Outcome SLV_D_3.3

Outcome 3.3. of the SN aligned to Outcome 2 of the UNSDCF: By 2026, all people, especially those in situations of greater vulnerability, due to gender inequalities, increase their participation and inclusion in the political, social, and economic spheres and more fully exercise their right to a life free from violence and discrimination.

During 2023, the fulfillment of this result was affected by contextual challenges related to the rotation of middle management of counterparts in institutions of the executive and judicial power. However, significant progress was made in strengthening public institutions to harmonize national regulatory frameworks with women's human rights standards and gender mainstreaming through the development of guides, guidelines, protocols, policies, diagnoses, and reform proposals, in addition to strengthening essential services in conjunction with national institutions with competence in addressing violence against women and girl survivors of violence. The country office continued its efforts to strengthen justice sector institutions and the Public Prosecutor's Office to prevent, detect, investigate and penalize violence against women and girls through the updating and implementation of action protocols for the investigation of feminicide and feminicide suicide of the Attorney General's Office, protocol to address workplace harassment, sexual harassment, discrimination and violence of the Supreme Court of Justice, and updating of its organization, procedures and positions manuals, as well as institutional policies for gender equality and equity and their operational plans (Supreme Court of Justice, Attorney General's Office and National Civil Police). The Country Office contributed to improve the response of the specialized care services of the National Civil Police (PNC) to provide specialized care to women and girls survivors of violence. The Module for registration and monitoring of the application of protection measures for women survivors of violence was strengthened in web and App versions, and support was extended to update the complaints module also to mainstream the gender approach in the registration of complaints. https://fb.watch/oilnS_19tr/?mibextid=Nif5oz https://x.com/FGR_SV/status/1728177614148231476?t=DkuqVTwgDIp22pN4BBKnWw&s=08 At the community level, the Country Office also made significant efforts to continue supporting initiatives that promote the empowerment of women and girls for the adoption of anti-discrimination norms, patterns and attitudes. Following the good practices of the Spotlight program implementation (2019-2022) and the partnership with MUCHAS MAS, the MELYT project supported technically and financially the MUCHAS MAS initiative for the development of the first phase of the project "Breaking gender gaps in STEM in the Salvadoran Trifinio", which aims to increase the access of young women in the Salvadoran Trifinio to educational and employment opportunities in STEM areas, while learning about women's rights and preventing gender violence, this initiative represents a first effort to replicate and possibly scale to other municipalities by 2024. In order to continue implementing the Special Law for a Life Free of Violence, these actions will continue to be promoted until 2024, on the one hand, to improve the provision of services to women survivors, and on the other hand, to contribute to the mainstreaming of gender and women's human rights throughout the life cycle.

Outcome 3.3. of the SN aligned to Outcome 2 of the UNSDCF: By 2026, all people, especially those in situations of greater vulnerability, due to gender inequalities, increase their participation and inclusion in the political, social, and economic spheres and more fully exercise their right to a life free from violence and discrimination.

During 2024, the fulfillment of this result was implemented in the face of contextual challenges related to significant changes related to the slowdown and limited prioritization of the women's rights agenda by national counterparts. However, significant progress was made in strengthening public institutions to harmonize national regulatory frameworks with women's human rights standards, and mainstreaming the gender perspective through the development of guidelines, protocols and policies. The office in El Salvador made efforts to improve the national regulatory and public policy frameworks, harmonizing and adapting them to international human rights standards on gender equality, highlighting the beginning of the implementation of the project “CIHUATL Mujeres: Strengthening the comprehensive normative framework for women's human rights in El Salvador” through the implementation of the project's result one has begun to review and strengthen the national regulatory framework to guarantee the right of women to equality, non-discrimination and a life free of violence, overcoming gaps in applicability and its coordinated implementation mechanism, in addition to continued efforts to strengthen the institutions of the justice sector, I also continued efforts to strengthen the institutions of the justice sector, the executive and the Public Ministry (Attorney General's Office, Attorney General's Office, and the Ministry of Housing, and the offices of the Institute for Legalization of Property (ILP) and the National Fund for Popular Housing (FONAVIPO) to mainstream the approach of equality and non-discrimination in their internal tools, equality and non-discrimination policies, protocol for addressing sexual violence and guidelines for mainstreaming equality. These efforts are strategic to strengthen the implementation of the Special Law for a Life Free of Violence and the Law for Equality, Equity and Eradication of Discrimination against Women. These actions will continue to be promoted until 2025, on the one hand, to review and propose improvements in the implementation of existing regulations, and on the other hand, to contribute to the mainstreaming of the gender and women's human rights approach in the life cycle, seeking to maintain the validity of the agenda of women's rights and their guaranteed protection.

Outcome 3.3. of the SN aligned to Outcome 2 of the UNSDCF: By 2026, all people, especially those in situations of greater vulnerability, due to gender inequalities, increase their participation and inclusion in the political, social, and economic spheres and more fully exercise their right to a life free from violence and discrimination.

During the reporting year, the fulfillment of the outcome was hampered by challenges related to political changes and turnover of authorities and middle management in counterpart institutions, such as the Executive and Judicial Branch. However, significant progress was made in strengthening public institutions to harmonize national regulatory frameworks with international human rights standards on gender equality and women's empowerment. A diagnosis was made on the reforms required in accordance with the recommendations issued by different international organizations, which allowed the preparation of a proposal for harmonization / legal reforms and a preliminary draft Legislative Decree submitted to ISDEMU for study and approval. The Country Office continued to strengthen justice sector institutions and others (Supreme Court of Justice, Attorney General's Office, Human Rights Ombudsman's Office, Attorney General's Office, Ministry of Justice and Public Security and National Civil Police) to prevent, detect, respond and protect women and girls who are victims of violence through the development, updating and implementation of national reports (Informe Unificado de Estado, Situación y Hechos de Violencia contra las Mujeres 2021), gender equality diagnostics, elaboration of institutional protocols in the Supreme Court of Justice and the Attorney General's Office, to sanction cases of workplace and sexual harassment, discrimination and violence against women users, employees and officials, as well as to improve the criminal investigation of femicide. The Country Office contributed to improving the response of specialized care services of institutions that provide care and access to women and girls who are survivors of violence. The National Civil Police (PNC) created a module for registering and monitoring the application of protection measures for women survivors of violence; Ciudad Mujer updated the Integrated Education for Sexuality (EIS) guidelines; and the Salvadoran Institute for the Development of Women (ISDEMU) improved its 126 hotline procedures and expanded its human resources to serve 4,647 women in 2022 (3,647 on the 126 hotline and 590 on the 126 Te Orienta Platform). At the community level, the Country Office also made important efforts to generate initiatives that promoted the empowerment of women and girls for the adoption of norms, patterns and attitudes against discrimination, while violence prevention strategies were promoted for girls, young women and adolescents in San Martín and San Salvador to promote the prevention and reporting of feminicide and feminicide violence. The innovative methodologies “Yo Controlo”, “Stop Violence” and "Muchas Más Beats" developed empowerment processes for youth and adolescents through a strategy that combines technological training methodologies and violence prevention that contemplates the development of 6 competency routes: 1) Patriarchy and discrimination; 2) psychological violence; 3) symbolic violence; 4) harassment and sexual violence; 5) economic and patrimonial violence; 6) feminicide violence. Source: Implementation Report Muchas Más, and Yo Controlo Manual. https://ne-np.facebook.com/IniciativaSpotlightSV/posts/577298300464370/ . These efforts are highly relevant to ensure the continuous implementation of the Special Law for a Life Free of Violence in a context of constant political changes, where positioning a gender agenda continues to be a challenge. Building on the progress made to date and on the new Strategic Note, the Country Office will continue to promote these multilevel interventions in 2023, to improve service provision for women survivors by raising the quality of such services.