International Women’s Rights Action Watch Asia Pacific

International Women’s Rights Action Watch (IWRAW) Asia Pacific is a feminist organisation based in the Global South. We work nationally, regionally and internationally towards the achievement of women's human rights. We aim to achieve progressive social change for women based on the universality, interdependence and interrelatedness of human rights, and use the lens of the Convention for the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) to contribute to the progressive interpretation and realisation of the human rights of women.

 

Our programme focuses on building understanding of and using CEDAW to address gender inequality and discrimination against women. Our strategies are designed to fill the gap between human rights monitoring by the CEDAW Committee at the international level and the activism of non-governmental organisations demanding government accountability at the national level, and to strengthen both normative content and processes of global and regional law and policy instruments that affect women’s rights.

 

Since 2004 we have been recognized by the CEDAW Committee and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) as the key NGO to support communication and submission of alternative information to the CEDAW Committee.

 

Since 2003 we have facilitated more than 1100 women across more than 305 countries to attend the CEDAW review sessions, monitor state reporting and engage with the CEDAW Committee. This strengthens the work being done on CEDAW implementation at the national level, including through processes and tools that support law reform/policy analysis, regional convenings to create more alternative spaces for the women’s movement to galvanise thinking and momentum on specific priorities, and litigation initiatives that we carry out in partnership with women’s groups at the local and state level.

 

IWRAW Asia Pacific’s ideology continues to be framed around its role as a capacity builder of women’s groups and networks, a convenor of alternate spaces for women’s voices, an advocate for strengthening the environment for the respect, protection and fulfilment of women’s rights, and a negotiator for state accountability.