SECOND MINISTERIAL MEETING OF THE NON-ALIGNED MOVEMENT ON THE ADVANCEMENT OF WOMEN TOWARDS THE ACHIEVEMENT OF THE MILLENNIUM DEVELOPMENT GOALS


1.    We, the Ministers and other Heads of Delegations from Member Countries of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM), guided by the Founding Principles of the Non-Aligned Movement, as well as the Declaration on the Purposes and Principles and the Role of the Non-Aligned Movement in the Present International Juncture adopted in the 14th NAM Summit in Havana, the UN Charter and international law, met in Guatemala City on 23 and 24 January 2009 to reaffirm our commitment towards the advancement of women and to assess, recognize and foster the role and contribution of women to development and their participation in all areas of life, as well as to achieve progress, address gaps and challenges, and fulfil actions needed towards the full realization of the Millennium Development Goals in relation to gender equality, empowerment of women, full advancement and comprehensive development of women.

2.    In this regard, the Movement will continue to uphold the principles of sovereignty and the sovereign equality of States, territorial integrity and non-intervention in the internal affairs of any State; take effective measures for the suppression of acts of aggression or other breaches of peace, to defend, promote and encourage the settlement of international disputes by peaceful means in such a manner that international peace and security, and justice, are not endangered; refrain in international relations from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any State or in any other manner inconsistent with the purposes and principles of the UN Charter; develop friendly relations based on respect for the principle of equal rights and the self-determination of peoples in their struggle against foreign occupation; achieve international cooperation based on solidarity among peoples and governments in solving international problems of a political, economic, social, cultural or humanitarian character; and promote and encourage the respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms for all without distinction as to race, sex, language or religion.

3.    We also reaffirm the Beijing Declaration and its Platform for Action, the Cairo Declaration and its Programme of Action, the twenty-third special session of the General Assembly, entitled “Women 2000: Gender Equality, Development and Peace for the Twenty-First Century”, the Millennium Declaration and the Millennium Development Goals, the Beijing Declaration of the forty-ninth session of the Commission on the Status of Women in 2005, as well as important contributions made by the above-mentioned Commission to the advancement of women worldwide, including empowerment of women and achieving gender equality.  

In conformity with all these principles and commitments, we hereby:

4.    Recognise the need for full and accelerated implementation of the United Nations Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women by States Parties to the Convention.

5.    Reaffirm our commitments contained in the Putrajaya Declaration and Programme of Action on the Advancement of Women in Member Countries of the Non-Aligned Movement, adopted in Malaysia, 2005.

6.    Emphasize that the present global scenario presents great challenges in the areas of peace and security, economic development and social progress, human rights and the rule of law to Non-Aligned Countries and affirm that many new areas of concern and challenges have emerged which warrant the renewal of commitment by the international community to uphold and defend the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations (UN) and the principles of international law. In this special context, we reiterate our commitment to promote the human rights of women and express our resolve to take appropriate measures at the national, regional and international levels to improve the quality of life of women and girls, and to achieve gender equality and empowerment of women, bearing in mind the inherent potential of women, through, inter alia, adopting proper socio- economic strategies and programmes, and provision of government services for all women, particularly women with disabilities, elderly women in rural areas and indigenous women, including access to health, education and justice services and strengthening family well-being.

7.    Recognise further the importance of expanding and accelerating NAM's efforts in enhancing the empowerment of women and the need to eradicate the conditions of inequality of women and harmonize these efforts with the commitments made by the countries at related major UN Conferences and Summits regarding women, as well as the internationally agreed development goals, including those contained in the Millennium Declaration.
 
8.    Reaffirm the primary and essential role of the United Nations General Assembly and the Economic and Social Council, as well as the central role of the Commission on the Status of Women which has a broad mandate covering all dimensions related to women’s development, human rights and fundamental freedoms. We also underscore the validity and relevance of the Movement's principled positions concerning the institutional reform of the UN and stress the need to ensure adequate and reliable funding for the United Nations Development system to meet the needs of Member States, in particular developing countries, in the area of gender to achieve the internationally agreed development goals, on the basis of their national development strategies and that reform efforts should enhance organizational efficiency and achieve concrete development results.

9.    Further acknowledge and encourage the ongoing intergovernmental process within the United Nations General Assembly that is being undertaken to achieve gender equality and empowerment of women.

10.    Express our resolve to eliminate all forms of discrimination and violence against women and the girl child, especially in situations of armed conflict and foreign occupation, thus ensuring the respect of human rights which enable them to develop and achieve their full potential.

11.    Reaffirm our commitment to actively promote the mainstreaming of a gender perspective in the design, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of policies and programmes in all political, economic and social spheres, ensuring full representation and full and equal participation of women as critical factors in the eradication of poverty.  

12.    Recognise that international cooperation, including South-South Cooperation and partnership in the context of the Movement’s comparative advantage based on the principle of common values in diversity, is the most effective way of working towards women’s empowerment and gender equality and equity.

13.     Promote the collection and the analysis of qualitative and quantitative gender disaggregated data, particularly for the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals and to facilitate a framework for national and, as applicable, for regional, sub-regional and international monitoring and evaluation of the impact of, inter alia, globalisation and trade liberalization from a gender perspective.

14.    Recognize, with concern, that the current food, energy and financial crises demand more efforts in enhancing regional integration and international cooperation, prioritization of women and girls, and mobilization of resources to address these challenges, especially as they affect women in the enjoyment of all their human rights, particularly the right to development, towards the advancement of women and achievement of the Millennium Development Goals by developing countries.

15.    Recognize also that the lingering negative consequences of structural adjustment programmes, the increasing debt burden faced by the most indebted developing countries, in particular the LDCs, is unsustainable and constitutes one of the principal obstacles to achieve progress, sustainable development and poverty eradication strategies that particularly affect women and girls.

16.    Express our deep concern about the grave situation of women and girls living under foreign occupation. In this regard, we reiterate that all human rights, including the right of peoples to self-determination, must be respected and call for exertion of efforts to ensure the realization and enjoyment of these rights. We also call for intensification of measures to provide assistance, especially emergency assistance, for alleviating the dire socio-economic and humanitarian situation being faced by women and girls and their families living under foreign occupation and supporting programmes for their development, empowerment and advancement.

17.     Recognise the persistent obstacles and challenges faced by women and girls in achieving gender equality and equity, improvement in their living conditions and their empowerment, even at the stage of the mid-term review of the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, therefore we resolve to promote the achievement of those goals by more efforts through the following actions:

Eradicate extreme poverty, hunger and promote women's economic development.  

18.    The eradication of poverty, particularly the eradication of the feminization of poverty, is one of the greatest global challenges facing the world today and is an indispensable requirement for sustainable development, in particular for developing countries. In this regard, we emphasize the significant role that women play in economic development and in the eradication of poverty. We should facilitate the participation of women in the design of and application of the economic development strategies to address poverty, to ensure their access to knowledge, and to support their contribution to the improvement of food security. Additionally, the persistent inequalities, the discrimination against them and the lack of economic empowerment limit their access to goods, resources, education, services and other development benefits, as well as deepen economic inequalities and injustices affecting women in the areas of the family, community, politics and labour.

19.    We reaffirm that the role of the family unit that respects the human rights of all its members, as an institution that provides the highest degree of material and moral well being, is extremely important as stated in the Doha Declaration on Family adopted on 30 November 2004.


We hereby commit ourselves to take the following actions:

19.1.    Review, modify and agree upon economic policies and programmes aimed at poverty eradication in order to include a gender perspective, thus ensuring women’s full and equal participation in the decision-making process;

19.2.    Include a gender perspective in poverty eradication policies aimed at addressing root causes, manifestations and challenges of poverty;  

19.3.    Integrate women’s interests and concerns in national, regional, sub-regional and international economic policies and reforms on the basis of gender equality and equity,  taking into consideration the impact of global economic trends;

19.4.    Ensure economic autonomy and empowerment of women, as a critical factor to eradicate poverty;

19.5.    Stress the need to create an enabling environment for improving the situation of rural women and ensuring their full participation in the development, implementation and follow-up of macro and micro-economic policies, including development policies and programmes and poverty eradication strategies, based on internationally  agreed development goals, including the Millennium Development Goals;

19.6.    Provide women, especially those in marginalized and vulnerable situations, with access to financing and micro-financing, in particular through credit, micro-credit and marketing facilities, and provide corresponding capacity-building programmes in gender awareness, fund management and other appropriate skills;

19.7.    Ensure access to finance and microfinance mechanisms, including micro-credit for poverty eradication as well as employment generation in private and public sector, and especially for the empowerment of women and encourage the strengthening of the existing institutions and emerging micro-credit institutions as well as enhancing their capacities;

19.8.    Take measures to develop, finance, implement, and evaluate gender-responsive policies and programmes aimed at promoting women’s entrepreneurship through, inter alia, microfinance, microcredit and cooperatives;  

19.9.    Promote research on the impacts of globalization and trade liberalization on women’s economic status so as to develop better understanding and mainstreaming of women’s issues in decision-making processes;

19.10.    Formulate strategies to effectively address circumstances causing negative impact of globalization on the situation of women and girls worldwide;

19.11.    Facilitate creation of sustainable jobs and livelihood opportunities to improve women’s position in the labour market and ensure favourable working conditions for all women, including migrant women, consistent with all their human rights;

19.12.    Enact and enforce legislation to guarantee the rights of women and men to equal pay for equal work or work of equal value;

19.13.    Recommend the enactment and enforcement of legislations that ensure recognition of the value of women’s unremunerated work.


Achieve universal primary education and promote access to all education levels.  

20.    Education, information and communication are human rights and an indispensable tool to achieve gender equality and empowerment of women. Literacy and primary school education are the basic learning tools for access to knowledge and information, as well as for enhancing women's opportunities to get better-paying jobs and fully exercise their rights.

21.    Globally, the illiteracy rate is significantly higher among women than men and varies greatly in regions and countries, especially among women from rural and remote areas and from indigenous peoples. Additionally, the vast majority of children not going to schools are girls.  

We hereby commit ourselves to take the following actions:
 
21.1.    Guarantee free and universal education to all as a key issue for the development of our societies and for the advancement of women and girls;

21.2.    Take all necessary measures to strengthen public educational systems to improve women and girls’ access to all levels of education, as well as the retention and success of children in school, particularly girls, including preventing girls and boys from dropping out of school;

21.3.    Take also all appropriate measures to enforce compulsory primary education and to ensure availability and accessibility to secondary education for every child;

21.4.    Promote plans and programmes in the education sector, in order to eliminate gender stereotypes;

21.5.    Take all appropriate measures to strengthen and improve the quality of the public education system, paying due attention to  Science, Mathematics and other technical subjects, in order to ensure that women and girls have equal opportunities and access;

21.6.    Remove economic, social and cultural barriers to achieve gender equality in primary school and adopt measures to tackle the obstacles that hinder girls' access to education;

21.7.    Implement strategies to reduce the illiteracy rate among women with a time-limit, including the provision of literacy programmes for women, taking into account age, socio-cultural and economic factors, and increase opportunities and facilities for lifelong learning for women;

21.8.    Take all appropriate measures to ensure the right of indigenous women and girls to education at all levels and forms, paying special attention to their cultural diversity;   

21.9.    Implement strategies to provide education to women and girls in emergency situations, in order to contribute to smooth transition from relief to development and stress the importance of including education as an integral element in the context of humanitarian assistance, with the support of the international community, the United Nations system, donors, multilateral agencies, the private sector and the civil society including non-governmental organizations.   


Promote gender equality and empowerment of women.  

22.    Gender equality and the empowerment of women are essential for the comprehensive development of countries. Therefore, in order to realize women’s full potential for their wellbeing, and that of their family, community and society, the development and implementation of policies and programmes should provide women with the following: (a) access to health care, nutrition, education, justice and economic resources; (b) economic and political empowerment and (c) safeguards and remedies against all forms of violence and abuses, including in armed conflict.

23.    Therefore, it is important to create and strengthen institutional mechanisms at the local, national and regional levels, with adequate human and financial resources, through adequate budgeting and appropriate mandate, for effective development and coordination of strategies, policies and programmes for women, and monitoring and evaluation of progress achieved.

24.    Actions should be taken to prevent all forms of violence against women, which create obstacles to achieving empowerment of women and gender equality and continue to place women in a marginalized situation.

25.    It is important to address, at national, regional and international levels, the challenges of combating trafficking in women and girls through the adoption of adequate policies, programmes and legislations and their implementation, as well as enacting legislations aimed at preventing and eliminating the demand for sex tourism and trafficking, giving special emphasis to the protection of women and girls.

26.    The political leadership and the empowerment of women in the field of election and representation at local, national, regional and international levels should be guaranteed.

27.    We recognize the role that media can play in promoting women’s rights, eliminating negative images and stereotypes, and promoting values vital for strengthening gender equality.

28.    We acknowledge the need to reinforce partnership between governments and civil society, in particular organizations working for the advancement of women, as well as the private sector, in the realization of the goal of the empowerment of women and the promotion of gender equality.

29.    We also recognize the contribution made by civil society in the promotion of gender equality and women empowerment, and stress the need to support their activities and encourage the effective networking and collaborative partnerships between organizations of civil society working for the advancement of women in NAM members.

We hereby commit ourselves to take the following actions:

29.1.    Create opportunities so that children, girls and women have access to education, health care and nutrition through policies and programmes that give priority to their participation and are responsive to their specific needs;

29.2.    Encourage men and women to share responsibility in family life;

29.3.    Make adequate provisions for child care services and formulate policies that will enable parents to balance family responsibilities with work responsibilities;
 
29.4.    Raise awareness among women and men alike on the importance of women’s participation in decision-making processes in all sectors and at all levels;

29.5.    Invite States to consider the adoption of affirmative measures, such as quota systems, to promote the access of women to appointed and elected posts;  

29.6.    Formulate and adopt policies and ensure effective application of existing national and international instruments, to increase participation and representation of women in all commissions, tribunals, local government bodies, statutory bodies, among others, set up by the government, with the view to achieving equal representation of women;

29.7.     Promote and strengthen national machineries for the advancement of women to formulate policies, strategies as well as collect and analyze gender-disaggregated data, in order to achieve economic empowerment, gender equality and eliminate all forms of discrimination against women;

29.8.    Ensure that national development plans are gender responsive;

29.9.    Mainstream gender-responsive budget initiatives, inter alia, through training of public officials;

29.10.    Ensure that more effective gender responsive poverty-eradication strategies are implemented at local, national, regional and international levels;

29.11.    Support the development of leadership training programmes for women, particularly young women that would enable them to exercise all their rights and responsibilities in decision-making;

29.12.    Support the participation of women’s organizations in decision-making in all relevant fields;

29.13.    Invite States, which have not done so, to consider ratifying or acceding to the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women; and encourage States Parties to consider signing, ratifying or acceding to the Optional Protocol to the Convention;

29.14.    Enact legislation and ensure effective enforcement to prevent violence against women and girls, to bring to justice perpetrators of such crimes, and to provide effective assistance and rehabilitation to the victims;

29.15.    Promote specialized training on gender issues for public officials to mainstream gender perspectives in national legislations and in their activities;

29.16.    Recognize that women and girls with disabilities are subject to multiple discrimination, and in this regard, express our resolve to take appropriate measures to ensure their full and equal enjoyment of all human rights and fundamental freedoms.




Improve, preserve and promote the comprehensive health care of women, girls and children.  

30.    In order to achieve the MDG’s, improvement must be made in health indicators, especially in the field of child and maternal health as well as in combating the spread of malaria, tuberculosis, HIV/AIDS and other communicable and non communicable diseases, as well as injuries and trauma. The high infant and maternal mortality rates continue to be a challenge, in particular, in the developing countries, and are directly linked to inadequate healthcare facilities as well as several social and economic factors such as poverty, hunger, illiteracy, lack of access to drinking water and basic sanitation and unemployment which are affecting women.

31.    Moreover, given the increasing feminization of the HIV/AIDS pandemic, the prevention, treatment, care and support provided to women should be further strengthened. Furthermore, children affected with HIV/AIDS, due to the mother to child transmission, face both medical as well as social obstacles for their treatment and survival.

32.    Malaria related ill health and deaths throughout the world, especially those that relate to women and children, can be substantially eliminated through national and international commitments, commensurate resources, as well as appropriate health services and access to affordable generic drugs for the prevention and treatment of malaria, particularly in countries where the disease is endemic.

We hereby commit ourselves to take the following actions:

32.1.    Formulate appropriate policies and programmes to address health rights of women from the perspective of women’s needs and interests, taking into consideration distinctive features and factors that differ for women in comparison with men, particularly the different responsibilities in the care of those infected and affected by HIV and AIDS;

32.2.    Ensure affordable primary healthcare services and promotion of healthy lifestyles;

32.3.    Ensure also that women have equal access to health care services, information and education through out their life cycle;

32.4.    Reaffirm the right to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health, protect and promote the attainment of this right for women and girls and incorporate it in national legislation;

32.5.    Reaffirm also the objectives and commitments adopted at the International Conference on Population and Development, contained in its Programme of Action, as well as the obligation of States Parties to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and other  relevant international conventions, in order to ensure and meet the health needs of women and girls;


Reduce child morbidity and mortality and improve maternal health

32.6.    Ensure that appropriate efforts are taken to tackle socio-economic factors like poverty, discrimination and all forms of violence against women, and restrictions to women’s access to medical facilities due to, inter alia,  lack of control of family resources and lack of decision making powers in a family, all of which have adversely contributed to increased infant and maternal mortality rates;

32.7.    Ensure availability of and access to quality as well as universal preventive, curative, sexual and basic reproductive healthcare services by 2015 and implement all efforts to achieve this objective;  

32.8.    Ensure safe motherhood and safe delivery  for women living in armed conflict areas, in situations of foreign occupation or in areas of natural catastrophes;

32.9.    Promote birth spacing, deliveries by qualified staff including professional midwives, where possible in an institution, and the transfer and proper management of gynaecological and obstetric emergencies;  

32.10.    Provide appropriate training to health personnel, including voluntary personnel, to identify dangerous signs and refer cases of obstetric emergency;

32.11.    Guarantee improved socio-economic conditions and promote a system of education that ensures higher school retention rates for girls, bearing in mind that the higher the educational level of the mother, the lower the infant mortality rate;

32.12.    Recognise that infant mortality rate can be affected by the age of the mother at the time of the delivery as well as by inadequate nutrition of mother and child,  and take appropriate steps to address these challenges;

32.13.    Encourage the exercise of responsible parenthood and shared responsibility in maternal health;

32.14.    Provide programmes and education for the prevention of pregnancies in adolescent girls;

Combat HIV and AIDS, malaria and other diseases.

32.15.    Promote comprehensive policies and programmes as part of the multidisciplinary strategies required to address challenges posed by communicable diseases, including HIV and AIDS, malaria,  tuberculosis, non communicable diseases like cancer, diabetes and others, as well as  injuries and trauma;

32.16.    Reaffirm also the commitments to the Declaration of Commitment on HIV and AIDS and to the Political Declaration on HIV/AIDS, and to adopt all necessary measures to ensure universal access to HIV comprehensive prevention programmes, treatment, care and support by 2010;

32.17.    Implement legal and policy frameworks, in particular to eliminate discrimination against women living with HIV and AIDS, especially in the workplace, and to ensure equal access to prevention, treatment, care and support, including psycho-social care and support;

32.18.    Eliminate discrimination and sexual and gender-based violence against girls and women that make them more vulnerable to HIV and AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases;  

32.19.    Encourage the active participation of women, including those living with HIV and AIDS and other communicable diseases, in the development of policies, programmes and services, and their monitoring and evaluation;

32.20.    Develop comprehensive policies in support of the children affected, orphaned and/or made vulnerable by HIV and AIDS, and their relatives, so that they can stay in their communities;

32.21.    Take all necessary measures to empower women and strengthen their economic independence, and to protect and promote their full enjoyment of all human rights and fundamental freedoms, in order to enable them to protect themselves from HIV infection;

32.22.    Encourage free access to information on the prevention of HIV and AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria as well as other communicable and non-communicable diseases, injuries and trauma;

32.23.    Promote comprehensive services to prevent mother-to-child transmission of HIV, including by ensuring universal access to antiretroviral treatment;

32.24.    Establish a coordinated implementation of malaria related activities and enhance funding of relevant programmes to eradicate malaria.

Ensuring the sustainability of the environment

33.    Developed countries bear historical responsibility for the degradation of the global environment. Ever since the Industrial Revolution, the developed countries have over exploited the world’s natural resources through unsustainable patterns of production and consumption, causing damage to the global environment, to the detriment of the developing countries. Given that environmental sustainability is closely linked with gender equality, it is essential to eradicate poverty that is related to environmental degradation. It must be recognized that poor households depend on the access to resources for their survival and that the need to collect fuel, food and water is a factor that forces women to discontinue schooling in many developing countries. Furthermore, women can play a significant role in environmental, sustainability related decision in all level, including in the household.

We hereby commit ourselves to take the following actions:

33.1.    Integrate a gender perspective into the design, implementation, monitoring, evaluation and reporting of national environmental and sustainable development policies, through, inter alia, strengthening mechanisms and providing adequate resources to ensure women’s full and equal participation in decision-making at all levels on these issues;

33.2.    Promote and ensure the participation of women from indigenous peoples and local and rural communities in environmental decision-making, including the acknowledgement of indigenous knowledge systems;

33.3.     Promote and facilitate the access of women to information and education to decision-making, handling and managing of resources in the areas of the environment, sustainable development, natural disasters preparedness, response and recovery; and the actions related to these areas, and the design of measures that effectively respond to impacts of international crises;

33.4.     Adopt measures that reduce the risks for women arising from environmental hazards at home, work and other places;

33.5.     Adopt measures that do not further burden women in the process of achieving environmental sustainability.

Encourage global partnership for development.  

34.    Noting that the gross national per capita income in developed countries  in 2006 was US$ 30,879.00 and in developing countries US$4,572.00 according to the Human Development Report , that trade liberalization and aid policies have direct implications on gender equality and equity, and that any negative consequences resulting from such measures may affect women more directly. Strategic alliances among countries are needed to capitalize on the lessons learned and best practices of the use of innovative technologies for productivity, as well as for partnership for development.

35.    In this regard, investing in women and girls has a multiplier effect on productivity, efficiency and sustained economic growth and that increasing women’s economic empowerment is central to the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, particularly the eradication of poverty; and recognize that adequate resources need to be allocated at all levels, mechanisms and capacities need to be strengthened; and gender-responsive policies need to be enhanced to fully utilizing the multiplier effect.

We hereby commit ourselves to take the following actions:

35.1.     Strongly urge the developed countries to fulfil their commitment of allocating 0.7% of their Gross National Product to be devoted to Official Development Assistance, which is one of the key elements for the development of economic policies towards women;

35.2.      Stress the need for development-oriented and durable solutions that integrate a gender perspective into the external debt and debt-servicing of developing countries, including least developed countries, inter alia, through debt relief and debt cancellation, in order to finance programmes and projects targeted at development, including the advancement of women;

35.3.      Stress also the need to address the differential impact of trade policies on women and men, and incorporate gender perspectives in the formulation, implementation and evaluation of their trade policies, develop strategies to expand trade opportunities for women producers from developing countries and facilitate the active participation of women in national, regional and international trade decision-making structures and processes;

35.4.      Promote effective cooperation among NAM members through different mechanisms and agreements favouring the development of just and equitable social policies, benefiting in particular women, in the framework of the NAM Founding Principles;

35.5.      Encourage greater South-South cooperation resulting in greater benefits for our peoples in general and women in particular;

35.6.      Encourage also mechanisms of integration and cooperation among regions and NAM members, in order to develop programmes on poverty eradication, trade, education, health, women empowerment, environment, sports and other relevant areas that enhance wellbeing and development for our peoples, particularly women and girls;

35.7.      Stress the need for the United Nations to enhance international cooperation for development in all the above mentioned areas of this Programme of Action, to achieve the full and effective implementation of the internationally agreed development goals, including the Millennium Development Goals,  and resolve to continue strengthening coordination within the United Nations system in close cooperation with all other multilateral financial, trade and development institutions in order to support sustained economic growth, poverty and hunger eradication and sustainable development;

35.8.    Promote plans and programmes which will guarantee women access to the use of new information and communication technologies.

Taking into account all the actions contained in this Programme of Action, we, the Ministers and other Heads of Delegations:

36.    Reiterate the commitments undertaken in the Putrajaya Programme of Action in the areas of Women, Poverty and Economic Development; Women in Power and Decision Making; Women and Education; Women and Health; Women, the Media and ICT; Women and Armed Conflict; Violence against Women; Women and Disasters Situations; Gender Mainstreaming.

37.    Strongly reject and address  obstacles  that impede the full advancement of women and limit the possibilities of economic and social development of our peoples and the integration of women, in particular, all forms of interference in the internal affairs of our States, wars, armed conflicts, foreign occupation, terrorism and externally imposed policies of pressures and conditions, taking into account our commitment to the purposes and principles enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, and reaffirming our decision to support all efforts to defend the sovereign equality of States, as well as the right of peoples living under foreign occupation to self-determination.

38.    Strongly condemn any military aggression carried out by Israel, the Occupying Power, against the Palestinian civilian population in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, in particular women and children, and especially condemn the recent massive aggression against the besieged Gaza Strip, which resulted in the killing and injury of thousands of Palestinians, widespread destruction of homes and infrastructure, and has deepened the humanitarian crisis and suffering. We demand that Israel unconditionally and scrupulously comply with all of its obligations under international law, including international humanitarian law and human rights law.  In this regard, we call for the immediate and full lifting of the economic and military blockade by Israel, the Occupying Power. We also call upon Israel, the Occupying Power, for the immediate and full withdrawal from the Gaza Strip and the immediate and sustained opening of the Gaza Strip’s border crossings, fully in accordance with the terms and provisions of Security Council Resolution 1860, to ensure the free access to emergency services, humanitarian aid, including urgently needed water, food, medicines, fuel and other essential supplies, as well as to facilitate the passage of persons to and from the Gaza Strip.  

39.    Strongly reject also the adoption of, and demand to put an end to unilateral coercive measures of any sort not in accordance with international law and the Charter of the United Nations, including economic sanctions, that impedes the full achievement of economic and social development by the population of the affected country, in particular women and children, that hinders their well-being and that creates obstacles to the full enjoyment of all their human rights.
 
40.    Stress the need for Member States to provide humanitarian assistance to their Internally Displaced Persons and refugees, taking into account the full spectrum of human vulnerabilities, particularly of women and girls.



41.    Recommend to the Heads of State and Government of the Non-Aligned Movement that the principle of gender equality and equity and the advancement of women be integrated in all NAM programmes and activities, taking into account documents adopted at the NAM Ministerial meetings on the Advancement of Women.

42.    Welcome the generous offer of the State of Qatar to host the Third NAM Ministerial Meeting on the Advancement of Women in Doha in 2010.

43.    Further welcome the proposal by Malaysia for the creation of a NAM Institute for the Empowerment of Women (NIEW) Trust Fund to allow the Institute to continue to enhance its activities dedicated to women’s empowerment and development for the benefit of the NAM member countries, and in this regard invites NAM member countries to voluntarily contribute to this Fund.

44.    Urge the NAM Institute for the Empowerment of Women to consider establishing regional programmes and representations, and take note with appreciation of the offer of the Government of Guatemala to host a regional representation of NIEW.

45.    Also welcome the establishment and the functioning of the NAM Institute for the Empowerment of Women in Kuala Lumpur, and reaffirm our commitment to actively support it and participate in its activities.

46.    Recommend to the Heads of State and Government of NAM the need to emphasize development and implementation of policies, programmes, and affirmative action, and other follow-up actions of the United Nations and other international fora to assess the achievements of the Millennium Development Goals.  

47.    Express our recognition and gratitude to the Government of the Republic of Guatemala for their initiative and hospitality in the Second Ministerial Meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement on the Advancement of Women towards the Millennium Development Goals.