The situation in South Sudan remains dire, with civilians facing a range of threats, including floods, famine and ongoing violence and displacement. Implementation of the Revitalized Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan (R-ARCSS) continues to be the only vehicle through which peace and security will be established, and women leaders continue to express concern regarding the lack of inclusion of diverse voices, including women from diverse communities, in the peace process and their representation in the government, national ministries and as state governors. Women’s involvement in these institutions falls short of the 35% quota required in the R-ARCSS. In line with the WPS-related recommendations in the UNMISS strategic review and the outcomes of the latest meeting of the Security Council Informal Experts Group on WPS, the Security Council should:

• Strengthen all language on women’s meaningful participation, including by adding a mandate provision explicitly stating that the mission’s support for the implementation of the R-ARCSS (S/RES/2514 (2020), OP 8(c)) must prioritize the full, equal and meaningful participation and leadership of diverse women; calling on the mission to engage with a wide range of diverse women’s CSOs across the mandate; and emphasizing that the conditions necessary to advance the peace process must be inclusive of diverse women in leadership positions.
• Welcome the recent announcement by the government regarding the establishment of the hybrid court and other transitional justice mechanisms laid out in Chapter V of the R-ARCSS, and emphasize that the mechanisms must be designed and developed with women’s full, equal and meaningful participation and leadership, and be gender-responsive, inclusive, accessible and fully-resourced.
• Maintain existing preambular paragraphs addressing threats against civil society and call on UNMISS and other relevant actors to strengthen their monitoring and reporting on threats and reprisals targeting women peacebuilders, human rights defenders, civil society leaders and women’s rights organizations, and emphasize the importance of creating an enabling environment that allows civil society to carry out their work safely and freely as central to sustainable peace.
• Emphasize that all mandated tasks related to protection must address the specific protection and security concerns for women and girls with disabilities, and further emphasize the importance of full, equal and meaningful participation and leadership of women and girls with disabilities in designing protection measures.
• Call on the mission to ground its efforts to prevent conflict in gender-sensitive conflict analysis accounting for community-identified root causes of conflict and violence, including inequality; discrimination; violence targeting women human rights defenders, peacebuilders, civil society leaders and women’s rights organizations; the proliferation of small arms and light weapons; corruption; and restrictions on civic space, and request future reporting mainstream gender-sensitive conflict analysis.
• Highlight women’s leadership in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic, recognizing the pandemic’s gendered impact on women and girls, and calling for a gender-responsive approach to post-pandemic recovery.