society.”
The discussion then continued with Zainab Al-Suwaij who mentioned several examples including how women are still being mistreated through avenues such as sex trafficking. She made it very clear that there is still a lot of work that needs to be done in order to improve gender equality in each region and nation around the world.
Carolyn Handschin then gave the concluding remarks and offered a very hopeful perspective for the advancement of gender equality. She brought the example of Winifred Banks from Mary Poppins. She felt inspired that there was an example of a husband that was supporting his wife who was a suffragette. Something that was very difficult during that time. She agreed with Ambassador Chabala and stressed the importance of both men and women to work together towards building a peace culture through reconciliation, and to make sure that it is not reactionary or accusatory.
