Women's rights under attack amid democratic erosion: UN – DW – 03/06/2025


Women

Mahima Kapoor with AP and AFP 03/06/2025March 6, 2025 As democratic institutions worldwide have weakened, so have women's rights, according to a report from UN Women. The head of the UN said instead of mainstreaming equal rights, the world was mainstreaming misogyny. Women labourers in Narayanganj, Bangladesh carry piles of bricks weighing more than 15 kg on their heads Women's rights have regressed in one-fourth of the world's countries in the last year in the face of issues ranging from weakened democratic institutions, growing conflicts, humanitarian crises and climate change, a UN Women report said on Thursday. The report came ahead of International Women's Day on March 8, and marks 30 years of work after the 1995 Beijing Platform for Action, a global conference on women's rights where 189 countries endorsed an agreement outlining the steps needed to achieve gender equality. "The weakening of democratic institutions has gone hand-in-hand with backlash on gender equality," the UN Women report said. "Anti-rights actors are actively undermining long-standing consensus on key issues," it said, adding that anti-rights actors blocked or slowed policy implementation in countries where they could not roll back laws. "Globally, women's human rights are under attack. Instead of mainstreaming equal rights, we're seeing the mainstreaming of misogyny," UN Secretary Antonio Guterres said in a statement.