UN Women urges member states at CSW70 to make access to justice a priority

New York — Sarah Hendris, a representative of UN Women, told reporters at a Commission on the Status of Women briefing that access to justice is central to achieving gender equality and that member states must act now to reverse ‘‘organized push back’’ against women’s rights.

"No country in the world right now has yet achieved full legal equality between men and women," Hendris said, summarizing findings set out in the Secretary‑General’s report being discussed at CSW70. She warned that discriminatory laws, weak enforcement and shrinking civic space, compounded by conflict and economic strain, leave large numbers of women and girls without meaningful protection.

Hendris cited several statistics from the report to illustrate the scope of the problem: in roughly three‑quarters of countries laws still allow child marriage; in 44% of countries the law does not mandate equal pay for work of equal value; and family‑law reforms since 1970 have opened new economic opportunities for an estimated 600 million…