Annette Lawson (NAWO Chair until June 2015), was honoured by UN Women with an invitation to their Civil Society Thought Leaders Meeting in New York on 24th September.  Annette was one of only 50 persons invited to attend from all over the World, chosen for her longstanding commitment to promoting gender equality and women’s rights.

The Thought Leaders meeting focused on the Sustainable Development Goals in the run up to the United Nations Sustainable Development on 25th – 27th September, at which the SDGs were officially adopted by Member States.

UN Women outlined the meeting as:

‘In the lead up to the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and to mark the 20th anniversary of the Beijing Platform for Action, UN Women convened a series of consultations at the global, regional and national levels that have facilitated discussions on accelerating progress on gender equality. As part of this series of consultations, and ahead of the Global Leaders Meeting on 27th September, UN Women [convened] a meeting of about 50 civil society thought leaders from all over the world to develop a road map to accelerate the results for substantive gender equality. Discussions will focus on priorities and strategies for implementation of the SDGs on the ground, and ensuring accountability by governments on their gender equality obligations (see more here).’

Read Annette’s blog from the meeting!