Declaration on Joint Action on the Promotion of Women's Rights Issued by Ms Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma, Foreign Minister of South Africa, and Ms Micheline Calmy-Rey, Foreign Minister of Switzerland

We have come together today as friends and allies committed to further promote the well-being and rights of women and to take joint action against violence against women.

As women ministers of foreign affairs our duty lies with taking a specific focus on gender issues within our overall goal to promote peace, democracy and the protection (and promotion) of human rights.

We declare the promotion of women's rights a priority for joint actions which we shall undertake within the framework of our Declaration of Intent on Joint Cooperation that was signed in June 2003.

We are deeply concerned about continued violence, discrimination, sexual exploitation and marginalization of women and reiterate our commitment to eliminate all forms of violence against women and girls as set out in the Beijing Declaration and Platform of action of 1995.

This year marks the 10th anniversary of the mandate establishing the Special Rapporteur of the UN Commission on Human Rights on Violence against Women, its Causes and Consequences.

To strengthen her mandate we declare our full support for the implementation of the Special Rapporteur's recommendations and the two indexes she proposes to develop to measure violence against women and state accountability.

Furthermore, we commit to strengthening the office of the Special Rapporteur on Women's Rights of the African Commission on Human and People's Rights and agree to propose deploying a Swiss and a South African expert for two consecutive years with the objective to assisting her in translating gender-sensitive policies and legislation into reality.

This year also marks the International Slavery Abolition Year. It refers us to a new form of slavery - trafficking in human beings, and draws our attention to the relationship between race, ethnicity and gender discrimination. We are committed to step up our fight against this most reprehensible violation of human rights.
One decade ago, in 1994, South African women and men together drafted one of the world's most progressive constitution which enshrines gender equality as a basic right.

Aware that the struggle against violence, unemployment, illiteracy and general poverty continues daily and that the burden of HIV/AIDS further undermines endeavors for promoting women's rights and well-being, we have agreed on the need to gear our development cooperation towards these challenges in a gender-sensitive way and to strengthen local efforts in an attempt to improve the lives of women.

We call upon the political leadership and civil society to join into our efforts to eradicate obstacles impeding women's full enjoyment of human rights. Safeguarding women's dignity and liberty, protecting their health and subsistence and promoting their education and empowerment must be at the core of our political engagement for a democratic, just and equitable society.

In recognizing the crucial impact of gender sensitive training in the field of conflict resolution and peace building, South African experts will participate in Switzerland's civilian expert training for peace building missions.

We propose to jointly strengthen ways to promote women in peace building processes and to better integrate women combatants into civil society.

Finally, we agreed to join our forces in promoting women within our own ministries.

We shall also pay due regard to gender-balanced deployments to the UN and UN specialized agencies.

We will build on our alliance and discuss further joint action with the network of women ministers of foreign affairs who will, on the invitation of Switzerland, meet in Geneva on 16 March 2004 at the High Level Segment of the 60th Session of the UN Human Rights Commission.

Our ministries will jointly work on the plan for implementation.

Violence against women is not a "women's issue", but one that concerns us all. Each of us must accept responsibility for stamping out gender-based violence. Let us ensure that this message is heard loud and clear - including by those who need to hear it most.