"My Body, My Rights", International Women's Day 2010

My Body, My Rights:
Together we call for Universal Maternal Health

For International Women's Day 2010, PES Women is presenting its 2010 campaign "My Body, My Rights". Under this umbrella slogan PES Women wants to dedicate its 2010 campaign to the overarching theme of sexual and reproductive health rights. 'My Body, My Rights' will be a one year commitment for PES Women with three windows of action; calling for universal maternal health, combating violence against women and a World AIDS Day action.

The International Women's Day, our first window of action, is set in the context of the UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW), celebrating the fifteenth anniversary of the Beijing Platform for Action. The aim of the Beijing Platform for Action is to bring a global women's rights agenda with specific objectives in different policy fields. However, fifteen years after its launch, the objectives are far from being achieved in Europe and around the world especially with respect to women's health rights and sexual rights. We even witnessed a backlash. Despite additional efforts through Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which contribute directly to improving women's rights and enhancing gender equality, including maternal health, it seems that our targets will not be reached by 2015. Therefore, PES Women decided to launch a campaign "My Body, My Rights" with a special call on universal maternal health.

To strengthen our position in Europe but also globally, PES Women, ECOSY, the Global Progressive Forum and the Global Progressive Youth Forum, organised a meeting on the fringes of the CSW with our socialist and social democratic ministers and adopted a declaration calling on all governments to reiterate their commitment towards maternal health in order to ensure women's empowerment in health rights, sexual rights, socio-economic and financial development.

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