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Role of the Monash IWRAW Asia-Pacific Intern: November 2006 – February 2007

International Women's Rights Action Watch Asia Pacific (IWRAW Asia Pacific) is an international organisation based in Malaysia working towards the realisation of women's human rights by contributing to the progressive interpretation, universalisation, implementation and realisation of women's human rights through the lens of CEDAW and other international human rights treaties. We facilitate a process through which the CEDAW Convention is used as a tool for applying international human rights standards at the national level and in a wide range of contexts whereby knowledge and skills are developed to create a better understanding of the various dimensions of equality, non-discrimination, State obligation, human rights principles (e.g. universality and indivisibility), and a rights-based approach to development.
IWRAW Asia Pacific's work is effected through two primary strategies: Building Capacity for Change (trainings and technical assistance on CEDAW and applying international human rights standards to local or national issues) and Enhancing the Realisation of Rights (which is a mainly an advocacy oriented strategy advocating to progressively expand international human rights standards and to ensure that gains at the international level are realised at the national level). Additionally we have cross cutting programmes such as the "From Global to Local" programme (which facilitates the engagement and advocacy of national women's organizations at the international level by enabling their participation in the review conducted by the CEDAW committee of the reports of their countries thus enhancing the ability to hold states parties accountable for implementing their obligations under CEDAW ) and the National-Regional Women's Rights Implementation Strategy, which is mainly a CEDAW implementation and monitoring strategy).  Finally, the entire framework is supported by our functional strategy called Information Dissemination and Exchange Application Strategy (IDEAS) which ensures people have access to information on the latest developments related to human rights through publications, the website, and our dissemination listservs.

Two projects have been identified as a focus of the interns work with us:

  • Lawyers training package
  • "From Global to Local" training materials package

Both of these projects require legal knowledge and familiarity with the UN mechanism and processes and will include in-depth research and analysis, especially of international human rights law and case law, to be done by the intern, under the direct supervision of an IWRAW Asia Pacific programme officer. This research and analysis will then be uploaded onto our website and disseminated widely among our global programme partners to assist them in their work of enforcing and enhancing women's rights on the ground.

In addition to working on these two projects, the intern will take part in some of the ongoing elements of IWRAW Asia Pacific's work, such as compiling information and writing summaries about important women's human rights issues and developments to send to IWRAW Asia Pacific's partner organisations, listservs and resource persons; assisting with discrete research and writing tasks for other projects; attending weekly staff meetings, occasional planning/strategy meetings and relevant seminars, conferences and trainings that take place during the intern's time in Malaysia; and any other tasks/activities that arise during the intern's 12 weeks of immersion in an international women's rights organisation.

Below is a brief description of each specific project and the related work that the intern will undertake :

1. Lawyers' Training Package

The idea to develop a lawyers' training package evolved out of IWRAW Asia Pacific's capacity building work with lawyers, ongoing since 1995. Recognising that CEDAW is a valuable legal tool and resource and can lend itself to standard setting jurisprudence, it is thus necessary to highlight the role of lawyers and judges in advancing the link between women's right to development and access to justice with overall national development.

CEDAW is a legally binding instrument and a policy document and hence lawyers' relevance as social actors is actively linked to giving relevance and appropriate application to CEDAW . Lawyers' interventions against infringements against basic human rights norms and extreme cultural and religious practices are in furtherance of the principle of equality enshrined in their laws. Bringing about a change in the minds and attitudes of the legal community will have a direct effect on the extent and quality of the remedies their clients are likely to receive. Judges are as much an arm of the state as other agencies and their failure to apply international standards which the state is obligated to apply, may lead to a violation of international law and lawyers are obligated to bring this knowledge to the judges' attention.

Elements of the training package

In the light of this and IWRAW Asia Pacific's experience in providing CEDAW training to lawyers the need for a more specialized training to support the legal profession was recognised, to support the concretizing claims for rights and to call for adequate and effective remedies to ensure State compliance with its obligations under CEDAW.  Hence, in the next year we plan to develop a training package which focuses on the specialized skill of lawyers and aims at re-focusing our concepts and issues to enable us to make better use of their expertise.

This training package for lawyers will cover the substantive issues of using CEDAW and international human rights norms to claim and enforce rights through legal initiatives with a tentative training framework that includes a proposed structure which includes 6 key sessions: (a) CEDAW and the Role of Lawyers in Advancing Women's Rights, (b) Substantive Equality, (c) Non-Discrimination, (d) State Obligation, (e) CEDAW as a Framework for Remedies, and (f) Uses of CEDAW in Legal Initiatives (case studies). 

The training package is composed of facilitator/trainer's notes, hand-outs, case studies and points for transparencies.

Work to be done by intern:

  • Develop conceptual framework for lawyers training package in consultation with
    the Executive Director
  • Review existing training materials for relevance, currency, correctness and functionality
  • Develop new materials
  • Support the Executive Director in all work related to this project

2. From Global to Local Training Package

This programme is designed to fill the gap between human rights monitoring by the CEDAW Committee at the international level and grassroots activism demanding government accountability at the national level. The programme provides technical guidance and support on the CEDAW reporting process to women's NGOs, and facilitates the presence of women from reporting countries at the CEDAW sessions to monitor and observe the review of their government's report and to interact with the CEDAW Committee members. Since 1997, nongovernmental organisations from more than 100 countries have participated in the programme and is IWRAW Asia Pacific's flagship programme on CEDAW implementation and advocacy.

The specific objectives of the project are to:

  • Raise women's awareness on the significance of the CEDAW Convention; 
  • Familiarise women with the mechanisms set up by the CEDAW Convention for monitoring its implementation;
  • Promote the compilation, analysis and dissemination of alternative information on the status of women in countries reporting to the CEDAW Committee;
  • Build women's capacities to approach women's issues according to international human rights standards that should be claimed and fulfilled at the national level;
  • Enable women to monitor their government's performance during the review of State party reports and to interact with CEDAW Committee members; and
  • Enable women to make plans for implementing the recommendations of the CEDAW Committee and to collaborate with the government to implement the CEDAW Convention in their countries.

Since its inception, the programme has essentially consisted of three main parts:

  • Before the CEDAW Session, IWRAW Asia Pacific helps to ensure timely coordination and writing of shadow/alternative reports by national level groups, encourages NGOs to contribute to the Committee's pre-session working group meeting, provides technical assistance as necessary to groups writing reports, collects final drafts of shadow/alternative reports from NGOs and distributes paper and electronic copies of the reports to the CEDAW Committee members. 
  • During the CEDAW session, there is either a full training programme (three days, plus one day evaluation) or an abridged mentoring programme (one and a half days) that includes information about the CEDAW Convention, a briefing on the CEDAW reporting process and how NGOs can influence the process and assistance to NGOs in preparing their oral statements for the informal NGO meeting with the CEDAW Committee. After presenting to the CEDAW Committee on Monday, the NGOs lobby the Committee members in order to raise awareness on critical issues and also observe their country's formal review that week. 
  • After the CEDAW Session. Upon return to their home countries, NGO participants plan follow up activities to help disseminate the CEDAW Committee's Concluding Comments, share their experiences in New York and encourage their governments to implement the Convention and the Concluding Comments.

IWRAW Asia Pacific is currently restructuring the "From Global to Local" programme to be more holistic and allow NGOs that are participating in the CEDAW reporting process to incorporate the CEDAW framework into their existing work. The restructuring also looks to address issues brought about by the current reform at the UN level. The restructured programme will consist of a centralised training programme for all countries to report in the following year approximately 3 months to one year before the scheduled review, mentoring at the CEDAW Session itself (similar to the current mentoring programme), and a centralised follow-up workshop approximately one to two years after the review to discuss implementation and monitoring strategies.
 
In conjunction with the restructuring of the programme, IWRAW Asia Pacific plans to repackage its training materials into a Global to Local training package that will cover the entire reporting cycle, including:

  • NGO input into drafting the State party report;
  • Development of an NGO shadow/alternative report;
  • Use of the shadow report as an advocacy and public education tool before the session;
  • Participating in the CEDAW Session, including oral presentations to the Committee, lobbying the Committee members, and using the media to publicise the review;
  • Dissemination of concluding comments;
  • Follow up after the CEDAW Session, including advocating for and monitoring implementation of concluding comments;
  • Using the CEDAW shadow/alternative report and lessons from the CEDAW process with other treaty bodies.

In addition, IWRAW Asia Pacific will be creating promotional materials for the programme, such as a promotional brochure and special section for Global to Local on its website. This will require both describing the programme and what past participants have done after participating in the programme and the CEDAW Sessions.

Work to be done by intern:

  • Work toward completion of materials: add to the draft of the new Global to Local training package, previously worked on by our intern Julia Barry, including updating/repackaging current materials and developing new materials (e.g., on media strategies, advocacy, follow-up suggestions, etc.)
  • Draft the promotional brochure and Global to Local sections for the website
  • Compile information the follow up activities of past Global to Local participants into a useful form for the website or training materials

Additional organisational tasks

Description and work to be done by the intern

In addition to the above tasks, IWRAW Asia Pacific will, as time allows, ask the intern to help with and participate in organisational activities. The intern will be expected to function basically as a staff member of the organisation, and thus attend staff meetings and take a turn writing minutes (a rotating task); attend internal and external seminars, trainings and conferences as they arise and complete activity reports for these activities; and assist with discrete additional research, writing or logistical tasks as necessary. IWRAW Asia Pacific will also try to give the intern exposure to various Malaysian women's NGOs that operate in the Kuala Lumpur area so the intern gains an understanding of some local issues and the work of local NGOs.

IWRAW Asia Pacific is looking forward to welcoming the Monash  intern into our organisation. We hope the intern will find the  experience in Malaysia to be enlightening, fulfilling and lots of fun!