Access to justice for all – Recommendations for the Commission on the Status of Women

From 9 to 19 March, the world will gather once again for the biggest conference on women and gender equality: the United Nation’s Commission on the Status of Women (CSW). This year’s priority theme, access to justice, could not be more urgent.

Liliane Fonds has been actively engaging with the CSW since 2024. This year, we continue our engagement online. We will advocate with governments and our civil society allies to ensure that women, girls, and gender-diverse people with disabilities are meaningfully included in the agreed conclusions, the commitments that will shape global action on access to justice in the years ahead.

Together with our youth panel, 6 young people with disabilities from Cameroon, Ethiopia, Uganda and Zimbabwe, we are calling on governments to recognize the systemic barriers that young people with disabilities, specifically young women and girls with disabilities, face when seeking justice. Their experiences must guide global action.

What justice means to young people with disabilities

For our youth panel, justice means fair treatment and equal opportunities for all, regardless of one’s identity or disability. Yet this ideal remains far from reality. Young people with disabilities continue to face deeply entrenched, intersecting barriers through the justice process. This denies them equal protection under the law and meaningful access to justice. Among the issues mentioned include:

Weak policy implementation and inaccessible systems
Many countries have policies or laws around reasonable accommodation – but they are often poorly implemented. Rahel, our youth panelist from Ethiopia, explains: “without sign language interpretation, it is impossible to access justice.” For Deaf people and many others, the absence of accessible communication can shut the doors of police stations, legal consultations or courts before a case even begins.

The high cost of seeking justice
For young people with disabilities, pursuing a legal case can be prohibitively expensive. Money can be a double-edged sword for young people with disabilities, as often they have specific costs due to their disability while also having less access to a stable income. One youth panelist shared simply: “going to the police is not free”. Transportation, legal fees, additional charges: all barriers that hit hard. This while young women and girls with disabilities are disproportionately experiencing gender-based violence.

Stigma, discrimination and harmful attitudes
Discrimination, stigma and harmful attitudes can shape each step within the justice process. Wilta, our panelist from Cameroon, shared that, for her, the biggest barriers to access justice are attitudinal and social. Misconceptions or lack of knowledge among police officers, paralegals, lawyers, prosecutors and judges can have big consequences. It can lead to biases, false confessions and in the worst cases false convictions, restricted legal capacity or death. Wilta thinks it is key to change the perception of people in society so that people with disabilities can access justice on an equal basis.

Gendered discrimination and violations of bodily autonomy
Young women with disabilities face intersecting layers of discrimination. In the case of sexual and reproductive health services, they can be more accessible for men with disabilities than for women with disabilities. Women and girls with disabilities seeking contraceptives or STI testing are often questioned or dismissed due to harmful stereotypes and ableist myths. In the most extreme cases women with disabilities experience violations, such as forced sterilization, denying them bodily autonomy and fundamental rights.

Recommendations for real access to justice

Liliane Fonds calls on governments, civil society and UN Women to:

• Implement and enforce the laws & policies that are already existing for the inclusion of (young) women and girls with disabilities
• Work on making the justice system more accessible by providing reasonable accommodations, such as lifts, ramps and sign language interpretation, at police stations, courts, jails, prisons and government buildings
• Provide free and subsidized legal aid so young people with disabilities can access justice
• Make certain that sexual and reproductive health services are accessible and inclusive for (young) women and girls with disabilities through training of service providers and accessible infrastructure
• Include (young) women and girls with disabilities within decision-making spaces from the local to the international level
• Collect disaggregated data and evidence on the situation, needs and rights of women and disabilities and use them to inform and monitor policies and programs

Towards a world where justice is truly for all

Access to justice is not a privilege, it is a right. Yet for millions of young people with disabilities, that right is still out of reach.

At CSW and beyond, we urge governments, donors, and civil society to listen to young people with disabilities, invest in their leadership, and commit to building systems that recognize and uphold their rights.

Justice can only be achieved when it is accessible to everyone.