Women’s Rights Action Movement to submit ‘List of Issues’ to CEDAW Committee

The Women’s Rights Action Movement, WRAM recently hosted a two day consultation session with members of Non-government Organizations (NGOs) to develop the list of issues (LOI) for Solomon Islands – as part of the role that NGOs play to raise issues concerning the status of women and girls in the country.  The Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) has often been described as the International Bill of rights for women which sets out a comprehensive set of rights for women in civil, political, economic, social and cultural fields. It also provides a definition of discrimination against women. WRAM says CEDAW preliminary sessions are an opportunity where NGO’s/CSOs communicate directly with the UN CEDAW committee, by giving a list of issues outlining areas of concern in relation to how the state has implemented the Convention in the country. This list of issues are usually submitted prior to the Committee receiving the State Reports. The Pre-Session Report is different from the Shadow Report. The Women’s Rights Action Movement (WRAM) in collaboration for the first time with other women’s organizations and NGO networks held this series of workshops to discuss the Pre-Session Reports. These discussions will feed into the Pre-session Report to the CEDAW Committee which WRAM will submit on the 11th of April 2023.