The IFJ Gender council met in an hybrid format for its mid-term meeting on 22-23 April under the theme "Empowering Women Journalists: Breaking Barriers to union leadership and combating violence and harassment". The meeting was hosted by the Kurdistan Journalists Syndicate, an IFJ affiliate.
Participants addressed some of the core IFJ concerns for women journalists: online and offline violence against women journalists and how unions can support them; women in war with the intervention of Amal Toman, a woman journalist from Gaza, Palestine; countering power abuse and implementing ILO Convention C190 on violence and harassment in the world of work; and ways unions can use the Convention to change media approach towards more gender equality.
A special session of the meeting included presentations of IFJ projects promoting gender equality at regional level, namely, gender training in the Asia pacific region, Rewriting The Story, a project to enhance unbiased portrayal of women politicians in Europe, safety training for women that was delivered in the MENA region and the latest regional report on the situation of women journalists in Latin America and the Caribbean.
The meeting ended with the adoption of the Erbil Declaration calling for renewed efforts to improve safety and achieve equality for women journalists as well as a revision of the objectives of the Beijing Declaration (1995) in relation to the media to advance equality by breaking down gender stereotypes in the media. The declaration also insists on IFJ’s specific work to promote more gender equality in trade unions.
Download the full Declaration in English here.
Download the full Declaration in Spanish here.
Download the full Declaration in French here.