He was speaking at the annual town hall meeting with civil society groups on the margins of the 70th session of the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW70) at UN Headquarters in New York, on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cYou are foundation\u2011shakers,\u201d Guterres told participants. \u201cYou are shaking out justice, dignity and equality for communities across the globe.\u201dHe warned that despite decades of progress, the world is witnessing a resurgence of anti\u2011rights sentiment driven by disinformation, fear\u2011mongering and culture wars. \u201cA bitter wind is blowing around the world,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is fuelling a backlash against women\u2019s rights that thrives on disinformation, exploits insecurity and seeks to silence women.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Guterres, now in his final year in office, stressed that silence was the last thing he expected from activists at a time when power imbalances persist in politics, economics and emerging fields such as artificial intelligence.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
During the dialogue, several civil society representatives questioned the proposed merger of UN Women and the UN Population Fund, with youth activist Maria Leon Gonzalez asking why \u201cthe two main players\u201d advancing women\u2019s rights were being targeted for consolidation. Guterres said the intention was to create \u201ca more powerful agency\u201d, stressing that both mandates would continue with shared resources.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Nigerian Law Professor Joy Ngozi Ezeilo raised concerns about shrinking civic space, funding shortfalls and government crackdowns on women\u2019s rights groups. She urged governments to \u201ctell themselves the truth\u201d and recommit to the Beijing principle that \u201cwomen\u2019s rights are human rights\u201d.<\/p>\n
Asked about his legacy, Guterres said changing power relations to advance gender equality had been central to his tenure. He praised civil society organisations, noting that the UN will meet with them again in July to seek input on the UN80 reform initiative.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you push for change, you are pushing against the patriarchy, and the patriarchy is pushing back,\u201d he said, acknowledging the risks faced by activists. He ended with a pledge of unwavering support: \u201cNo to the pushback, no to the rollback, no surrender. We will never, ever give up.\u201d<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
–UN\/ChannelAfrica–<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":28288,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"news-type":[26],"class_list":["post-28411","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-general_news","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"The United Nations (UN) Secretary\u2011General Ant\u00f3nio Guterres has praised women\u2019s rights defenders for \u201cshaking the foundations of privilege\u201d in a male\u2011dominated world, urging them to resist intensifying global pushback against gender equality.\u00a0","published_date":"","news_description":"The United Nations (UN) Secretary\u2011General Ant\u00f3nio Guterres has praised women\u2019s rights defenders for \u201cshaking the foundations of privilege\u201d in a male\u2011dominated world, urging them to resist intensifying global pushback against gender equality.\u00a0","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/28411","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/28411\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28412,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/28411\/revisions\/28412"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28288"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=28411"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=28411"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}