Worldwide: Women's rights at stake

Only half an hour before the 15-day session was to end, Iran’s representative, supported by delegates from Egypt and Sudan, rose to register his government’s objection to paragraph (o), which read: “Condemn violence against women and refrain from invoking any custom, tradition or religious consideration to avoid their obligations with respect to its elimination.” They were not prepared to have their reservations on the paragraph officially recorded after the document had been adopted by consensus in its entirety. Nor were other delegations willing to drop the paragraph so that the rest of the document could be adopted by consensus.