Thank you, Mr. Chair.
On behalf of KAIROS let me begin by thanking you for this opportunity to address the committee as a part of its study on women, peace, and security. It's good to be here with you today.
KAIROS is a national ecumenical organization that works with partners both in Canada and internationally for human rights and ecological justice. We unite 11 national churches and religious organizations from eight Christian denominations.
KAIROS approaches all of our work through the lens of gender justice, understanding gender justice as full equality and equity among women, girls, men, and boys in their diverse identities and in all spheres of life. KAIROS is committed to working for a more just world in which power and responsibility are shared equally by all and to supporting those individuals and organizations working to transform power relations and end historical injustices.
KAIROS and our global civil society partners have a noteworthy history of working together on issues of women, peace, and security, and human rights in countries of protracted conflict.
Together with these partners, KAIROS has developed our women of courage program. This work is rooted in the understanding that while women around the world face many injustices, women are also key catalysts and agents of change when they create and exercise leadership in human rights and peace building. KAIROS works with partner organizations in Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, the West Bank in Israel-Palestine, the Philippines, and South Sudan to respond to the needs of women in their local contexts. In addition, KAIROS works to build solidarity relationships with women in Canada who are affected by gender-based oppression, particularly indigenous and migrant women.
Our women of courage programming is multi-faceted.
It includes a psychosocial support and counselling to women who are victims of human rights abuses and survivors of sexual violence, as well as legal support to increase their access to justice and reparations; as well as training and capacity-building workshops for women's organizations and women human rights defenders to assist them in using national legislation and international frameworks and resolutions to protect women's human rights in contexts of militarized conflicts and to advocate for women's participation in peace-building processes.
The program also includes grassroots education campaigns on such things as the women, peace, and security agenda, the UN Security Council resolution 1325, and the other resolutions to increase awareness of these commitments among women and all members of society. Finally, it includes international exchanges between women's organizations and human rights defenders that allow the sharing of experiences and best practices in order to help develop joint strategies and recommendations.
For example, in Colombia in the context of the current peace process and the victims' law KAIROS and our partner, Organización Femenina Popular, are supporting individual and collective reparations for victims of human rights abuses and gender-based violence, as well as the victims committees in which women receive legal representation and support to prosecute abuse and violence.
In South Sudan, KAIROS works with the national women's program of the South Sudan Council of Churches to engage women across tribal lines on advocating for peace locally, while developing an understanding of the international frameworks on women's role in peace building, including UN Security Council resolution 1325.
Although historically women have been at the forefront of movements for peace and human rights, peace-building processes are often dominated by men's voices and experiences. From 1992 to 2011, only 2% of chief mediators and only 9% of negotiators in peace processes were women.
At the same time, studies have shown that peace processes that involve women are not only more equitable and inclusive, but are also more sustainable. There are convincing reasons to support the participation of women's civil society organizations and women human rights defenders in peace process and post-conflict development: equity, inclusivity, justice, sustainability, and the efficiency of the process.
Our first recommendation to this committee would be that the Government of Canada should provide more in the way of financial support to women's rights organizations and grassroots civil society organizations for peace-building efforts in conflict affected and fragile states.
KAIROS supports the recommendation brought to you by the Women and Peace Security Network—you heard from them just a moment ago—around the target of 15% of our support towards a peace and conflict context going towards programming with women's empowerment or gender equality as the principal objective of the programming.
We were very encouraged by Canada’s remarks at the UN Security Council in March that recognized the critical importance of supporting the participation of local women’s organizations in peace building. In contrast, the Government of Canada has focused much of its official development assistance in recent years through large multilateral organizations, such as UN agencies and the World Bank, and less through partnerships with civil society organizations in Canada and internationally.
There are cases where this makes sense, when Canadians' support can leverage contributions from other donors, but experience in peace building has shown that lasting peace is achieved by supporting the women, peace, and security agenda at all levels. I'd like to offer you an example.
In February I was in the Democratic Republic of Congo. KAIROS and our Congolese human rights partner, Héritiers de la Justice, run a legal clinic that provides legal accompaniment and counselling to victims of sexual violence. To enable these women to defend their rights and engage in peace building, paralegals and women’s rights educators from the clinic hold training workshops on domestic law, international human rights instruments, and UN Security Council resolution 1325. Supported by Héritiers de la Justice, local women’s committees have been established in the cities and the villages to help women support each other, and most importantly, to break their silence around sexual violence.
In 2013 the Government of Canada made a significant investment of $18 million through the United Nations Development Programme to fight impunity around sexual violence in Congo. Through this project, mobile tribunals have been created to travel deep into rural areas in eastern Congo and facilitate access to justice. While this institution-building is critical, it requires the participation and trust of women at the local level. Without investing in such grassroots capacity-building by local organizations, Canada’s commitment to ending impunity through this larger multilateral project will not be fully realized. In our view, it’s not an either-or scenario. For peace building and women’s empowerment to be truly lasting, top-down national and regional initiatives must be accompanied by grassroots civil society-led initiatives.
KAIROS was already planning to expand the legal clinic in Congo in 2009. Back then, we approached the Canadian International Development Agency to partner with KAIROS on this work in Congo and other conflict-affected states. As many of you will recall, notwithstanding a recommendation from the CIDA president, the KAIROS proposal was not approved.
In January of this year, KAIROS submitted a new proposal to Global Affairs Canada seeking support for our women, peace, and security partners. While we are still awaiting a response, we remain hopeful that the work of KAIROS and our partners will complement and help to ensure the success of Canada’s current programming in these areas.
We believe our global partners and our international program are transformative, and they deliver long-lasting, sustainable results. We see the lives that are changed, the communities that have been empowered, and the women who regain their dignity and are able to exercise their rights. However, more resources are needed to support women's civil society organizations and women's human rights defenders. Despite the research that they have been the key drivers to defending rights and promoting peace all over the world, the resources they receive are shamefully scarce and dwindling.
Our second recommendation for the committee is regarding the national action plan. We would like to see the national action plan on women, peace, and security be expanded, such that it can serve both as a strategic vision for how Canada will implement and strengthen its international commitments around women, peace, and security, and as a monitoring and tracking tool to facilitate reporting on financial commitments, activities, gaps, and the progress to date.
KAIROS recognizes that the Government of Canada has played an important role in supporting the passage of the first UN Security Council resolution on women, peace, and security in the year 2000, in welcoming subsequent resolutions, and in adopting the national action plan in 2010. As I mentioned earlier, we appreciate Canada’s recent statements at the UN Security Council regarding its commitment to women, peace, and security.
Through our participation in the Women, Peace and Security Network, KAIROS has been monitoring Canada’s implementation of these resolutions and its commitment to working with partners on the implementation of the subsequent resolutions. We hope the renewal of the C-NAP in 2016 will produce a strategic vision for how Canada can best implement its international commitments on women, peace, and security. The plan must allow Canadians to gauge how Canada as a country is making this a policy priority, where we are headed, and what Canada's particular contribution will be to this global effort.
Therefore, our third recommendation for consideration by this committee is that the Government of Canada hold consultations and collaborate with women's rights organizations and their international partners on policy development and programming around women, peace, and security.
In the first instance, a broad-based public consultation should be held across Canada to inform the renewal of C-NAP. We believe this is an opportunity for the government to enhance the plan with input from a wide range of stakeholders. These parliamentary hearings are building a good foundation, but we hope that Global Affairs Canada will conduct a broad-based public consultation in cities across Canada in 2016 to inform the development of the new plan.
Women's organizations and other civil society organizations like KAIROS have a great deal to share on experiences from other countries, and lessons learned from efforts in Canada to end violence against women and promote women's political participation and empowerment.
Thank you for your consideration. I look forward to answering your questions.