Although women make up half the world's population, they account for only 5 to 10 percent of formal political leadership positions worldwide. In January 2001, the highest court in Kuwait dismissed a case seeking to grant women the right to vote and to run for office. Sixty-six percent of the world's 130 million children who are not in school are girls. And during the past 20 years, the combined primary and secondary school enrollment ratio for girls in developing countries has increased only 40 percent. Yet men and women of good will around the world continue to press for better conditions for women across the board.
Poverty can also force women into situations in which they are vulnerable to sexual exploitation.
The crimes took place in the town of Foca, southeast of Sarajevo, in 1992 and 1993, at the height of Bosnia's ethnic conflict. It is estimated that tens of thousands of rapes took place during the war in Bosnia. The Optional Protocol is significant for a number of reasons. It reaffirms existing remedies available under other international human rights instruments, and advances the development of international human rights law, incorporating practices developed by international monitoring mechanisms over the last 30 years. The Protocol entered into force in December 2000.