Our recommendations to the French Presidency of the Council of the European Union

Every semester, End FGM EU sends its recommendations to the Presidency of the Council of the European Union on matters related to FGM and Gender Equality.

We are pleased to announce that on Thursday 3 February, we have addressed our letter with recommendations to the freshly installed French Presidency.

In our letter we have made several recommendations based on the French Presidency’s programme and priorities.

We have welcomed the importance that the Presidency intends to devote to tackling gender-based violence and we have further recommended, among other points, to:

• ensure that all migration and asylum policies take into consideration the human rights of people on the move, in particular girls and women, and their right to receive international protection when affected or at risk of being affected by FGM in the countries they are fleeing;
• ensure the acceleration of actions at EU level and in global partnerships to achieve SDGs, particularly SDG 5.3 and that it is high on the agenda at the upcoming AU-EU Summit;
• ensure that gender and an intersectional approach are mainstreamed in all EU policies and tackle the issue of racism, xenophobia and islamophobia, all of which negatively affect the fight against the harmful practice of female genital mutilation, nourishing stereotypes and marginalisation of affected communities

We are confident that the French Presidency will show leadership in the upholding of human rights and EU values and we stand ready to support it in the achievement of our common objectives. The full letter of recommendations, in French and English, is available here.