Uruguay’s Armed Forces will implement a project to increase the participation of women in United Nations (UN) peacekeeping missions to 11% by 2024, the presidency said in a statement.
According to the government, Uruguay is the fourteenth largest contributor of troops to UN peacekeeping operations and currently has 1,057 military personnel, 6.1% of whom are women.
The project is funded by the Elsie Initiative Fund, which was established in 2019 by the United Nations, Canada and member states.
For this purpose, Uruguay will receive 1.1 million dollars from the fund.
UN Under-Secretary-General for Peace Operations Jean-Pierre Lacroix met with Uruguayan Defense Minister Javier García on September 9 in Montevideo.
The undersecretary said that Uruguay has proposed to the United Nations to reduce the period of deployment of women in peacekeeping missions, which is currently one year.
Participation in peacekeeping missions is voluntary and often takes place in single-parent families where women take care of their children alone, which is why they are not willing to participate in a mission for a year, García explained.
