Roundtable – Canada–Malaysia Collaboration on the Development of Malaysia’s First WPS NAP

Kuala Lumpur, 21 July 2025 – INITIATE.MY participated in the Civil Society Roundtable on Women, Peace and Security (WPS), co-organised by the High Commission of Canada and the Ministry of Women, Family and Community Development (KPWKM). The dialogue convened women leaders, peace practitioners, and civil society representatives to discuss how Malaysia’s upcoming National Action Plan on Women, Peace and Security (NAP WPS) can translate global commitments into local realities.

The roundtable reaffirmed that peace is more sustainable when women are meaningfully included in peace processes — a principle underscored by UN Security Council Resolution 1325. Discussions at the forum emphasised that Malaysia’s NAP must go beyond policy rhetoric by ensuring institutional commitment, civil society engagement, and mechanisms for harm prevention.

Participants examined how women’s rights advocacy, youth engagement, and peacebuilding initiatives align with WPS principles, while identifying barriers to mainstreaming gender perspectives in national security policies. Insights from Canada’s WPS Network illustrated how sustained collaboration between civil society and government can foster more inclusive policy design and monitoring.

Representing INITIATE.MY, Balqis Maesara, Project Officer, and Irdina Sorfina, Legal Intern, contributed perspectives from the Preventing and Countering Violent Extremism (PCVE) field — highlighting that women’s roles in radicalisation are often confined to that of victims or intermediaries, rather than dominant players. They stressed that to counter this, women’s empowerment must be a core strategy—by placing women in decision-making roles and highlighting women peacebuilders as visible role models..

INITIATE.MY’s policy recommendations presented at the roundtable included:

1. Institutionalise reconciliation mechanisms within PCVE frameworks, including a National Mediation Centre to document women’s testimonies and facilitate community healing.
2. Provide trauma support, anti-stigma initiatives, education, and economic reintegration for women and children affected by extremism.
3. Introduce systematic screening to identify trafficking victims in terrorism contexts, ensuring legal safeguards, safe shelters, and psychosocial assistance.
4. Empower affected women as mediators and peacebuilding leaders to ensure their direct participation in policy formulation and implementation.
5. Establish a gender-disaggregated online database to track mediation outcomes, rehabilitation success, and reconciliation progress.

These recommendations aim to ensure that Malaysia’s NAP WPS not only protects women from violence and discrimination but also positions them as key agents of peacebuilding and conflict resolution. As Malaysia prepares for the upcoming ASEAN WPS Summit, INITIATE.MY looks forward to continued collaboration with state and non-state actors to advance inclusive, trauma-informed, and gender-responsive peacebuilding in Southeast Asia.

INITIATE.MY joined the Civil Society Roundtable on Women, Peace and Security to advocate for gender-responsive, trauma-informed approaches in Malaysia’s upcoming NAP WPS.