Protection & Access to Justice

The legal protection of women’s land and resource rights and physical protection from gender-based violence in natural resource use contexts are key to ensuring equitable recovery, economic growth, and human rights in conflict-affected settings. Women’s ability to secure and contest their land rights are particularly critical to protecting their productive assets.

However, women often do not have access or the capacity to protect their rights in court, facing complex and gender-biased legal landscapes. Furthermore, as conflict can increase resource scarcity and constrain access to resources, women often face an increased threat of sexual violence as they leave settlements to collect and use natural resources, such as water and firewood. This is often the case in camps for refugees and internally displaced people, where concentrated populations place great pressure on already limited resources. Due to gendered roles in resource use, women can also experience greater exposure to environmental contamination and pollution.

There is great need to better understand the risks women face when carrying out gendered natural resource management roles, to improve sensitivity to these risks in peacebuilding interventions, and to support women’s economic and social development in conflict-affected settings. To strengthen the legal protection of women’s rights and access to resources, programs must ensure that both men and women are aware of the legal structures to protect their rights, including law enforcement, courts, and other dispute resolution mechanisms. Legal aid programs and other measures to support the exercise of these rights are particularly important.

Measures to protect women from physical violence in natural resource contexts include: (1) ensuring that women have safe access or transportation to key resources, (2) ensuring equal representation and promote awareness of women’s rights among actors in security and conflict resolution processes, and (3) promoting simple technologies that reduce risks associated with resource use, such as fuel-efficient stoves that significantly reduce need for firewood. Ensuring the physical and legal security of women in these settings is crucial for their personal safety and health, as well as their ability to maintain sustainable livelihoods that depend on natural resources.

Resources

Women Building Peace

Library
This volume looks back at a wealth of women’s peacebuilding practice documented by Accord since 1998. Case studies from Cambodia, Sierra Leone, northern Uganda, Papua…

Ensuring African Women’s Access to Justice: Engendering Rights for Poverty Reduction in Sub-Saharan Africa

Library
About half of the people of Sub-Saharan Africa live below the poverty line, and 80 per cent of them are women. Their access to justice…

Honduras: Violence, Land Conflicts, Corruption and Impunity Defy Human Rights

International
Persistent violence, including gender-based violence, land conflicts and impunity are among the most serious human rights challenges in Honduras, the UN High Commissioner for Human…

Israel/Palestine: How Israel’s Flooding of Gaza’s Tunnels Will Impact Freshwater Supply

International
Israel confirmed this week that its troops are pumping seawater into a network of tunnels in Gaza, a method environmentalists say could violate international law…

When It Comes to Women, COP28 ‘Fell Short’

International
Historically underrepresented in policymaking positions and discussions, women were vocal at COP28, which concluded on Tuesday, if only because the conference in Dubai scheduled events like a…

International Day for Preventing the Exploitation of the Environment in War and Armed Conflict 2023

International
The International Day for Preventing the Exploitation of the Environment in War and Armed Conflict, observed on November 6th each year, is a significant global…

International Women’s Day: Our Planet Needs Gender Justice

International
Although women bear the brunt of environmental injustice, they’re also leading the way to save our planet. Find out why we celebrate International Women’s Day…

“Environment, Conflict, Media” Conference Held in Sarajevo

International
The conference entitled “Environment, Conflict, Media”, dedicated to issues of environmental protection and reporting on climate change, was organized yesterday in Sarajevo. It is the…

UN Will Vote to Strengthen Protection of the Environment during War

International
The United Nations General Assembly is expected to adopt new principles to protect the environment from foreseeable damage before, during and after armed conflict. Experts…

Thailand: Minister- Women’s Economic Empowerment Boosts Sustainability

International

Belgium: Women in Conflicts - Brussels Declaration on Actions Towards Empowering Women

International
Women continue to be particularly affected by conflict situations: whether as civilians in directly affected areas, as refugees, or as persons directly targeted. At the same time, women contribute…

Colombia: Colombia's Extractive Industries Watching Election Warily

International
Colombia's leftist firebrand presidential candidate Gustavo Petro is too close in recent polls for the comfort of oil companies and miners who worry that his…

Indigenous and Rural Women's Voices: Recommendations to Address Climate Security Risks in Colombia

Briefs & Development
From an ecofeminist and human security perspective, this study aims to contribute to filling this existing gap by developing actionable recommendations that can be replicated…

Malala: I Survived the Taliban. I Fear for My Afghan Sisters.

Blog
In the last two decades, millions of Afghan women and girls received an education. Now the future they were promised is dangerously close to slipping…

At the Nexus of Participation and Protection: Risks and Barriers to Women’s Participation in Northern Ireland

Blog
Of its four pillars, participation and protection arguably predominate the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda.  Growing gaps in women’s leadership across all spheres, exacerbated by…

Cameroon: Sexual Violence Pervasive in Cameroon’s Anglophone Regions

International
Every day, Gladys, a 33-year-old vendor in Buea, the capital of Cameroon’s Southwest region, heads to Muea market to sell vegetables, sweets and other food…

Climate Change: Scorched Earth: The Climate Impact of Conflict

International
Militaries around the world are under pressure to rapidly reduce their own outsized carbon "bootprint" to help limit global heating — and future climate conflict.

Chile: Chile Indigenous: Time to Make Our Voices Heard

International
Replacing it had been one of the demands made in nationwide protests which swept through the country in 2019. This weekend, Chileans are being asked to…

Kenya: Women and Youth Are Leading Kenya’s Coral Reef Revival

International
Five years ago, 20-year-old Said Abdallah was struggling with alcohol and drug addiction while living on Wasini Island, located in the Indian Ocean, 3 kilometres…

Myanmar: Gender-Based Violence in Myanmar and the Military Coup

International
Myanmar has long struggled as a multicultural society governed primarily through the ethnic Burmese-led military known as the Tatmadaw. The conflict exists since gaining independence…

Myanmar: Myanmar’s Anti-Coup Protesters Defy Rigid Gender Roles – and Subvert Stereotypes about Women to Their Advantage

International
One of the first signs of the military coup that overthrew Myanmar’s democratically elected civilian government was a Facebook Live video of regional lawmaker Pa Pa Han being arrested,…

DRC: DR Congo to Suffer $4bn Shortfall from Gertler Contracts: Activists

International
The Democratic Republic of Congo is on track to suffer a shortfall of nearly four billion dollars from mining and oil contracts that it signed…

Afghanistan: Women, Girls, and Afghanistan’s Missing Justice

International
Rights groups say girls were the clear target of the 8 May violence, when a series of explosions erupted as many students were leaving class.…

Liberia: Pres. Weah to Constitute Committee to Probe Nimba Land Dispute

International
President George Manneh Weah has disclosed plan to set up a committee that will be charged with the responsibility to thoroughly investigate the land dispute…

United States: Earth Day Special: Winona LaDuke and the Women Over 50 Fighting to Save The Environment

International
While the consequences of climate change—rising air and sea temperatures, droughts, extreme storms and even insect outbreaks—have an impact on all humans around the globe,…

Ukraine: How War Is Making Water a Scarce Resource in Eastern Ukraine

International
There are around 12,000 kilometres of pipes near the frontline in eastern Ukraine, supplying water to about 3.8 million people from Sloviansk in the north…

Venezuela: Women and Girls at Greatest Risk as Thousands Escape Violence Due to Military Operations in the Border Zone with Colombia

International
At least 5,500 people from Venezuela had crossed the border between Apure and the Colombian department of Arauca in the last two weeks. They are…

Egypt/Ethiopia/Sudan: Ethiopia to Go on Filling Nile Mega-Dam Despite Impasse: Minister

International
Ethiopia said Wednesday it would not be deterred from impounding water at its Nile mega-dam, despite a persistent impasse with downstream countries worried about their…

Policy Brief Describes New Mindset Needed to Accelerate Gender Equality

International
A policy brief published by the International Institute for Sustainable Development offers a “formula” for accelerating implementation of the 2030 Agenda – enabling women’s participation…

Yemen: Women Struggle to Get by as Yemen Conflict Hits Six-Year Mark

International
As the world’s worst humanitarian crisis rages on, women and children make up three-quarters of the four million people forced from their homes, putting them…