A/HRC/39/34 I. Introduction 1. In its resolution 36/8, the Human Rights Council requested the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, in collaboration with Member States, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN-Women), the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and other United Nations agencies, funds and programmes, international human rights mechanisms, civil society organizations and other relevant stakeholders, to organize a two-day intersessional expert meeting to consider gaps in, challenges to and best practices aimed at the full enjoyment of human rights by all women and girls and the systematic mainstreaming of a gender perspective into the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The Council also requested the High Commissioner to prepare a report on the outcome of the meeting and to present it to the Council at its thirty-ninth session. 2. The intersessional expert meeting was held on 2 and 3 May 2018 in Geneva. Sixteen experts attended the workshop, while one expert, who could not physically attend the meeting, shared her presentation. The meeting was open to observers, including Member States, civil society organizations, United Nations agencies and academics. In the present report the High Commissioner summarizes the discussion held by the experts, interventions made by observers and promising practices shared at the meeting. 3. The discussion at the expert meeting built on existing assessments and used illustrative examples of areas where the integration of a gender perspective could be strengthened. In the discussion, participants linked a number of Sustainable Development Goals across the three dimensions — economic, social and environmental — of the 2030 Agenda through the lenses of women’s rights and gender equality. The experts made suggestions on how to integrate a gender perspective in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and ensure that efforts to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals promoted women’s rights and gender equality. They also made recommendations on how to enhance synergies across the United Nations system and with other multilateral actors in efforts to support the implementation of the 2030 Agenda in a way that promoted women’s rights and gender equality. The agenda, concept note and the full presentations by the experts are available on the website of the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).1 II. Setting the context 4. In General Assembly resolution 70/1 on the 2030 Agenda, adopted by consensus by all States Members of the United Nations, States committed to protect human rights and promote gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls, recognizing that gender inequality remained an immense challenge for sustainable development. States also recognized that realizing gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls would make a crucial contribution to progress across all the Goals and targets of the 2030 Agenda and that the systematic mainstreaming of a gender perspective in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda was crucial. States also reaffirmed the importance of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international instruments relating to human rights and international law and called for the new agenda to be implemented in a manner that was consistent with the rights and obligations of States under international law. 5. At the intersessional meeting, experts acknowledged that the 2030 Agenda had goals and targets that were integrated and indivisible, global in nature and universally applicable; focused on sustainability, equality, peace and human progress, which could provide a powerful counter-narrative to the rise of extremism, conflict and environmental degradation; pledged to leave no one behind, which challenged the trend of deepening 1 2 See www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Women/WRGS/Pages/SystematicMainstreaming IntersessionalMeeting.aspx.