The march towards equality is a long-term task, and one of its fundamental axes is raising awareness and mobilizing conscience to eradicate violence against women. Since the 1980s, the institutional and personal voices of human rights defenders have risen against the violence, impunity and invisibility of women. Many international organizations, such as governments and civil society organizations, have dedicated themselves to the same goal.

In this context, the governments of France and Mexico, convinced that just societies cannot be created as long as there are gender inequalities, preventing millions of women from striving for better living conditions, launched the Generational Equality Forum, promoted three years ago. Presidents Emmanuel Macron (France) and Andrés Manuel López Obrador (Mexico), with the support of UN Women. During this forum, organized in June 2021, governments, civil society and the private sector contributed to building a consensus on joining forces against violence against women and girls.

It is necessary to continue fighting this battle together, because it concerns all of us and we can contribute from different perspectives to the achievement of conditions that enable a world without violence. There is no doubt that the international community is increasingly aware that change is necessary to establish justice and redress the harm suffered by millions of women and girls due to unjust structures of domination.

In Ecuador, we work through the Round Table for International Cooperation (MEGECI), which consists of more than forty representatives of the diplomatic corps, donors, civil society and United Nations agencies. MEGECI is a coordination space that enables the coordination of international cooperation activities on gender issues, supporting the efforts of the Ecuadorian state to achieve equality between women and men and stop violence against women and girls. In this framework, the French Embassy and UN Women, for example, support the construction and dissemination of a national protocol to combat gender-based violence in the sports system promoted by the Ministry of Sports ahead of the 2024 Paris Olympic and Paralympic Games, which will be the first equal games in history.

We are at a defining moment, during which slowing momentum or retreating are not options. It is necessary to go forward with perseverance, conviction and firmness in defense of this cause which could not be more just. We have an ethical obligation as governments and societies committed to our time, and as responsible human beings who support us, to strengthen and sustain actions aimed at eradicating this violence without any excuse. (OR)