Women's Philanthropy--Women's Issues

NOTABLE WOMEN IN HISTORY -- Rebecca Lolosoli A Kenyan Woman’s Efforts To End Violence Against Women

SOURCE:  http://blogs.state.gov/sgwi/index.php/site/entry/kenyan_woman_efforts

Posted by Nicole Peacock / March 18, 2010

About the Author: Nicole Peacock serves as the Public Outreach Officer in the Bureau of African Affairs.

On March 9, 2010, Rebecca Lolosoli received the Vital Voices 2010 Global Leadership Award for her efforts to end violence against women in her Kenyan community. Lolosoli, a Vital Voices Global Partnership Alumna, met with representatives from the Bureau of African Affairs to discuss her work on behalf of Kenyan women.

Lolosoli's empathy for widows and children compelled her to speak out on behalf of victims of rape, forced marriage, female genital cutting, and homelessness. In the 1990s, she too became homeless. Determined to improve the lives of others facing similar situations, Lolosoli and 15 other women created the Umoja Uaso Women's Organization in the Samburu District of Kenya.

Since the program's establishment, Umoja Uaso has become a refuge for women who refused to tolerate the cattle raids, gender-based and sexual violence, lack of property rights, and more recently the impact of small arms. The program has become both a sanctuary and a training center for those seeking to promote human rights and economic empowerment, and it promotes the preservation of indigenous art and crafts.

Lolosoli's efforts to empower the women of Umoja have resulted in their ability to provide for their children and themselves through the sale of their beaded jewelry and crafts. Under Lolosoli's leadership, the Umoja Organization has inspired change in surrounding communities. Lolosoli continues to inspire change as she works to promote women's rights and create opportunities to empower women.

To find out more about Rebecca Lolosoli and other Vital Voices 2010 Global Leadership Awards recipients, click here.

Ending Violence Against Women Is a Foreign Policy Priority

SOURCE:  http://blogs.state.gov/sgwi/index.php/site/entry/ending_violence_against_women

Posted by Melanne Verveer / February 08, 2010

About the Author: Ambassador-at-Large Melanne Verveer serves as director of the Secretary's Office of Global Women's Issues.

No matter what country women around the world live in, no matter what religion they are, how much money they earn, or what age they are, they have at least one thing in common: They are potential victims of violence. Violence against women is endemic around the globe.

Violence can affect girls and women at every point in their lives, from sex-selective abortion and infanticide, to inadequate healthcare and nutrition given to girls, to genital mutilation, child marriage, rape as a weapon of war, trafficking, so-called “honor” killings, dowry-related murder, and the neglect and ostracism of widows -- and this is not an exhaustive list.

Far too often, these acts go unpunished. Even when countries have laws on their books to criminalize violence against women, these laws frequently go unenforced. Even when individual cases are seen as the individual tragedies that they are, connections are too seldom made to the larger pattern of women's global inequality and the worldwide lack of respect for their human rights.

Far too often, these acts are seen as family matters, and take place behind a veil of privacy. And far too often, efforts to punish these criminal acts are dismissed as being against national customs or traditions.

I want to make it clear: “culture” cannot justify the violation of human rights. Addressing violence against women is the responsibility and imperative of every nation. In terms of its moral, humanitarian, development, economic, and international security consequences, violence against women and girls is one of the major impediments to progress around the globe. We need the kind of serious and coordinated response to it that we give to other threats of this magnitude.

On February 4, the International Violence Against Women Act was introduced by Senators Kerry (D-MA), Boxer (D-CA), Snowe (R-ME), and Collins (R-ME) and Representatives Delahunt (D-MA) and Poe (R-TX). They and other members of Congress understand the severity of this global scourge. We share Congress' view that ending violence against women must be a policy priority of the United States. While we continue to push this issue at all levels of our foreign policy engagement, we know that more work can and should be done to support effective coordination across the entire U.S. government to address international violence against women.

The proposed legislation calls for a five-year strategy to support programs to combat violence against women around the world. It would authorize a specialized office in the U.S. Agency for International Development to expand and modify emergency and humanitarian relief programs to address violence, and would support prevention strategies across foreign policy and assistance programs.

Members of Congress rightfully seek to put the issue of of violence against women in its proper context, as one that's central to our foreign policy goals. As I've said on other occasions, no country can get ahead if half its population is left behind -- and ending violence against women is a prerequisite for women's social, economic, and political participation and progress. Girls in Afghanistan can't get an equal education if they're subject to acid attacks and their schools are burned down. Women can't succeed in the workplace if they are abused and traumatized, nor can they advance if legal systems continue to treat them as less than full citizens. And female politicians can't compete for office on an equal playing field when they receive threatening “night letters” or fear for their families' safety.

Our response to violence against women must include men and women working together to elevate the problem beyond “a domestic matter,” and beyond a “women's issue.” Ending violence against women around the world is a human rights issue, and a worldwide crisis that must be resolved if we are to make gains in global stability, security, and prosperity. It is long past time that ending violence against women became a priority for us all.

Related Content: State Department Spokesman's Statement on the Introduction of IVAWA

Agenda reflects the continuing fragility of the new partnership and lingering tensions between the former Cold War foes.

SOURCE:  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/03/17/AR2010031703419_pf.html

Clinton's agenda for Russia trip reflects improving but fragile relationship

By Mary Beth Sheridan and Philip P. Pan
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, March 18, 2010; A09

MOSCOW -- A year after U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton presented a mock "reset" button to Russia's foreign minister, the two nuclear giants have significantly improved their tattered relationship, making progress on U.S. priorities such as Iran and Afghanistan and closing in on a major arms-control agreement, officials from both countries say.

But it has not been easy. As Clinton arrives here Thursday morning for a two-day visit, her agenda reflects the continuing fragility of the new partnership and lingering tensions between the former Cold War foes.

Clinton plans to discuss negotiations on a replacement for the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START), which have dragged on beyond the pact's expiration in December. She also will talk about possible new sanctions against Iran, an idea that Russia has tentatively accepted but in a milder form than that pushed by the United States and European allies.

The two nations will also review their cooperation with regard to Afghanistan. A Russian agreement to allow the U.S. military to fly troops and equipment over Russian territory is beginning to bear fruit, after months of red tape.

"I think the past year has been successful," said Mikhail Margelov, chairman of the foreign affairs committee of the upper house of the Russian parliament. That's particularly true, he said, if "we keep in mind what the level of bilateral relations was when Obama came to power. It was less than zero."

Relations became strained over the George W. Bush administration's support for democracy movements in former Soviet republics and plans for an ambitious missile-defense system. The Russian invasion of Georgia in August 2008 produced a deep chill.

In early 2009, 38 percent of Russians had a "very good or generally good" attitude toward the United States, according to a poll by Russia's Levada Center cited by the news agency Interfax. By early this year, the figure was 54 percent, with the number of people reporting a negative attitude tumbling from 49 percent to 31 percent.

Clinton is traveling to Moscow primarily for a meeting of the Quartet, a diplomatic grouping of the United States, Russia, the European Union and the United Nations that is mediating efforts to bring peace between Israel and the Palestinians. But she will tackle major U.S.-Russia issues in talks with President Dmitry Medvedev and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.

Russia's attitude toward sanctions against Iran illustrates the promise and uncertainty of the new partnership. During the negotiations on three previous U.N. Security Council resolutions penalizing Iran for its nuclear program, Russia was the key skeptic, dragging out the talks. But this time around, it has dropped its objections to sanctions, after months of persuasion by U.S. officials and continued Iranian defiance of international concern over its nuclear facilities.

"We now have a shared diagnostic of the problem," said a senior U.S. administration official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss the matter frankly. "We're in negotiations on the substance of that [sanctions language] now. We're not arguing over whether there should be sanctions or not."

Still, the Russian support has its limits. A Russian official familiar with the issue said his government does not back broad economic sanctions and instead supports targeted penalties to curb nuclear-weapons proliferation. And although the U.S. government is pressing for a Security Council vote soon, "we still believe we have a window of opportunity to engage with Iran diplomatically, before sanctions," said the official, speaking on the condition of anonymity.

Stephen Sestanovich, a Russia expert at the Council on Foreign Relations, said the case is "a really good example of how the administration has taken the relationship further than before. You've got the Russian president saying rather stiff things to Iran in public. But you also have most of his subordinates walking it back. And I think it's completely up for grabs what's the result."

Negotiations on the new nuclear-arms treaty illustrate the continued wariness in the relationship. In July, during a summit with Medvedev, President Obama declared that an agreement "will be completed this year" to replace the expiring START.

But the talks have dragged on, with "a thousand catches" emerging in recent weeks, according to a senior Pentagon official, James Miller, who testified before Congress on Tuesday.

Some U.S. analysts accuse the Russians of bringing up last-minute objections as a negotiating tactic. The Russians note that they were ready to start renegotiating the treaty years before it expired but that the Bush administration was in no hurry.

A latest complication in the talks is a flap over missile defense. Russian authorities have long worried that the United States could get the upper hand as a nuclear power because of its more advanced missile-shield programs. The Kremlin was relieved last year when Obama scrapped Bush's plan for a long-range missile defense system based in Europe, substituting a design featuring shorter-range missiles.

But when Romania recently announced that it would host elements of the new missile shield, the Russians cried foul. The Obama administration had largely persuaded the Russian side to leave the issue out of the START talks, but suddenly it was back on the table, officials said.

Fyodor Lukyanov, editor of the journal Russia in Global Affairs, said the clash was over trust, rather than the fundamentals of the missile defense system.

"The way the Obama administration disclosed it, without advance notice to the Russian Federation, that unfortunately contributes to mistrust. . . . Psychologically, it was an unhappy move," he said.

A U.S. official familiar with the matter said the Russian government had been briefed for months about the new system but was not told which countries would host the components. He said the U.S. government was not going to "ask permission" from Russia on where to install it. But he acknowledged that the two sides could have done a better job of consulting.

Analysts say dealing with Russia is particularly fraught because its political and military elites are divided over how close the country should get to the United States.

"I think they are still in the sort of show-me posture. They're waiting, or believe the returns are still out on how serious the United States is about this," said James F. Collins, a former U.S. ambassador to Moscow who is now at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

© 2010 The Washington Post Company

Background Briefing on Plans to Elevate and Strengthen Development as One of the Three Pillars of the Nation's Foreign Policy

SOURCE:  http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2010/01/134787.htm

Teleconference Background Briefing by Two Senior Officials

Washington, DC

January 6, 2010

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OPERATOR: If you would like to ask an audio question, please press *, then 1. Please record your name clearly when prompted. To withdraw your request, you may press *, then 2. Once again, to ask an audio question, please press *1.
Your first question comes from Steve Baragona with Voice of America.
QUESTION: Hi, thanks for taking the call. I’m wondering what role food security is going to play in this strategy.
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL ONE: Well, food – well, we know food security plays a very important role in this strategy. And fundamentally, this is really about following a set of priorities that are delineated in countries by country leadership. And so the Food Security Initiative, as an important initiative announced by the President earlier this year, is in response to countries that often have their total gross domestic product – more than 30 percent of that coming from the agriculture sector, more than 60 percent of total employment in agriculture, and often more than 70 or 80 percent of that is of average disposable income spent on food.
Countries that have those attributes have been, over the past few years, increasingly asking for a more focused and strategic investment set of activities in food security and agricultural development. That’s why the President developed and launched the Food Security Initiative, and that will be an important part of taking this forward.
Also, the principles of how that will work in partnership with countries as opposed to as opposed to projects implemented outside of that partnership, focused more on sectors and with a serious strategic review that says what are the outcomes we’re trying to get, how do we measure baselines, how do we really focus on accountability and generating results, and in a way that engages the private sector and the science and innovation components, are all sort of examples of some of the principles that we’re talking about today.
QUESTION: Thank you.
OPERATOR: Kim Ghattas with BBC.
QUESTION: Hi, good morning. Thanks for doing this and Happy New Year still.
I know this is going to be a speech mostly about the wider strategy about development, but I was wondering if you could tell us anything about what sort of thinking has gone into what could be done in Yemen when it comes to development aid there, particularly because some development people, organizations argue that pouring money and development aid into countries like Yemen, countries that are at war or countries that are failing, doesn’t actually have an impact, that that’s when it’s too late to actually to use aid to have any impact on the country and on the situation internally.
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL TWO: It’s a very important question. And one of the things the speech addresses is the need to have different development strategies in different contexts. The Secretary will emphasize that because this is the government spending development dollars, we do have to focus on areas where we need development results as part of our broader security strategy, as well as other circumstances in which what we’re hoping for is transformative development in countries that are better poised for economic growth.
In a place like Yemen, it’s very hard, and you don’t have a lot of the conditions that are optimal from a pure poverty reduction perspective. On the other hand, without development, you’re never going to have security, so we have to pursue security goals and development goals simultaneously. What is, I think, distinctive here is the emphasis, though, will be, even in a context as difficult as Yemen, on really getting results, not just pouring money in, but measuring what comes from that expenditure of money and adjusting our strategies accordingly.
QUESTION: Thank you.
OPERATOR: Once again, if you’d like to ask a question, please press *, then 1.
Andrew Quinn with Reuters.
QUESTION: Yeah, hi. You mentioned that there’s going to be a need for political accountability, presumably on the part of the recipient countries. And you also talked about sort of the leap of faith that this is going to require that we’re have to give up some of the direct control and allow them to take more responsibility for what happens.
I’m wondering if you can talk about whether or not the speech is going to outline specific mechanisms that will be envisioned for how we can ensure that this money, which is so badly needed at home, isn’t wasted on corruption, as so often is the case, or just on simple mismanagement. What can the U.S. do while empowering these other countries to ensure that we’re just not sort of throwing money into the wind?
SENIOR ADMINISTRATION OFFICIAL ONE: Well, I can outline a few tools that have been used in the past and will continue to be employed going forward and talk through a few other tools that we’re going to look at using. This is an ongoing area of continual improvement in development for all development partners over the last several decades.
You can, of course, provide resources to specific government partners, public sector partners, private sector organizations, and have very vigorous focus on accountability and results. You can put into place baseline assessments of actual outcomes so that your subsequent measures of outcomes and results have some real comparator. You can develop almost case-controlled methodologies for program rollouts where you look at what’s happening in communities that aren’t yet getting program services, what’s happening in communities that are, and actually make realistic judgments about what’s the net impact of a program against a more dynamic baseline. That’s something that Poverty Action Lab and others have pioneered.
You can continue to do what we have been doing, which is a very strong focus on auditing and process evaluation to ensure that you can track resources as they flow through a variety of different organizations on the ground and highlight and identify any discrepancies that do arise. And of course, you can have a more selective approach to who you’re able to partner with and trust. There may be certain ministries and certain parts of certain governments that are able to work in a new paradigm of partnership and engagement, and there may be others where that may not be the case. And being realistic and honest and data-oriented in making those judgments is, I think, an important part of executing the vision.
QUESTION: Thank you.
MR. CROWLEY: We probably have time for about one more question. I apologize, but both of our speakers have to get to a meeting with the Secretary.
OPERATOR: Sir, at this time, I show no further questions in the queue. (Laughter.)
MR. CROWLEY: Okay. Well, thank you very much. And we look forward to listening to the speech and following up with all of you. Thanks for joining us.

PRN: 2010/009