UN General Assembly
2012

to announce that at the Pacific Islands Forum Australia said that it would work alongside our partners in the Pacific on an unprecedented gender initiative: Pacific Women Shaping Pacific Development. Australia will provide $320 million over 10 years to support women’s political participation, to expand women’s leadership and to spread economic and social opportunities in the Pacific. That is a principle underpinning every Australian aid intervention and initiative: empowering women and girls. We will help fight drug-resistant malaria. The Secretary-General has made malaria one of his key priorities for his second term. It is a priority we share. Since 2000, the world has cut the number of deaths from malaria by 26 per cent. Without those advances, 330,000 more people would have died of malaria last year, the great majority of them in Africa. But malaria itself is fighting back. New drug resistance in malaria must be overcome. Later this year, Australia will hold the Malaria 2012 meeting, bringing together political leaders, civil society and the private sector to accelerate efforts to control and eliminate malaria and combat