Outcome KHM_D_3.1

Cambodia has an enabling environment to better prevent, respond and prosecute all forms of gender-based violence [aligns to UN Women SP 2018-2021 Output 11]

The outcome was not fully achieved in 2021, partly as a result of the continuing impact of successive waves of COVID-19 and the measures in place to respond to the pandemic. However there was progress towards improvements of the enabling environment to prevent, respond to and prosecute GBV in Cambodia. In particular Ministry of Women’s Affairs (MOWA) technical capacity and leadership in coordinating for the implementation of the 3rd National Action Plan to Prevent Violence against Women (NAPVAWIII) has been significantly improved. UN Women has continued to provide technical advisory support to MOWA to coordinate the Technical Working Group on Gender-Gender Based Violence (TWGG-GBV) which consists of 17 line ministries and 26 CSOs and 4 development partners including Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and 3 UN agencies and to co-chair this group, the key coordination mechanism for GBV prevention and response in Cambodia as well as providing technical inputs to support the development of key tools needed for a coordinated and quality response to GBV. A key example is that UN Women has contributed to the development of the Annual Operational Plan (AOP) format, a simplified tool for the implementation and monitoring of the 3rd NAPVAW by line ministries including resource mobilisation. This is an important tool to facilitate and coordinate the multi-sectoral engagement that is needed to create an enabling environment to better respond to the needs of survivors. With an increase in capacity, MOWA has continued to provide technical support to TWGG-GBV members to develop their AOPs. During this reporting period, 15 AOPs have been developed by 11-line ministries, 3 CSOS and the Bar Association of the Kingdom of Cambodia. From the initial analysis, a total 34 selections of strategic priorities were made with the majority focus on prevention (73%), followed by Legal Protection and Multi-Sectoral Services (21%), Laws and Policies and Monitoring and Evaluation (3% each). At the same time, key gaps have been identified and presented to the TWGG-GBV members during the 25th TWGG-GBV meetings on the 23rd November 2021. The gaps identified include still significant numbers of TWGG-GBV members that have not completed AOPs. This results in a lack of documentation of many of the activities that have occurred and represent significant work toward the NAPVAW implementation. As a result of lack of AOPs from many organizations, the focus on marginalised and at-risk groups access to services is not documented adequately. For example, there is no/limited documentation of the work on women migrant workers, women in ethnic/indigenous communities or women with disabilities which all have been a significant focus. The AOPs have significant detail about the work that TWGG-GBV members are doing. However, some of the activities or actions are not NAPVAW priorities but the planned activities of the line ministry. Geographic focus of work is not detailed. In addition, UN Women has contributed to conducting the legal review of the Law on the Prevention of Violence and the Protection of Women (DV Law) to be able to provide relevant and contextual policy advice to MOWA for addressing the discrimination, stereotyping of the law substances when MOWA develop a roadmap for DV law reform. The desk review of good practices in VAW legal frameworks was conducted to identify good practices, and the DV Law analysis was initiated. A preliminary review report analysing the DV Law in the context of relevant international human rights principles and standards from the United Nations (UN), and from the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has been completed. With UN Women's coordination, six separate consultations were conducted via Zoom with two UN agencies (UNFPA and OHCHR), three CSOs (Women Peace Makers, Legal Aid of Cambodia, and NGOs CEDAW) and the Ministry of Women's Affairs (MoWA). The consultations have provided a deeper understanding of the previous work and the progress so far by MoWA in relation to the DV law review process. UN Women will be working with MoWA on a Roadmap for the Legal Reform that will be initiated in the next quarter. The full draft analysis report of the DV Law Review will be provided by the international consultant in the 1st quarter of 2022.

Cambodia has an enabling environment to better prevent, respond and prosecute all forms of gender-based violence [aligns to UN Women SP 2018-2021 Output 11]

During the reporting year, some progress has been observed toward improving the enabling environment to prevent, respond to and prosecute all forms of gender-based violence. A priority has been initiating toward the review of the Law on Prevention of Domestic Violence and Protection of Victims (DV law) and improvement in its current implementation were prioritized in the National Action Plan to Prevent Violence against Women (NAPVAW). A key priority is ensuring that the law and its implementation address the needs of marginalised groups or groups with challenges accessing services, such as women migrant workers, LGBTIQ women, ethnic minorities, women with disabilities, older women, and others marginalised by occupation. The planned actions stated in NAPVAW to review the DV Law are in line with the CEDAW Concluding Observation (CEDAW COB) 9a, 9b related to improvement of the legislative framework and 25 b to undertake a comprehensive review of the DV law and amends its provisions to define, prohibit and criminalise all forms of gender-based violence, including domestic violence and marital rape, to facilitate the process of obtaining protection orders and to ensure that victims/survivors of domestic violence have access to effective remedies and that perpetrators are held accountable. Despite these declarations of intent, there is not yet a clear pathway forward on how to reform and/or amend the DV law. Therefore, the Ministry of Women's Affairs as the secretariat of the Technical Working Group on Gender-Gender Based Violence is coordinating the process to develop the roadmap for reforming the DV law. UN Women is significantly contributing to the development of the roadmap for reforming the DV law by providing technical expertise to the Ministry of Women's Affairs in coordinating and facilitating consultations between key line ministries. In addition, UN Women is ensuring there is engagement from Civil Society Organisations working on DV law implementation in drafting and finalising the roadmap. Key discussions were held between the Ministry of Women's Affairs and UN Women including the technical consultants to identify the priority actions. It was agreed to have a closed-door meeting to initiate a discussion on critical action steps toward the DV law review/reform between key stakeholders from the Ministry of Interior, Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Women's Affairs, Bar Association of Kingdom of Cambodia, UN Women, UNOHCHR, and two Civil Organisations, Cambodia League for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights (LICADHO) and NGO CEDAW. The DV Law Reform Roadmap aims to ensure a participatory approach for consult with all stakeholders, especially maginalised groups and survivors in the law reform process. The roadmap is expected to be completed by quarter 1 of 2023.

Cambodia has an enabling environment to better prevent, respond and prosecute all forms of gender-based violence [aligns to UN Women SP 2018-2021 Output 11]

During the reporting year, some progress has been observed towards this outcome. The Ministry of Women’s Affairs (MoWA) has strengthened their leadership to coordinate with relevant stakeholders in developing a Roadmap for Reforming the Law on the Prevention of Domestic Violence and Protection of Victims (DV Law). The DV Law Roadmap was developed based on consultative meetings with key line ministries including Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Interior, National Police, and the Bar Association of the Kingdom of Cambodia, women’s rights organizations working on ending violence against women and relevant United Nations agencies including the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA), and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).The DV Law Roadmap is a stepping stone and indicates MoWA efforts towards the DV Law amendment to be in line with the international norms and standards in response to recommendation from the Committee on the Elimination of Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW Committee). The DV Law Roadmap has provided a comprehensive analysis on good practice, lessons learned, and the gaps in the implementation of the DV Law and most importantly it has identified key priorities and steps for initiating and conducting the DV Law amendment process. The roadmap analysis indicates that the majority of the DV Law articles need to be comprehensively reviewed and suggests eight significant steps towards the DV law amendment process. Due to multiple areas of the DV Law that have been analysed in need of improvement and review, the roadmap analysis suggests preparing a new version of DV law to replace the existing law. UN Women significantly contributed to the DV Law Roadmap development process through advocating for inclusive participation from women’s rights organizations working on ending violence against women and relevant stakeholders. As a result, the MoWA agreed to invite three women’s rights organizations to join together and provide space for a representative from women’s rights organizations to present the legal analysis that they have collectively conducted on the DV Law implementation during the first close-door consultative meeting in February. The MoWA has continued to engage women’s rights organizations, relevant line ministries and United Nations agencies in reviewing the draft of the DV Law Roadmap. Five women’s rights organizations joined the second close-door meeting in September, jointly reviewed and validated the draft of the DV Law Roadmap. Overall, key stakeholders including women’s rights organizations agreed on the substance of the roadmap analysis and women’s rights organizations called for the MoWA and the Government to initiate the DV Law amendment process with a clear timeline. However, there has not been any common decision whether to draft a new law or to amend some articles. The workshop suggested the decision is to be made later by MoWA senior leadership management team with the advice from the Minister. Up to date, MOWA has indicated a positive commitment to adopting the DV Law Roadmap and this was highlighted in one of the 14 key priorities presented at the MoWA annual congress on 12 January 2024 to the Prime Minister. Another significant achievement is that MOWA has strengthened its ownership towards the final evaluation of the third National Action Plan to Prevent Violence against Women (NAPVAW III). The MOWA has increased its confidence to coordinate with 17 line ministry members of the Technical Working Group on Gender-Gender Based Violence (TWGG-GBV) to conduct the final evaluation. Working closely with UN Women, MoWA has ensured inclusive participatory approaches throughout the final evaluation process. As a result, a total of 351 people (255 women) from the Government both at the national and sub-national levels, civil society organizations, development partners and women survivors of violence including Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender people and women migrant workers participated in consultations in Phnom Penh and five provinces. The findings of the final evaluation have provided strong evidence base on the progress and gaps in the implementation of the NAPVAW III, most importantly strategic recommendations that would help better inform the MoWA and the TWGG-GBV on areas of improvement in the NAPVAW IV formulation process. It is important to note that the MoWA has accepted the recommendation and committed itself to addressing them in NAPVAW IV to ensure effective primary GBV prevention, and quality essential service response to the survivors. The achievement above indicates that the planned strategy remains consistent, relevant and effective for ending violence against women programme work in Cambodia context. This was reflected in the findings from the Cambodia Demographic and Health Survey (2021-2022) which showed there was a decrease of prevalence of violence against women from 29 per cent in 2014 to 21 per cent in 2021-2022. The findings from the final evaluation of the NAPVAW III also show women survivors are more aware of and accessed available services and service providers, as 31 per cent of women who have ever experienced any physical or sexual violence sought help in 2021- 2022, an increase from 24 per cent in 2015. However, the vast majority of women survivors of violence do not seek help indicating more work is needed to support women survivors to access services. In addition, the NAPVAW III remains a very important guiding document for multi-sectoral coordination on ending violence against women and girls, and the TWGG-GBV and GBV Working Groups, have served as platforms to coordinate and collaborate on GBV prevention and response. The NAPVAW III is part of a longer term effort and commitment of the Royal Government to end violence against women and girls in Cambodia, and needs to be viewed with both a short term lens for accelerating progress on providing quality services to women and girls affected by violence and those at risk and sustained longer term efforts to address gender inequalities and harmful gender norms that perpetuate violence against women and girls.