The International Women's Rights Action Watch - Asia Pacific (IWRAW-AP) just released the second edition of the Resource Guide to the United Nations’ Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women’s (CEDAW) Optional Protocol . This edition is called Our Rights are Not Optional! For the full text of this Guide, please click here (PDF, 143 pages). The Guide’s main goals are to help countries effectively use the Optional Protocol to fulfill their CEDAW obligations and to provide tools for non-governmental actors who promote women’s human rights. NGOs may be particularly interested in Section C. Here, the Guide gives tips on how to get a country to ratify CEDAW and the Optional Protocol, broken down into stages from raising awareness to the ratification process itself. It also encourages NGOs to strategize ways to use CEDAW and the Optional Protocol once they have been ratified, such as increasing support and awareness, litigating and lobbying, and ensuring justice for women at the national level. Finally, Section C covers sixteen ethical considerations for NGOs handling victims under CEDAW.
Compiled from: International Women's Rights Action Watch - Asia Pacific, Our Rights are not Optional! Advocating for the Implementation of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) Through its Optional Protocol, A Resource Guide, 2nd ed. (2008). (PDF, 143 pages).