Tunis/Tunisia — The Ministry of Women, Family, Children and the Elderly and the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and Empowerment of Women (UN Women), on Tuesday, signed a memorandum of co-operation to consolidate women's rights and gender equality.

Minister Imene Zahouani Houimel and UN Women's Representative for Tunisia Begoña Lasagabaster signed the memorandum which seeks to foster bilateral cooperation in priority fields related to women's economic empowerment, ending violence against women, leadership, security, peace, governance and planning.

The agreement provides for gender mainstreaming in various national policies to cope with the repercussions of COVID-19 and adopting programmes to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030.

Houimel stressed the importance of cooperation between the Women Ministry and the UN Women in consolidating women's rights and gender equality and the support brought to various relevant institutions such as the Centre for Research, Studies Documentation and Information on Women (CREDIF) and the National Observatory of Violence against Women to achieve common goals.