From DEBRA@oln.comlink.apc.orgFri Sep 1 09:59:54 1995 Date: Mon, 28 Aug 1995 20:45:00 +0100 From: Debra Guzman Reply to: beijing-conf@tristram.edc.org To: beijing95-l@netcom.com, beijing-conf@tristram.edc.org Subject: Gertrude Mongella ready for Beijing [The following text is in the "ISO-8859-1" character set] [Your display is set for the "US-ASCII" character set] [Some characters may be displayed incorrectly] ## author : theearthtime@igc.apc.org ## date : 23.08.95 --------------------------------------------------------------------------- Gertrude Mongella ready for Beijing By Daniel J. Shepard Earth Times News Service As Gertrude Mongella prepared to leave New York for Beijing last week, there was clearly heightened anticipation in her office concerning the imminent Fourth World Conference on Women. "It's just a matter of days now," the Conference Secretary General said, "and I've done all the preparations, and I'm just waiting. I've done my best. I've used all my experience, used all my time, and I've given everything I can to the Conference." Mongella was buoyed by the change in attitude shown by delegations at the recent informal consultations in New York earlier in August, which she said were conducted in the "spirit of cooperation and peace." Mongella was optimistic that the goodwill would carry across the Pacific to Beijing. "Like an expectant mother, what I am expecting in Beijing is to have a healthy baby. I will be very happy if the Conference ends up in peace--and generous action. But my expectations go way beyond the document. We are going to frustrate many women if we come away from Beijing without actions, commitments, and accountability." Mongella was emphatic that the focus of the Conference remain on women's issues, and not be distracted by other diversions. "I want to say again that the agenda for this Conference is women and not China." Mongella said she believed that there were two main reasons for the exceptionally high level of interest in the Conference. "One is that I'd like to believe we did a good job in involving people in the process, and the second is that the issues of women are becoming more crucial, and more focused in international discussions." She said, "Women keep asking me, 'What are the actions?' They are not interested in the placement of a comma in the document. They are interested in what we are going to do to follow up to fight violence against women. Women want to hear what governments are going to do to stop discrimination against women in all parts of life." She said this Conference will be different from previous women's conferences because there is now a very strong, built-in constituency of women. Women, she said, can no longer be ignore and that "even if a government doesn't implement the Beijing Platform, they cannot ignore women's issues anymore." Her message for the Conference: "Forget what you are and what you do, and focus on the issues of women. We must all be united. Even though there are women from many different backgrounds coming to Beijing, their agenda is the same. The agenda is women."