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Support for women's human rights in Southeast Asia
To this end, on November 10, 2012, Prime Minister Stephen Harper announced support of $10 million (2011-2016) through the Canadian International Development Agency’s Southeast Asia Regional Program for a project aimed at promoting the empowerment of women in eight Southeast Asian countries. The announcement was made during Prime Minister Harper’s visit to Manila, the Philippines.
This initiative – implemented by the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women) – aims to assist a number of countries in Southeast Asia to comply with the United Nations Convention to Eliminate All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). Countries that will benefit from this project are Burma, Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, the Philippines, Thailand, Timor-Leste and Vietnam.
This initiative is aimed at helping government officials and civil society experts to develop and monitor new and revised legislative frameworks. The project is also assisting in increasing awareness among formal and informal justice sector institutions of the UN CEDAW commitments, and strengthening monitoring and accountability mechanisms for their implementation.
The project builds on the achievements of the Government of Canada’s Support to the Implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) initiative in Southeast Asia (2004-2009). Also implemented by UN Women (formerly UNIFEM), it successfully raised awareness among governments and civil society on the UN CEDAW obligations, and supported major legislative reforms on domestic violence and laws protecting women’s rights.
Canada was one of the first countries to sign and ratify the CEDAW, which set international standards for eliminating discrimination against women. In 2002, Canada ratified the Optional Protocol to the CEDAW, which was adopted by the UN General Assembly in December 2000. The Protocol provides an international remedy for violations of women’s human rights through a communications and an inquiry procedure.
