Support to the 6th High-Level Women, Peace and Security Africa Forum

While the 6th High-Level WPS Africa Forum will serve as a strategic platform to mobilize political commitment and accelerate WPS implementation over the next decade on the continent, its specific objectives were to: 

1. Celebrate Africa’s normative, policy, and programmatic achievements over 25 years of implementing WPS, acknowledging instruments such as the Maputo Protocol (2003/2005), SDGEA (2004), GEWE Strategy (2018–2028), and AUCEVAWG (2025) as pillars of this progress. 

 2. Take stock of persistent gaps and threats — including legal backsliding, budget constraints, weak enforcement, and shifting global priorities — and learn from country experiences.

 3. Articulate how multilateral diplomacy, both between African States and with global partners, can be harnessed strategically — including through regional networks, shared institutions, diplomatic coalitions, and South-South cooperation — to safeguard, resource, and scale up WPS initiatives. 

4. Promote the localization of the WPS agenda by partnering strategically with AWLN as a co-convener of the High-Level WPS Africa Forum, ensuring that women leaders—from grassroots to policymaking levels—actively shape the Forum’s agenda and drive the advancement of WPS priorities in the coming decade.

5. Map out concrete strategic priorities for the next decade of WPS implementation in Africa (2026–2035).

The Forum acknowledged Africa’s global leadership in advancing the WPS agenda through strong normative, institutional, and programmatic frameworks, including adoption of 37 NAPs in Africa, and 6 Regional Action Plans on WPS, the Maputo Protocol (2003/2005), the Solemn Declaration on Gender Equality in Africa (2004), the Strategy for Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment (2018–2028), and the landmark African Union Convention on Ending Violence Against Women and Girls (AU CEVAWG, 2025).

Participants recognized that Rising geopolitical tensions, conflicts, unconstitutional changes of government, increased militarization, and the shrinking of civic and humanitarian space that disproportionately affect women and girls. In addition, aps in implementation, weak enforcement of legal protections, and limited integration of gender perspectives in peace, security, and climate resilience frameworks. Participants expressed their commitment to enhance multilateral cooperation and regional WPS Architecture through strengthened partnerships to for sustained financing and political support. they agreed to Strengthen Africa-driven multilateral diplomacy within the AU, RECs, and global fora to safeguard and advance the WPS agenda. They also agreed to institutionalize WPS in diplomacy, embedding the principles, commitments, and practices of the WPS agenda into the core structures, processes, and culture of diplomatic institutions at national, regional, and international level. The forum also identified Strengthening partnerships between Member States, civil society, youth, private sector and regional institutions, taking a whole-of-society approach to promoting inclusive peace and security as one of priority areas going forward for the next decade among others. The Forum also urged Member States to foster Africa-led political solutions and multilateral cooperation to safeguard normative gains on WPS amid a shifting global order.