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The term “women’s human rights” evolved in response to the recognition that women, because of their gendered social roles and unequal status, do not understand or enjoy their fundamental human rights to the same extent as men. In addition, the term acknowledges that women, as a result of their physical and biological realities, are entitled to a set of rights that is uniquely theirs (the right to safe motherhood, for example).

The idea that “women’s rights are human rights and human rights are women’s rights” first emerged during the Fourth World Conference on Women, held in Beijing, China in 1995.  It was here that UN Member States affirmed “that all human rights -civil, cultural, economic, political and social, including the right to development- are universal, indivisible, inter-dependent and inter-related..."

The only legally-enforceable international treaty to comprehensively address women’s human rights is the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW, 1979) (LINK) and its Optional Protocol (1999), though a number of other declarations, programmes of action and agreements have touched on different aspects of this issue.

As the world marks the fifteenth anniversary of the Beijing Platform for Action, it is essential that society bear in mind both the significant progress made in establishing a legal and policy framework for the protection and enforcement of women’s human rights, and the challenges that remain to ensuring that these rights on paper become rights in reality for all women, everywhere.

A number of obstacles remain to women’s full realization of their human rights as human beings; from women’s ability to access education, employment with equal pay and benefits, and health and other social services, to women’s ability to negotiate sexual relations, reproduction and to protect themselves from violence, including in their own homes.

In support of women’s full awareness and realization of their rights, as a necessary condition for democratic governance, sustainable development and lasting peace in the region, CIM has established the following key areas of action:

• Leading participatory and inclusive policy dialogue on policies to support women’s rights
• Strengthening capacity for integrated monitoring of women’s access to and exercise of human rights
• Promoting an inter-cultural approach to human rights within a context of democratic
• Supporting the integration the Inter-American Convention for the Prevention, Punishment and Eradication of Violence against Women (Convention of Belém do Pará) in Inter-American jurisprudence, and strengthen monitoring of the Convention at the national level with a particular focus on its full implementation.