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UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Thursday stressed the need to promote the participation of women in decision-making, noting that, "democracy and gender equality are interlinked and mutually reinforcing. Also speaking, Helen Clark, the Administrator of the UN Development Programme (UNDP), said that, "democratic governance cannot be fully achieved without the full participation and inclusion of women.

Over 150 women leaders from civil society, government, academia, and political parties convened in Yerevan on May 18 for a two-day conference organized by the National Democratic Institute (NDI) and USAID, with support from the British Embassy and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). The conference on “Supporting Women’s Political Participation in Armenia: A Nationwide Women’s Conference and Women’s Platform” aimed to bring greater attention to women’s issues and increase women’s political representation and participation in Armenia.

UN Resident Coordinator in Vietnam John Hendra has received the “For the Development of Vietnamese Women” insignia for his great contributions to fostering gender equality and the advancement of Vietnamese women.

Pavlodar Regional School of Management in collaboration with UNDP Kazakhstan and support of UNDEF held a series of trainings for women, rural youth, and people with disabilities on participation in elections, electoral law and its practice. 

To read the complete article pease visit www.undp.kz

NDI organized a public signing ceremony to launch a code of conduct for snap parliamentary elections on June 5. Though not legally binding, the document was signed by leaders of 38 political parties who pledged to respect all politicians’ freedom to campaign. The president of the national assembly, the president of the state electoral commission, representatives from civil society and heads of foreign missions attended the ceremony, which received wide coverage in the media.

This is an event that will be held in Cairo on June 1, 2011 and will be hosted by International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance- IDEA, iKnow Politics and Nazra for Feminist Studies.

The event will be organized to share civil society domestic experience in monitoring the elections, presenting a manual guide on "Monitoring elections from a gender perspective"  providing an overview situation of monitoring elections in Latin America and came of recommendations and tools to reach effective election monitoring for next parliamentary elections in Egypt.

UN Women observes progress in many areas, including expanding women’s leadership roles and enhancing women’s economic empowerment. For many women, poverty and violence are every day facts of life as they fight to acquire equal rights with men – in employment, family, property, as well as access to public services and security, says UN Women's program director for the sub-regional office for Eastern Europe and Central Asia, Damira Sartbaeva.

Michelle Bachelet,  the Executive Director of the UN Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN Women) reiterated that economic empowerment of women, political participation, ending gender-based violence and raising women’s involvement in post-conflict peacebuilding are the priorities of the UN Women. 

To read the complete statement please visit UN News Centre.

In September 2010, UN Women (former Division for the Advancement of Women), in cooperation with ECLAC/Subregional Headquarters for the Caribbean, organized an expert group meeting in Port-of-Spain, Trindad and Tobago, on good practices in national action plans on violence against women.

The Handbook for national action plans on violence against women is a result of that meeting. The Handbook presents a model framework for national action plans on violence against women, which sets out detailed recommendations, accompanied by explanatory commentaries and good practice examples.