DYB2011-Part-II-web

Related issues, including information and outreach
security. An important part of its role is to leverage the entire United Nations
system to ensure accelerated implementation of all resolutions on women
and peace and security. The report also referred to other gender-related
developments in 2011.
The Special Committee on Peacekeeping Operations continued to
encourage measures to ensure women’s participation in peace processes,
post-conflict planning and peacebuilding, as well as in post-conflict public
institutions, by including the provision of gender expertise.
The report indicated a significant increase from the previous year in the
number of Governments that had adopted national action plans to implement
their commitments relating to women and peace and security. A number of
additional countries were in advanced stages of finalizing their national action
plans.
In February, the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs signed
a memorandum of understanding with the International Action Network on
Small Arms (IANSA) that included mainstreaming gender and diversity in the
fields of arms control, disarmament, peace and security as one of the areas
of cooperation. In addition, renewed attention was given to the participation
of women in disarmament, non-proliferation and arms control decisionmaking
at the intergovernmental level with the adoption of General Assembly
resolution 65/69.
In April, women ambassadors from Austria, Brazil, Canada, Denmark,
Germany, Ireland and Kenya, who were accredited to the African Union,
undertook a mission to the Sudan to encourage the continued engagement of
women in efforts to secure and sustain peace.
In 2011, in connection with United Nations Security Council resolutions
1325 (2000) and 1820 (2008), the United Nations Regional Centre for Peace
and Disarmament in Africa (UNREC) assisted the Togolese Government with
the elaboration and adoption of three documents: (a) training curricula for the
armed forces including gender issues; (b) a gender policy for national defence
and security forces; and (c) the National Action Plan on the role of Togolese
women in promoting security and peaceful conflict resolution. UNREC
also assisted the Togolese national authorities in the implementation of the
National Action Plan through media awareness activities and embarked on a
draft United Nations country team joint programme to prevent gender-based
violence in Togo.
The United Nations Regional Centre for Peace, Disarmament and
Development in Latin America and the Caribbean (UNLIREC) collaborated
with IANSA and the Swedish Fellowship of Reconciliation for the second
consecutive year in organizing specialized training for women on small
arms control issues. Its regional training participants ranged from security
sector personnel in the Andean region to civil society organizations in South
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