"Workshop held in Phnom Penh to discuss discrimination against women", 17 December 2019

Ten national and international organisations jointly convened a workshop … to discuss the discrimination of women.

They also voted on some of the 57 recommendations tabled at the 74th Session of the UN’s Committee on the Convention for the Elimination of all forms of discrimination Against Women (Cedaw) in Geneva, Switzerland ...

Chim Channeang, the coordinator of the Cambodia NGO committee, told … that the attendees voted on the recommendations so that the government would begin implementing them over the next four years.

She warned after the workshop that if the government failed to prioritise certain recommendations, then future Cedaw sessions would only yield the very same concerns…

“The Cedaw committee raised some [concerns] and offered recommendations during previous assessments from 2006-2013 and in 2019 [but] civil society organisations observed that the government had not implemented all of them…

Among recommendations that were also put to vote … were the access to justice and compensation; independent national human rights institutions; special and temporary measures for gender equality, and discriminative gender mindset…

Klahaan executive director Bunn Rachana told … that some national plans designed to promote gender equality were still not implemented because the Kingdom had not allocated the budget for it…

Gender and Development for Cambodia programme manager Eng Chandy told … that she remained concerned regarding the lack of women’s engagement in the political system since 1993, noting that only 43 of the 24,435 people serving in the diplomatic corps are women…