Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security

Lord Sharma Excerpts

Monday 12th December 2016 Written Statements

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (Alok Sharma)]

My right hon. Friend, the Minister of State, Foreign and Commonwealth Office (Baroness Anelay of St Johns), has made the following written ministerial statement:

I wish to inform the House that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, together with the Department for International Development and the Ministry of Defence, are today publishing the annual report 2016 on progress on the UK’s third national action plan on women, peace and security, which was published on 12 June 2014 (HC Deb, 16 June 2014, cc72-4WS).

The national action plan sets out our priorities on women, peace and security from 2014-17. It provides direction and vision to the Government and their partners as we work to ensure that women and girls are at the centre of our efforts to prevent, respond to and resolve conflict.

The report published today outlines our overall progress on the national action plan. It highlights our overseas work in the six focus countries: Afghanistan, Burma, Democratic Republic of Congo, Libya, Somalia and Syria. It gives details of our activities under the four main pillars of women, peace and security: participation, prevention, protection and relief and recovery.

It also reports on our progress towards implementing the commitments we made in October 2015 at UN Security Council high level review of resolution 1325 on women, peace and security.

We will continue to report to Parliament annually on progress, with our final report due in December 2017. We are already planning our fourth national action plan which follow directly afterwards.

I will deposit copies of the report in Library of the House. The progress report has been published online: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/uk-national-action-plan-on-women-peace-and-security.

[HCWS344]