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WOMEN'S UN REPORT NETWORK - WUNRN
MIGRATION, PEACE, GENDER
United Nations Human Rights CouncilJune 3, 2009
Geneva, Switzerland
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MIGRATION - PEACE - GENDER
MIGRANTThe term migrant can be understood as "any person who lives temporarily or permanently in a country where he or she was not born, and has acquired some significant social ties to this country."1
_____________________________________________________________________________________
REFUGEE 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees A person who is outside the country of his nationality and is unable, or owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself of the protection of that country; or who, not having a nationality and being outside the country of his former habitual residence as a result of such events, is unable or, owning to such fear, is unwilling to return to it. _______________________________________________________________________ INTERNALLY DISPLACED PERSONS - IDP's UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement/ 2. For the purposes of these Principles, internally displaced persons are persons or groups of persons who have been forced or obliged to flee or to leave their homes or places of habitual residence, in particular as a result of or in order to avoid the effects of armed conflict, situations of generalized violence, violations of human rights or natural or human-made disasters, and who have not crossed an internationally recognized State border.
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Zimbabwe - Crossing the Border - Crisis - Hunger - Foraging for Food
A Zimbabwean woman with her child on her back flees across the border into South Africa at Beitbridge Border Post.
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Forms of Migration Vary But Women Tend to Stay in Familiar Places & Circumstances & Relocation Presents Challenges
*Migration for Work*Migration for Marriage, Family Unification +*Forced Labor Migration*Refugees - From War, Conflict*Fear for Survival*Migration also to Avoid War, Conflict, Political & Economic Crises*Poverty*Dreams of a Better Life*Desire to Escape Persecution as Religious*Internal Displacement*Trafficking & Human Slavery*Urbanization*Natural Disasters*Climate Change Impact on Livelihood WOMEN ALSO TEND TO TRY TO PROTECT FAMILY UNITY, SURVIVAL, BASIC NEEDS, EVEN WHEN FORCED WITH RELOCATION ISSUES. DESIRE OF WOMEN FOR PEACE RELATES TO MANY FAMILY VALUES.
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GEORGIA - INTERNAL DISPLACEMENT - MOTHER, DAUGHTERS, FAMILY
The family of Ramiashvili Giorgi, left, fleeing Gori, Georgia, on the back of the truck.
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Bangladesh - Yearly Floods - Women & Natural Disasters – Survival - Challenges
Photo of a Bangladesh woman cooking her family's daily food standing on a banana raft, after flood water inundated her kitchen on a char (river island) in Saria Sub-District in northern Bogra
District, Bangladesh, September 2008.
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WOMEN, NATURAL DISASTERS, RELOCATION, RECONSTRUCTION OF LIVES Natural disasters and the ensuing relocation and reconstruction efforts present unique challenges to women in developing countries.
In the immediate aftermath of a disaster, threats to women’s physical safety increase exponentially.•Violence against women – The trauma of a natural disaster exposes the strengths and weaknesses in relationships, and a dramatic rise in violence against women consistently follows the advent of natural disasters.•Inability to meet basic needs – Women are the majority of the world’s poor, and even in good times, many rely upon assistance to supplement their below-subsistence incomes. Disaster disrupts the flow of regular assistance threatening women’s ability to care for themselves and their children. The gendered nature of disaster continues into the reconstruction phase as women and families seek out new ways to make ends meet. •Women heading households – Natural disasters leave many women in charge of both household duties and supporting their families. In addition to widows who become wholly responsible for their children and elderly family members, wives head their households when their husbands migrate to find employment. •Caring for more with less – As the primary caretakers in most developing countries, women experience an expansion of their household responsibilities after a disaster. Displaced family members seek refuge with those who have already resettled, and women face the challenge of providing for their growing families while access to resources dwindles. In particular, women struggle to provide water. Disasters tend to damage water systems, and women, who are chiefly responsible for transporting water, tend to spend more time gathering water. •Job loss and poverty - Women’s livelihoods tend to be very resource dependent. Therefore, when disaster destroys natural resources, women loose their source of income. •No social safety nets – While women often find ways to cope with poverty prior to disasters, their solutions cannot withstand intensified poverty and reintegration into new communities.•The cycle of poverty - Disasters intensify women’s poverty and increase their workload making it harder for them to access the types of resources and training they need to transition into sustainable livelihoods.•Homelessness and property rights - The right to own property helps women, and especially widows and girl orphans, endure natural disasters and reestablish lives for themselves and their families. If women do not have the right to own property, they can loose their homes and fields. •Trafficking and the sale of girl children – Faced with the possibility of starvation, impoverished families have made choices that trade girls’ futures for immediate survival.
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Feminization of Migration
The PROPORTION OF WOMEN MIGRANTS IS ABOUT 50%, but has not changed significantly in the past 4 decades (Zlotnik). What HAS changed has been the number of women migrating independently in search of jobs, rather than as "family dependants" traveling with their husbands or joining them abroad. There has also been significant increase in the important role of WOMEN AS REMITTANCE SENDERS. There has been recently a major increase in the number of women and men migrants, in response to changing labor markets globally, particularly the massive depand for cheap female labor from poor countries to fill the growing demand for caregivers in rich countries. A notable feature of female migration is the extent to which it includes the continued reproduction and exploitation of gender inequalities by global capitalism. For the most part, female labor migrants perform "women's work" as nannies, maids and sex workers - the worst possible occupational niches in terms of remuneration, working conditions, legal protections and social recognition. In this way, gender acts as a basic organizing principle of labor markets in destination countries, reproducing and reinforcing pre-existing gender patterns that oppress women. Gender can also be compounded in discrimination by race, class, ethnicity and/or nationality.
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HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH - Migrant Women And Girls
Women and girls comprise approximately half of all migrants worldwide. They are concentrated in poorly regulated, low-paid sectors such as domestic work, agriculture, and entertainment. Some face tight immigration restrictions when migrating as a spouse. Domestic workers risk abuse at every stage of the migration cycle: recruiters often deceive them and charge extortionate fees, most countries’ laws exclude domestic workers from key labor protections, and isolation in employers’ homes places domestic workers at greater risk of abuse, with fewer opportunities to seek redress. Conditions are markedly better in countries with protective labor legislation, political will to stop abuses, and freedom for women migrants to form workers’ associations.
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WOMEN & GIRL AFGHAN REFUGEES IN NORTHERN PAKISTAN NEAR THE AFGHANISTAN BORDER
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Examples of Issues of Migrant, Refugee, IDP, Trafficked Women
*National Identity Papers*Birth Registration*Marriage Registration*Health Care *Housing*Employment & Protections on Job*Loss of home country house, land, property *Discrimination in race, sex, age*Language*Education needs*Marginalization*Poverty & Low Pay Work *Lack of information for Remittances*Multiple Vulnerabilities*Lack of knowledge of legal issues*Isolation from family & support systems*Cultural adjustments
*Potential continued migration, displacement, commodification *Victimization potential as in domestic violence*If not documented, fear of arrest, deportation*Potential stigmas as on clothing (eg. veil), religion*Possible family responsibilities & adjustments*Loneliness for familiarity of home, place and life or origin, potential depression*Vulnerability to manipulation as with money, documents, commerce, basic needs*Sexual abuse as with domestic workers, trafficked and prostitute women*Status as documented, legal vs.illegal, processes for longer stays for women, their children
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COLOMBIA - INDIGENOUS EMBERA FLEE ARMED CONFLICT EMERGENCY DISPLACEMENT FOR NATIVE WOMEN & CHILDREN
Indigenous Embera People Flee from Armed Group in ColombiaRIO BAUDO, Colombia, April 10 (UNHCR) – More than 2,000 indigenous Embera people have fled their collective territory in the jungles of north-west Colombia since the arrival there a month ago of a newly formed irregular armed group. A UNHCR team heard evidence of physical abuse and rape by the group.
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India - Prostitutes of Bombay (Mumbai)
Falkland Road is lined with old wooden buildings. On the ground floor there are cage-like structures with girls inside them. Above these cages the buildings rise three or four stories, and at every window there are more girls--combing their hair, sitting in clusters on the windowsills, beckoning to potential customers. They vary in age from eleven-year-old prostitutes to sixty-five-year-old ex-madams.
Bombay - Falkland Road - Prostitution Cages at Night
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Online Commodification of Women & GirlsGoogleGirls for Brides [Search]Advanced SearchPreferencesBeautiful Foreign Brides www.InternationalCupid.com Find Your Perfect Foreign Bride. Browse Photo Profiles. Join Free. Search ResultsRussian women single Russian girls dating brides, wife-marriage Single Russian women, beautiful Russian brides and blonde Russian girls seeking men for dating and marriage. We have served thousands of Ukrainian women and ...www.dating-world.net/ - 52k - Cached - Similar pagesrussian brides : single hot Russian brides, ukrainian brides ... Hot russian Brides from Russia seeking men online. Ukrainian women. Russian brides, Find your russian girls now.www.datingrw.com/ - 37k - Cached - Similar pagesWomen Seeking Men in the Czech Republic alinutzaali very nice girl :D:D, Last Visit: More than 3 months. 23 year old Woman. 2 Photos. Looking for Men Living in Brno. Advertisement ...www.friendfinder.com/search/g304967.sub_czech_girls_women_brides&country=Czech%20Republic&age=18-30&show=F - 313k - Cached - Similar pagesRussian Dating Agency: : Russian women, Russian girls, Russian brides Meet Single Russian Woman for Marriage. Mail Order Brides. Online dating Russian women. Photo gallery and Video Chat. Find the Russian Bride of your dreams ...russ-love.com/ - 25k - Cached - Similar pagesUkrainian Women Dating Service, Belarus Girls, Russian Brides Ukrainian women dating. Belarus and Russian bride personals. Russian girls seeking marriage.www.ukrainianwomen.net/ - 15k - Cached - Similar pagesWidgetbox › Asian girls, Asian brides, Asian women and Asian Widget Sep 15, 2008 ... Get the Asian girls, Asian brides, Asian women and Asian widget on Widgetbox.com! Asian dating services and dating site for men to meet ...
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MIGRANT WOMEN - PEACE - SECURITY
Women and Especially Women Migrants Are Often Absent from Power Structures on the Peace Process. The lack of access to resources - in particular economic resources - undermines women's decision-making powers, reinforcing their exclusion from decision-making forums. There is a polarization of male power in the peace and security structures. Migrant women are often focused on documentation and survival priorities for themselves and their families.
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UN Security Council Resolution 1325 on Women, Peace & Security
HOW CAN A MIGRANT, REFUGEE, IDP, TRAFFICKED WOMAN BECOME ENGAGED
WITH UN SECURITY COUNCIL RESOLUTION 1325 ON WOMEN, PEACE, SECURITY IF SHE
DOES NOT HAVE HER OWN POWER, HER OWN SECURITY, HER
OWN DOCUMENTATION, EVEN NETWORKS, IN HER HOME COUNTRY, IN
HER RELOCATED DESTINATION/COUNTRY.....??
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Call for NGO Signatures for UN Statement on Human Right to Peace & Migration
UN HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL - 11th SESSION - JUNE 2009
WUNRN NOTES GENDER DIMENSIONS OF STATEMENT WOMEN & MIGRATION - CHILDREN - PEACE
________________________________________________________________________ The Human Right to Peace and Migration The former Special Rapporteur on the human rights of migrants stressed the problem of violence against women migrant workers due to their double marginalization as women and as migrants[16]. There exist a high number of women that are obliged to cross the border and travel long distances to engage in poorly paid work at home. It follows that they have a high risk of suffering situations of isolation and subordination, including physical or psychological violence. The kinds of abuse and violence suffered by women migrant workers include the withholding of their wages, acts of physical and sexual violence, undernourishment, the seizure of their passports, and the lack of medical and health care, among other abuses[17]. The Statistical Office of the International Labour Organisation noted in 2004 that there were 218 million children in situations of child labour, of which 126 million performed hazardous work[18]. Many of them had left school as a result of emigration. The main factor behind the migration of child labour is poverty and family destitution. Because of their inexperience and age, children are taken on for badly paid and menial jobs, jobs where they are particularly vulnerable to exploitation in the workplace, manual jobs and work in factories, and even sexual exploitation[19].
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Sri Lanka - Crisis of Civilians Trapped in Conflict Zone – Women & Children
Sri Lanka: UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Deplores Deteriorating Situation for Civilians29 January 2009GENEVA -- The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay said Thursday she was deeply concerned by reports of the rapidly deteriorating conditions facing a quarter of a million civilians trapped in the conflict zone in northern Sri Lanka, and of alleged human rights abuses and a significant number of civilian casualties, as well as the huge displacement. Pillay also expressed concern at the highly restricted access to the Vanni region for aid agencies and impartial outside observers, including journalists and human rights monitors. “The perilous situation of civilians after many months of fighting, multiple displacements and heavy rains and flooding is extremely worrying,” Pillay said. “The lack of access for independent monitors, humanitarian workers and the media only adds to concerns that the situation may be even worse than we realize,” she added.
The body of an ethnic Tamil woman, photographed on Jan. 23, amid debris of a shelter in a rebel-controlled area of Sri Lanka.
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Africa-Chad - Internal Displacement & Women
Feminine Face Internal Displacement in Africa - Chad Internally Displaced Persons - IDP's are forced to travel huge distances, often on foot, to seek safe refuge from the fighting – these are the displaced populations of Africa.
Internally displaced persons camp in Arkoum, eastern Chad, February 2008. The site consists of the village plus people displaced by fighting near the Sudanese border. The camp now houses over 10,000 displaced persons, the first of whom arrived at the end of 2005.
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International Convention on Rights of Migrant Workers & Their Families
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Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
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Migrant Mother - USA 1936
California 1936
Dorothea Lange's "Migrant Mother" Photographs in the Farm Security Administration Collection
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WOMEN RELOCATED BY NATURAL DISASTERS
Italy - Hundreds of L'Aquila's 80,000 residents gathered in the central Piazza Duomo, where nuns from a local convent attended to frightened residents, the ANSA news agency reported.
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Women & Internal Displacement
The often cited statistic that as many as 80 per cent of displaced populations are women and children fails to convey the complete devastation that displacement visits upon women and communities. Leaving homes, property and community behind renders women vulnerable to violence, disease and food scarcity, whether they flee willingly or unwillingly. Internally displaced women face additional dangers as they are often invisible to the international community within the context of violent conflict. Camps for refugees and the internally displaced have been criticized for not addressing women’s needs and concerns in their design and procedure. Failure to account for women’s security and health needs can make a camp intended to provide refuge a dangerous and deadly place for women and girls. Fortunately, UN, governmental and civil society organizations that serve displaced women are beginning to rise to the challenge of including women and a gender perspective at every stage of policy-making and implementation.
Women, War, Peace & Displacement - UNIFEM
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Migrant Smuggling - Women & GirlsUN Office on Drugs & Crime - UNODC ISSUE FOR MIGRANT WOMEN & GIRLSMigrant Smuggling Smuggling of Migrants is a crime involving the procurement for financial or other material benefit of illegal entry of a person into a State of which that person is not a national or resident. Migrant smuggling affects almost every country in the world. It undermines the integrity of countries and communities, and costs thousands of people their lives every year. UNODC, as the guardian the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (UNTOC) and the Protocols thereto, assists States in their efforts to implement the Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land, Sea and Air (Migrants Protocol). What is Migrant Smuggling? The Migrants Protocol supplementing the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime defines the smuggling of migrants as the"procurement, in order to obtain, directly or indirectly, a financial or other material benefit, of the illegal entry of a person into a State Party of which the person is not a national or a permanent resident." (Article 3, Migrants Protocol).In order to comply with the Migrants Protocol, Article 6 requires states to criminalize both smuggling of migrants and enabling of a person to remain in a country illegally, as well as aggravating circumstances that endanger lives or safety, or entail inhuman or degrading treatment of migrants.Virtually every country in the world is affected by this crime, whether as an origin, transit or destination country for smuggled migrants by profit-seeking criminals. Smuggled migrants are vulnerable to life-threatening risks and exploitation; thousands of people have suffocated in containers, perished in deserts or dehydrated at sea. Generating huge profits for the criminals involved, migrant smuggling fuels corruption and empowers organized crime.
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Migrant Women - Vulnerabilities - Need Maternal & Child Health Services - IOM
GENEVA - March 8, 2009 - Migrant-hosting communities the world over need to provide accessible, acceptable and affordable maternal and child health services for all migrants, irrespective of their legal status, in order to lessen the vulnerability of women to migration, says the International Organization for Migration (IOM).
"Women and girls, especially when forced to migrate or when in an irregular situation, are disproportionately affected by the risks of migration because of their vulnerability to exploitation and violence," says IOM Deputy Director General Ndioro Ndiaye to mark International Women's Day.
"This vulnerability is being exacerbated to unacceptable levels by the lack of access to appropriate maternal and child health services in particular, which can have a long-term public and social cost."
Maternal and child health, often thought of as preventative care, can and does lead to life-threatening situations with tragic results because problems have not been spotted in good time or because the right skills and treatment are unavailable. Babies and children of women who have not had ante-natal care can be more susceptible to problems such pre-mature births and growth and development issues.
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Europe Protracted Internal Displacement - Women & Girls
INTERNALLY DISPLACED - IDP – WOMEN & GIRLS IN EUROPE
Internally Displaced People in Europe Still Marginalized
GENEVA, 14 May 2009 – Around two and a half million internally displaced people in Europe are still unable to lead normal lives, according to a report released today by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC) of the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC). Some 2.5 million people remain displaced within their countries in Europe. Most fled their homes as a result of violence and conflict in the 1990s, and while the fighting has largely ended, peace agreements have yet to be concluded in several countries.
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Gender-Sensitive Labour Migration Policies - OSCE Guide
OSCE Guide on Gender-Sensitive Labour Migration Policies
18 May 2009
This guide was produced jointly by the Office of the Coordinator of OSCE Economic and Environmental Activities, the Office of the Special Representative and Coordinator for Combating Trafficking in Human Beings and the OSCE Secretariat Gender Section.
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Somalia-Kenya - Refugee Tide of Misery Flees Somalia - Women & Children
Newly arrived Somali refugees gather at a registration centre at the Dadaab Camp in Kenya.
SOMALI WOMEN & CHILDREN REFUGEES IN OVERCROWDED KENYAREFUGEE CAMPS - UNMET NEEDS, MANY RISKS, UNCERTAIN FUTURES.
Somalis Flee to Kenya Camps - Tide of Misery - Crisis Continues
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Poem - The Immigrant Woman
The Immigrant Woman
She’s surrounded by peopleShe can’t understand,And every signs says
“This is not your land”.She stands in line after line—
If she’s legal and lucky; She lies down on bed after bed
If she’s not.They are the women
Their countries forgot:the nanny, the maid, the meatpacker,the prostitute, the sweatshop woman
Starting over again,Surviving once more.
The Immigrant Woman
Dr. Carole Fontaine
