Name of organization/institution
Ministry of Justice and Security
Organization details
Government
Description of your organization/institution
The Ministry of Justice and Security of the Netherlands is responsible for maintaining the rule of law in the Netherlands, so that people can live together in freedom regardless of their life-style or views. The Ministry is working towards a safer, more just society by giving people legal protection and, where necessary, intervening in their lives. The Ministry consists of several different departments that work together and individually on topics such as, but is not limited to, police and safety regions, sanctions and protection, counterterrorism and security, justice and law enforcement, subversive crime, migration and society and Covid-19.
Description of your main WPS related activities
The Directorate for the European and International Affairs (DEIA) of the Ministry of Justice and Security coordinates and facilitates the activities of the Ministry with regards to the implementation of the NAP 1325-IV in The Netherlands. With its partners within the Justice and Security domain, it monitors the way the Ministry impacts on women and girls from (post) conflict countries. For our Ministry, this action plan helps us protect women and girls in and from conflict zones during the various tasks of our Ministry. For example, during international police missions, we ensure that attention is paid to the protection of this group, we are committed to the fight against impunity for international crimes, which often affect women and girls to a great extent, and keep an eye on the vulnerability of this group in the migration chain.
Strategic outcome
1. Participation - More women hold leadership positions, and women participate equally and meaningfully in decision-making processes at every level in the interests of peace and security, including conflict prevention and resolution, peacebuilding, protec,
2. Prevention - Conflict prevention and the prevention of violent extremism, including of related violence against women and girls, is based on the human rights approach and starts from the principle of human security. Prevention policy and its implementa,
3. Protection - Women and girls, as well as men and boys, in and from conflict situations, are protected against all forms of conflict-related violence, including sexual and gender-based violence. Their rights are safeguarded and enforceable,
5. WPS Mainstreaming - A gender lens is applied to every reorganisation, improvement, development and evaluation of analysis, policy and policy implementation with regard to peace and security
Sub-outcome 3
3.1 Women and girls have access to security and justice systems,
3.2 Impunity for violent offences against women and girls combatted,
3.4 Gender sensitive, -responsive, -transformative asylum policy
Sub-outcome 5
5.1 Peace and security personnel gender aware; applies gender lens
What type of investments will you make to contribute to the selected outcome(s)?
Policy, Programmatic
Description/comments
Strategic outcome 1: More women hold leadership positions, and women participate equally and meaningfully in decision-making processes at every level in the interests of peace and security, including conflict prevention and resolution, peacebuilding, protection, relief, reconstruction and recovery. We strive to improve our gender balance in military, police and civil missions, alongside more women in senior positions by means of recruiting campaigns and gender training. We aim at achieving equal opportunities, development and participation of women in the decision-making processes in regard to peace and security, the prevention of violence and armed conflict and protection against it. The police has included a mandate that emphasizes the Women, Peace and Security (WPS)-agenda during missions and aims at a 30% participation rate of women in peace missions.
Strategic outcome 2: Conflict prevention and the prevention of violent extremism, including of related violence against women and girls, is based on a human rights approach and starts from the principle of human security. Prevention policy and its implementation are conflict-sensitive, gender-sensitive, gender-responsive and gender-transformative. In relation to police missions gender focal points have been created in order to have an advisory role. So far, six gender focal points have been active during deployment in 2021.
Strategic outcome 3: Women and girls, as well as men and boys, in and from conflict situations, are protected against all forms of conflict-related violence, including sexual and gender-based violence. Their rights are safeguarded and enforceable. In order to be able to protect, all of our deployed police staff will participate in a three-day gender training in order to be able to assume the roles of gender focal points. This is for all staff, not only the official gender focal points because we believe that all employees must be aware of gender issues and activities. Every deployed staff member must rapport three times about gender activities that have taken place, which in turn will create valuable information for future training sessions. The National Public Prosecutor’s Office (OM) organizes an educational afternoon on international crimes as part of a permanent education program. The educational afternoon is aimed at practitioners within the Dutch police, Public Prosecution Service and judiciary in the field of international crimes. One of the main topics that will be discussed is sexual and gender based violence. During a panel discussion international speakers experienced in questioning victims will share best practices with the participants.
Sub-outcome 3.1: Women and girls who have experienced conflict and/or related sexual and gender-based violence have access to international, regional, national and local security and legal systems. In the migration chain, we believe that proper access to security and legal systems should be available for those who need it most. Therefore, we have implemented country-specific immigration policies that targets countries with high numbers of refugees. This allows us to take conflict-related sexual violence and the psychological consequences thereof, towards both adults and minor men and women into consideration.
Sub-outcome 3.2: Impunity is combatted by prosecuting suspects and imposing sanctions on perpetrators of violent offences against women and girls, including sexual and gender-based violence. We are committed to the fight against impunity for the crime of genocide, crimes against humanity and war crimes. These efforts include international crimes related to sexual and gender based violence. We publish an annual report on our activities with relation to the investigation and prosecution of international crimes. It is also in this context that the Netherlands, together with Argentina, Belgium, Mongolia, Senegal and Slovenia have been working for a number of years on launching a multilateral treaty on mutual legal assistance in criminal matters and extradition for the investigation and prosecution of international crimes (MLA initiative).
Sub-outcome 3.4: Asylum policy is gender-sensitive, gender-responsive and gender transformative, with a special focus on unaccompanied women, minors and LGBTQI+ asylum seekers. The Directorate Migration (DMB) is in continues conversation with the central agency for the Reception of Asylum Seekers (COA) and the Immigration and Naturalization Services (IND) concerning the improvement of gender sensitivity within our immigration policies. Multi-stakeholder dialogues are taking place about development, execution and supervision on these policies together with other women- and refugee organizations. Additionally, this allows them to attract experts and knowledge from other organizations that are not part of the ministry, such as Transgender Netwerk Nederland.
Strategic outcome 5: A gender lens is applied to every (re)organization, improvement, development and evaluation of analysis, policy and policy implementation with regard to peace and security.
Sub-outcome 5.1: Peace and security personnel are gender-aware and systematically apply a gender lens to policy formulation and implementation on peace and security. Within civilian missions where the police is involved, applying a gender sensitive lens will be done through reporting mechanisms that inform on employees’ gender and WPS-expertise within missions. Here, the gender focal points come into play as mentioned by strategic outcome 3.
Country/Region
International and national focus: besides its commitment to Women, Peace and Security within the framework of civilian missions, the Ministry of Security and Justice has also been looking into the implementation of the NAP 1325-IV within the Netherlands.