JORDAN: French Embassy, UN Women Sign Agreement to Protect Women's Physical Integrity

The French Embassy and the UNWOMEN Arab States Sub-Regional Office signed on Wednesday an agreement to combat violence against women and enhance their human rights.

As per the agreement, the first phase of a project to strengthen local capacity to protect women's physical integrity and human rights in Jordan will be launched. The aim is to enhance civil society's role in protecting women from physical and psychological violence in private and public spheres, and to increase their role as active participants in decision making processes.

The agreement was signed by the French Ambassador to Jordan Corinne Breuze and Officer in Charge and Deputy Regional Director of UN WOMEN Maha Al-Nuaimy .

According to the ambassador, the agreement comes within efforts to combat violence against women and enhance human rights.

The agreement, she added reflects commitment of France to combat violence against women as well as within the strong partnership between France and UN WOMEN.

Breuze said Jordan was selected among Arab countries as a venue for the project as it has rich experience in protecting women from violence.

With the financial and technical support of the French Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs, UNWOMEN-Jordan Office will lead the implementation of the project in partnership with the Jordanian National Commission for Women (JNCW) and other relevant institutions.

Close participation of other networks of women NGOs and stakeholders will materialize through building their capacities to deal with issues pertaining to the protection of women's physical integrity. The implementation of the agreement will build on existing capacities and efforts by developing specific awareness raising and capacity building activities while coming up with cross-cutting measures to strengthen women's visibility and role in politics in order to increase their decision making power This project marks a strong partnership between France and UNWOMEN and is part of a broader cooperation to combat violence against women in six countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and in the Middle East. This agreement embodies the strong commitment of the French Republic to combat violence against women, at home and all around the world.

"Women who are subjected to physical and verbal violence are not in a position to actively participate in the development of their communities. Violence against women does not only target women, but it undermines the whole society. Given its tremendous social and economic costs, this phenomena should be prevented by collaborating efforts to accelerate progress on this front,"commented Maha Al NuaimyDeputy Regional Director at UN Women.