Highlights from the ICPD30 conference discussions

Highlights from the Regional Conference on ICPD 2023, Population and Development: Ensuring Rights and Choices, organized by UNECE and UNFPA in Geneva on 19-20 October 2023.

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UN review of population trends in Europe, Central Asia and North America stresses that rights and choices must underpin policy responses to societal shifts

With the wider European region facing the impacts of several overlapping crises, including the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic and the ripple effects of the war in Ukraine and other conflicts in the region, speakers at a high-level regional population conference in Geneva today stressed that investing in the well-being and choices of people must remain a key priority for enabling countries to address current socio-economic and demographic challenges and make the most of the opportunities that also present themselves.

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Youth-friendly services scaling up in Kazakhstan, offering critical sexual and reproductive health care

"It was my first time with my boyfriend. We didn’t use a condom,” 17-year-old Amina* told UNFPA at one of the youth-friendly health centres in Almaty, Kazakhstan’s biggest city. Comprehensive sexuality education had not been provided in her school curriculum, and she was not comfortable raising such issues with her family. So when her menstrual period did not come as scheduled, Amina panicked.

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“Once the door opens slightly, the rest is easy”

“I was just like a sheep being sent to slaughter,” said Nuray, from Nevşehir in central Türkiye. “You have to go whether you want to or not.” Nuray was married off by her parents to a much older man when she was only 15 years old. She gave birth soon after, after a difficult delivery that the baby almost didn’t survive. “I resented my mother and father because they prevented me from getting an education,” she said.

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Governments to convene for ICPD30 review of population and development dynamics in Europe, Central Asia and North America

In the UN Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) region, comprising 56 member States in Europe, North America and Central Asia, the review process will culminate in a Regional Conference on ICPD30, entitled Population and Development: Ensuring Rights and Choices, which will be organized by UNECE and the UNFPA Regional Office for Eastern Europe and Central Asia in Geneva on 19-20 October 2023.

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