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The UK and South Africa have launched a new international coalition aimed at strengthening global action to prevent violence against women and girls and improve accountability for perpetrators.
The coalition was announced at the Global Partnerships Conference in London and brings together eight founding member states: United Kingdom, South Africa, Brazil, Morocco, Spain, Jamaica, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Australia.
According to the UK government, the initiative will focus on coordinated international efforts to scale up prevention programmes, strengthen protection systems, share best practice and improve accountability mechanisms relating to gender-based violence.
The coalition will also address violence against women and girls in conflict and humanitarian settings, recognising the heightened risks faced by women and girls in fragile environments.
The Foreign Secretary, Yvette Cooper, described violence against women and girls as “a global emergency”, adding that international cooperation was necessary to ensure women’s safety became “a worldwide priority”.
The initiative builds on existing collaboration between the UK and South Africa, including support for South Africa’s Gender-Based Violence and Femicide Response Fund, which funds prevention initiatives, survivor support services and community-based programmes.
The announcement reflects the growing internationalisation of violence against women and girls policy, with governments increasingly treating domestic abuse, sexual violence and online harms as transnational issues requiring coordinated legal and policy responses.
The coalition also aligns with the UK government’s domestic strategy to halve violence against women and girls within a decade, alongside recent legislative and policy developments concerning coercive control, public sexual harassment, online pornography regulation and victim protection.
A global summit is expected to be convened in 2027 to review progress and encourage additional international commitments, with participating countries expected to strengthen or develop national action plans in the interim.
