October 2025 marked 25 years since the UN Security Council adopted Resolution 1325, launching the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda. Despite WPS highlighting women’s critical roles in peacebuilding, today’s conflicts are at their highest since 1946 (data by Uppsala Conflict Data Program), and funding for women’s rights organisations and movements has decreased whereas the backlash against women’s rights and gender equality is at an alarming level. Women remain largely excluded from peace negotiations—UN Women reports that only 1 in 10 peace talks in 2024 included women negotiators. Greater involvement of women in decision-making processes at all levels of peace negotiations, protection from gender-based violence in conflict and post-conflict settings, and inclusion of women’s needs, perspectives and leadership in humanitarian responses and post-conflict reconstruction are urgently needed.
This 8th of March, we would like to echo the words of Sima Bahous, UN Women Executive Director “Women and girls are being killed in record numbers, shut out of peace tables, and left unprotected as wars multiply. Women do not need more promises, they need power, protection, and equal participation.”
For more reading on this topic, see Kvinna till Kvinna publication ‘Meeting the Moment’ and the NGO Working Group on Women, Peace and Security ’Open Letter to Permanent Representatives to the United Nations’.
On behalf of the NCG Sweden team
Managing Director, Suzana Zivkovic