Representation and participation of women in the OAS

Thank you very much, Mr. Chair.

The Delegation of the Dominican Republic is grateful for the convening of this special meeting of the Permanent Council, and congratulates the Permanent Mission of Panama and the Executive Secretary of the Inter-American Commission of Women (CIM), Alejandra Mora Mora, on the draft resolution, for it reaffirms the importance of recognizing women in our State, in the Americas and in the world.

Each year, the celebration of International Women's Day is one more occasion for us to give an account of our individual, national and collective efforts as an Organization in protecting and promoting the rights of women in the Hemisphere, which we need to connect with everyday life. This is a demanding task because of the history of discrimination we carry, which is made worse when a woman also lives with a disability; but it is at the same time a worthy one, because of our conviction that we must guarantee a future in which gender is defined within each person's own life plan.

The Dominican Republic has more than one reason to be proud of the role that women have played in our society: from the historic deeds of the Mirabal sisters, recently chosen by Time magazine as three of the one hundred most influential women of the past century for their unyielding stand against the dictatorship of Rafael Leónidas Trujillo, to the efforts of great women in national politics, in the arts, in sport and in international diplomacy, among other fields. One example is the current Presidency of the Inter-American Commission of Women, held by Minister Janet Camilo, a high representative of the Dominican Republic.

We take this opportunity to recognize the merits of some of the women who stand out as examples to society, both in our country and beyond it: Police General Teresa Martínez, Director of the Specialized Office for Women and Domestic Violence; Paola Santana, Founder and Chief Executive of Social Glass, next-generation software that uses artificial intelligence to power high-performing governments; and, lastly, the engineer Gloria Ceballos, Director of the National Meteorological Office (ONAMET) and a key figure in plans to mitigate natural hazards.

These individual efforts by women add to the various inclusion policies of the Dominican State, which range from reserved quotas for participation in the political arena to economic assistance focused on the needs of women. These achievements in turn allow us to recognize that great challenges remain before us in ensuring that Dominican women attain full integration and inclusion in society. Hence the importance of the Organization of American States and its Inter-American Commission of Women, which make it possible to channel joint efforts and to share useful experiences in facing common challenges in the region.

The resolution we have co-sponsored, “Representation and participation of women in the OAS,” will serve to make this Organization a model for the various American States to follow, because it constitutes a space open to all women and men.

Finally, we believe that we commemorate the rights of women aware of the challenges we must face in order to uphold those rights, through empowerment and through the visibility we give them in order to guarantee them.