A/HRC/23/44 available, has proven invaluable to IDW seeking access to justice for SGBV, as well as for other crimes and legal claims. 39. Furthermore, in the absence of rule of law that characterizes many conflict and post-conflict contexts and where women’s access to formal justice mechanisms may be compromised by lack of documentation, illiteracy and absence of or restricted access to judicial structures, it is important for the humanitarian community to engage with alternative dispute resolution processes (including customary, religious and local governance structures) to promote women’s access to land and housing and resolve disputes over central issues such as inheritance. 41 International development actors also have a critical role to play in working alongside national actors to respond to these concerns and support more concerted efforts to evaluate interventions and identify best practices in this field. 40. In addition to promoting access to criminal and civil justice systems for IDW, it is also essential to consider how their concerns are addressed through transitional justice processes. Transitional justice measures such as restitution, compensation, trials and truth and reconciliation commissions can contribute to recognizing and redressing the violations experienced by IDW, and in turn supporting sustainable solutions to displacement. Maximizing these contributions depends upon ensuring their accessibility, equitability and relevance to the priorities of IDW. For instance, reparation programmes can be calibrated to mitigate pre-existing structural inequalities, such as biased inheritance or other practices, for example by recognizing customary marriages in order to facilitate recognition of succession and inheritance rights and displaced women and men as co-claimants, or by distributing compensation benefits on an individual rather than family-unit basis, so as to increase women’s control over the use of their share.42 In countries where the presence of formal legal institutions is limited at the local level, and alternative dispute-resolution mechanisms or customary justice are de facto the main accessible form of justice, programmes should consider engaging with these to sensitize them to national and international standards and progressively redress discriminatory customary practices. 41. International and national actors should also be accountable to IDW for delivery of effective protection and assistance programmes, a challenge currently largely unmet. Integrating a stronger gender lens into initiatives such as the Humanitarian Accountability Partnership Standard in Accountability and Quality Management and more accessible and trusted complaints and response mechanisms at field level constitute important steps towards addressing this challenge. Increasing donor accountability towards IDW entails more effectively integrating gender issues into donorship practices, including through tools like the gender marker. 5. Implementing meaningful participatory approaches and supporting internally displaced women’s mobilisation 42. Gender-sensitive responses to internal displacement require the full and equal participation of women in decision-making at all stages of displacement and in 41 42 14 For example, the Information, Counselling and Legal Assistance Programme of the Norwegian Refugee Council. Lucy Hovil, “The Nexus Between Displacement and Transitional Justice: A Gender-Justice Dimension” in Roger Duthie (ed.), Transitional Justice and Displacement (New York, International Center for Transitional Justice (ICTJ) and Brookings-LSE Project); Brookings-ICTJ, “Transitional Justice and Displacement: Challenges and Recommendations” (2012); report of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences, to the Council on reparations for women subjected to violence (A/HRC/14/22).

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