IPU Inter-Parliamentary Union [to 31 October 2015]
http://www.ipu.org/english/news.htm
Selected Press Releases/Briefings

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MPs propose action to boost peace and security through gender equality
29 OCTOBER 2015
MPs have called for fresh action to help ensure that UN Security Council resolution 1325 on women, peace and security is more widely implemented and respected as they marked its 15th anniversary. Their recommendations, aimed at boosting parliamentary involvement in promoting the women, peace and security agenda, include speeding up the adoption of National Action Plans on 1325; increasing the participation and leadership of women in parliaments, particularly in work relating to peace and security; and ensuring that 15 per cent of peace and security funding is dedicated to gender-related issues such as boosting women’s political participation and protecting women and girls from violence. The recommendations followed a discussion by IPU’s Meeting of Women MPs on gender equality as an indispensable element of sustainable peace and security. The Meeting of Women MPs, a permanent fixture of IPU Assemblies, works to advance gender equality and women’s rights. This includes promoting the UN Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and working alongside the CEDAW Committee.

WHO call for stronger parliamentary engagement on health
29 OCTOBER 2015
World Health Organization (WHO) Director General Dr Margaret Chan has urged MPs around the world to step up their efforts to improve the health of their citizens, stressing the importance of political solutions in a new generation of complex challenges. In her first address to an IPU assembly, Dr Chan stressed the vital role of MPs in a wide range of strategies including delivering universal health coverage, taxing tobacco, improving food labelling and fighting tax, trade and insurance policies which impacted on the poor. She warned of new threats including drug-resistant pathogens, the globalized marketing of unhealthy products, and the growing rates of chronic non-communicable diseases such as heart disease, cancer and diabetes – which have overtaken infectious diseases as the world’s biggest killers. Dr Chan also offered to strengthen WHO’s collaboration with IPU through structured technical support to IPU’s advisory bodies and confirmed a new role for parliamentarians in jointly organized side events at WHO assemblies, the organization’s supreme decision-making body. Her address builds on the existing cooperation between WHO and IPU in fields including women’s and children’s health, family planning, violence against women and girls and harmful traditional practices.

New guidelines help MPs step up HIV action
29 OCTOBER 2015
New guidelines on how parliamentarians can speed up HIV treatment have been published by IPU and UNAIDS. Fast-tracking HIV treatment: Parliamentary action and policy options defines a range of measures parliaments can take to try and ensure all citizens with HIV have access to treatment. HIV treatment is a cornerstone of the AIDS response – helping prevent deaths and new infections – but is still not accessible to all who need it. Vital agents of change, MPs have a pivotal role in delivering social justice and human rights, including access to HIV treatment. The guidelines provide examples of good practice by parliaments and individual members on the issue. The wealth of information in the publication includes details of the fast-track targets the world must meet to end the AIDS epidemic as a global health threat by 2030, the human rights-based approach to HIV, the patenting of drugs and ensuring it does not restrict access to treatment, and how to mobilize resources and finance treatment of the disease.

Crucial tool for MPs to tackle migration issues
29 OCTOBER 2015
A new Handbook for Parliamentarians giving vital guidance to MPs and parliaments on migration has been published by IPU and partners, the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the UN’s Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR). Handbook no.24 “Migration, human rights and governance covers the issues and provides the tools and policy responses to the international movement of people. A complex and highly divisive issue, international migration is motivated by a range of economic, political and social factors. With xenophobia growing and the migration debate predominantly negative, parliamentarians must help ensure there is a meaningful, balanced and informed response to migration through fair and effective policies that maximize the benefits of human mobility whilst addressing the challenges that origin, transit and destination countries and migrants face. This latest Handbook for Parliamentarians offers policy responses to questions such as root causes for migration, social cohesion and migration governance.

Action pledge follows nutrition seminar
29 OCTOBER 2015
MPs from nine countries in the Southern African Development Community (SADC) pledged parliamentary action to tackle malnutrition, which affects more than 180 million of the world’s under-fives, during a meeting in Namibia earlier this month. The MPs examined issues such as the stubbornly high rates of malnutrition as well as the emerging challenge of obesity in their region. They recognized the critical importance of food and nutrition security to economic development, the survival and healthy growth of children, and breaking intergenerational cycles of poverty. The MPs made a commitment to ensure that the necessary laws and budgets on nutrition were in place, to scrutinize government policies, galvanize action by raising awareness of the unacceptably high malnutrition rates, and work in cooperation with other groups and bodies. The meeting, hosted by the Namibian Parliament, was organized by IPU and UNICEF.

Conference to focus on answers to statelessness
29 OCTOBER 2015
A conference in South Africa will explore how parliaments can combat statelessness, which deprives many people of basic rights but which can be solved with relatively simple changes to laws and practices. Statelessness, caused by a variety of factors including discrimination and the redrawing of national boundaries, affects some 10 million people around the world. MPs attending the conference on 26-27 November in Cape Town, organized by IPU, the South African Parliament and the UN refugee agency, UNHCR, will learn more about the impact of legal reforms such as changes to the law in Senegal and Algeria that have enabled women to transfer their nationality to their children and end a major cause of statelessness. They will also learn more about promoting accession by their States to two UN conventions on statelessness which provide the framework for a united international response. The conference is expected to result in a parliamentary action plan to end statelessness.