Monthly Action Points (MAP) for the Security Council: March 2026

Afghanistan

The situation of women’s rights in Afghanistan continues to deteriorate as the Taliban intensify their widespread, systematic policies of gender-based discrimination intended to erase women and girls from public life, including through the January 2026 criminal code. Taliban restrictions on women, including on women aid workers, combined with severe funding shortages, have seriously hindered women’s and girls’ access to humanitarian assistance, including sexual and reproductive health (SRH) services. Afghanistan has one of the world’s highest maternal mortality rates, yet access to healthcare has become even more challenging due to the closure of hundreds of health clinics. Bans on contraception also seriously threaten women’s health. Women and girls are unsafe at home, as the Taliban have dismantled systems to respond to gender-based violence (GBV), and the new criminal code has legitimized domestic violence and criminalized women leaving home without their husbands’ permission. The Taliban continue to surveil, target and arbitrarily detain women activists, journalists, human rights defenders (WHRDs) and protestors, and women and girls accused of violating the Taliban’s morality laws; they frequently face torture and sexual violence in detention. Women, girls and LGBTIQ people also face intersecting forms of discrimination based on ethnic and/or religious identity, age, displacement and disability, among others. The rights to freedom of expression and access to information, including women and girls’ ability to access online education, have also been restricted through telecommunications shutdowns and restrictions on internet access. Meanwhile, Afghan refugees continue to face forced returns despite ongoing persecution and discrimination targeting Afghan women and girls.

These grave violations of the rights of women, girls and LGBTIQ people likely amount to gender persecution, a crime against humanity for which the International Criminal Court (ICC) has issued arrest warrants against senior Taliban leaders. Afghan women and international experts also describe the situation as gender apartheid, and call for codification of gender apartheid as a crime against humanity and as a violation of protections guaranteed by the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). 

The Security Council should:

• Renew in full the current mandate of the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) and call for its full implementation, in particular: improving women’s access to humanitarian and development activities; promoting gender equality and the full protection of women’s human rights; monitoring and reporting on human rights, including all forms of sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) and violations, abuses and reprisals against women including WHRDs; facilitating political dialogue without discrimination based on gender, and with the full, equal and meaningful participation of women; and integrating gender mainstreaming as a cross-cutting issue throughout implementation of the mandate.
• Demand that the Taliban immediately reverse all policies and practices that prevent the full enjoyment of all women’s human rights in accordance with Afghanistan’s international obligations, including CEDAW and relevant Security Council resolutions. In particular, condemn and call for the immediate repeal of the Taliban’s new criminal code.
• Demand the protection of women’s rights and the full, equal, meaningful and safe participation of diverse Afghan women and LGBTIQ people, especially WHRDs, peacebuilders and victims and survivors of gender-based crimes, in all international fora concerning Afghanistan’s future, including all aspects of the “Doha Process.”
• Support all efforts to seek accountability for all international crimes, including gender-based crimes, such as a case against Afghanistan for violations of CEDAW at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and the independent investigative mechanism created by the Human Rights Council. 
• Call on the Taliban to ensure that all UN entities can enter the country and fully discharge their mandates without hindrance, and to immediately reverse the ban on Afghan women working for the UN and INGOs.
• Urge donors to fully fund the humanitarian response and allocate increased flexible, long-term and direct funding to Afghan women-led and LGBTIQ-led civil society and humanitarian organizations. Urge all actors to ensure safe, gender-responsive and non-discriminatory humanitarian delivery, with women’s full and equal participation and leadership.
• Call on the Taliban to immediately stop targeting human rights defenders (HRDs), peacebuilders and journalists, and release all arbitrarily detained individuals.
• Urge all Member States to recognize gender-based persecution against Afghan women and girls as grounds for asylum; refrain from forcibly returning any refugees and asylum seekers to Afghanistan; and create and expand pathways to safe resettlement for Afghans who are experiencing persecution in Afghanistan, including WHRDs.

Democratic Republic of the Congo

Despite ongoing mediation efforts, violence continues in eastern DRC, where over 5.7 million people remain internally displaced. The conflict has greatly compounded the already acute risks of SGBV for women and girls, including widespread and systematic conflict-related sexual violence (CRSV), with displaced women and girls particularly at risk. Humanitarian access remains limited as providers have been forced to scale back or suspend operations amid ongoing fighting, targeted attacks, disrupted supply routes, bureaucratic and administrative impediments and severe funding cuts. Services for survivors, including SRH care, are similarly restricted, including due to a shortage of post-exposure prophylaxis (PEP) kits. Ongoing conflict, displacement, the destruction of IDP camps, and suspension of basic services have also multiplied the risk of infectious diseases such as cholera, led to a collapse of protection services and further exacerbated food insecurity, forcing women and girls to adopt high-risk coping mechanisms such as transactional sex. HRDs, journalists, activists and members of civil society, including women and LGBTIQ people, face serious protection risks as a result of their essential work and on the basis of their identities, particularly in AFC/M23-controlled areas.

The Security Council should:

• Demand all parties immediately cease hostilities and ensure protection of civilians, including by issuing clear orders to refrain from violence against civilians, including SGBV, and to ensure accountability for such actions. Call on the DRC and Rwanda to cease support to their respective allied militias, and call on the Rwandan Defense Forces and its AFC/M23 proxies to immediately withdraw from the DRC without preconditions.
• Demand that all actors allow and facilitate full, safe, unhindered and immediate humanitarian access to all affected populations and restore basic services in line with Resolution 2773 (2025).
• Call for the full, equal, meaningful and safe participation of diverse women in all efforts to build peace. Any peace process or ceasefire negotiation should center human rights and accountability for all abuses against civilians, including SGBV.
• Support efforts to investigate and hold accountable all parties responsible for atrocity crimes, including gender-based crimes, such as the ongoing ICC investigation and the OHCHR fact-finding mission. Call on all parties to facilitate unfettered access for international monitors and investigators.
• Condemn threats and attacks against HRDs, journalists and civil society. Call for the protection and promotion of civic space and condemn the spread of mis- and disinformation.
• Urge donors to provide increased, sustainable, direct and flexible funding to local women-led, women’s rights and LGBTIQ organizations and organizations providing SRH care and interventions against GBV; and support their meaningful participation and leadership in humanitarian coordination and response.

Israel / Palestine

Israel’s military offensive in Gaza since October 2023 — which Palestinian, Israeli, international and UN experts, including the Independent International Commission of Inquiry (COI) on the occupied Palestinian Territory (OPT), have concluded amounts to genocide — has killed over 72,000 Palestinians and injured over 171,000. Despite the October 2025 ceasefire agreement, Israel continues to inflict conditions calculated to bring about the physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza, including through daily attacks and continued obstruction of humanitarian aid. Attacks on healthcare facilities and providers have decimated health infrastructure, violating Palestinian women’s sexual and reproductive health and rights — with pregnant and postpartum women at particular risk — and their rights to life, health, human dignity and non-discrimination. About 1.3 million people in Gaza remain forcibly displaced, and SGBV risks are heightened for women and girls in displacement sites, where they are largely unable to access menstrual products, clean water or hygiene facilities. Israeli laws banning the operations of UNRWA and restricting operations of international NGOs further threaten relief and civil society efforts. 

In the occupied West Bank, over 32,000 Palestinians remain forcibly displaced as a result of Israeli military operations. Since 7 October 2023, at least 1,054 Palestinians have been killed in the West Bank by Israeli state or settler violence, some of which may amount to extrajudicial killings. Palestinian detainees, including women and girls, face grave human rights violations, including sexual violence, in detention.

Meanwhile, discussions on Gaza’s future are being negotiated largely by outsiders, with the exclusion of diverse Palestinians from positions of authority and the near-total exclusion of women; this approach risks entrenching impunity and undermining the right to Palestinian self-determination.

The Security Council should:

• Demand all parties fully comply with the ceasefire, including by immediately stopping all attacks on civilians, civilian infrastructure and humanitarian actors. 
• Demand Israel’s immediate compliance with all provisional measures ordered by the ICJ to prevent genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. All Member States must uphold their obligations to prevent and punish genocide.
• Demand an immediate end to the forcible transfer of civilians and to all measures aimed at altering the demographic composition, character and status of the OPT, including immediate cessation of Israeli settlement activities in the West Bank.
• Demand immediate, safe, unhindered and expanded humanitarian access into and throughout Gaza, in line with the ICJ’s November 2025 advisory opinion and as required by Resolutions 2728 (2024) and 2720 (2023). Demand respect for core humanitarian principles of humanity, impartiality, independence and neutrality, and reject any proposed aid modalities that do not adhere to these principles.
• Call on Israel to repeal legislation banning UNRWA and to lift restrictions on NGOs and civil society organizations.
• Demand an immediate halt to military assistance and the transfer of arms and other equipment or items, including jet fuel, to Israel while there is risk that they are used to commit or facilitate serious violations of international law.
• Demand the humane treatment and immediate and unconditional release of all arbitrarily detained individuals.
• Urge all parties to cooperate with independent, impartial investigations, including the COI on the OPT, to monitor, collect and verify evidence, and report on human rights violations and abuses, including gender-based crimes, committed by all parties in Israel and the OPT. Call for all justice and accountability efforts to be human rights-based, survivor-centered and non-discriminatory and designed and implemented in partnership with survivors.
• Call on all Member States to take immediate measures to implement the findings of the July 2024 ICJ advisory opinion on the legal consequences of Israel’s occupation.
• Demand respect for the rights of diverse Palestinian women, and demand their full, equal, meaningful and safe participation in building peace and shaping post-conflict recovery. Ensure that all negotiations and discussions on the future of Gaza uphold the inalienable rights of the Palestinian people, including the right to self-determination and the right of return of Palestine refugees.