UN-Resolution 1325

Few regions illustrate the relevance of the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda as clearly as the South Caucasus, where women across the region have been at the forefront of peacebuilding efforts in multiple protracted conflicts.

North Macedonia’s first National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security treated women as a homogeneous group, and failed to address categories of women who are differently impacted by conflict, insecurity, and peace-building.

Twenty-five years after the adoption of Resolution 1325, Bosnia and Herzegovina still fails to protect women from violence. Instead: impunity, silence, and a political culture that mocks survivors. But feminist movements keep fighting. 

El Salvador’s commitment to UN Resolution 1325 faces a crossroads: Past progress is now at risk as President Bukele’s growing militarization threatens women’s rights and equality, reviving echoes of the country’s war-torn past.

In an age marked by rising authoritarianism and anti-gender backlash, feminist peace in the Western Balkans stands as both an act of resistance and a re-imagining of security itself. The Women, Peace and Security Agenda needs to be reviewed.

Twenty-five years after its creation, the Women, Peace and Security agenda sounds hollow in the Arab World. Our author argues for radical action – to finally place women at the helm of the institutions that claim to champion them.

In 2023, Germany’s Federal Foreign Office and its Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development published guidelines for a feminist foreign and development policy. Political headwinds, however, are jeopardising the implementation of the concepts.

It was a long way before the implementation of UN Resolution 1325 on the prevention of war and sexual violence against women got on track. On the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the resolution, Barbara Unmüßig speaks about what steps and actions have to be taken to approach the goal of female participation in phases of conflict.