Nawaf Salam: Women's Rights Are a Fundamental Standard for Building the State and Facing Economic Challenges

Prime Minister Nawaf Salam asked in a speech delivered at the opening of the "Women on the Frontlines" conference at the Venice Hotel: "Do we change practices that burden women first and make them the last to receive opportunities?".

He noted that "women's rights are a fundamental standard for building the state. In the context of displacement, women were the first to bear responsibility for themselves and their families, and it is the state's duty to ensure that women do not need daily heroism.".

Salam stressed that "the primary responsibility falls on us as a society and state to help the state recover, which affects women. True stability is the ability to plan for tomorrow without fear, under conditions where the decision of war and peace rests in the hands of the state.".

He indicated that "no economy can recover while wasting the potential of some women, and talent alone is insufficient when opposed; therefore, we need an economy that protects women and makes their integration into work a reality.".

Salam affirmed that "it is not fair for women to be in the front lines when crises occur and in the back lines when decisions are made," considering that "women's rights are not a separate file from the project of building the state, but one of the first standards to know what kind of state we are building.".

He clarified that "it is illogical to plan for others' lives without sharing with those who know and create this life. We must make recovery an opportunity to correct imbalances. Reconstruction is not complete without returning families to their homes, protecting citizens, and securing their lives," stressing that "our digital future is not measured by the number of its users but by the number of participants in developing it and influencing the rules that regulate it, and we want women to be participants in making it.".

Salam concluded: "A society in which people cannot distinguish between truth and fabrication makes it difficult to take free decisions. Equality is not achieved through speeches or slogans, but through just laws, institutions that enforce them, and effective participation in decision-making. When the state becomes more just for women, the state becomes more just for all people.".