Brazil's Marcia Braga shows why UN peacekeeping needs more women

A female Brazilianpeacekeeper serving in the central African Republic has been selected to receive the UNited Nations Military Gender Advocate of the Year Award, the UN annoUNced on its official website on Tuesday.

Marcia Andrade Braga, a Naval officer working in the UNited Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in the central African Republic (MINUSCA), will receive the award from UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres during the 2019 Peacekeeping Ministerial, held at the UN Headquarters in New York this Friday, according to the UN's statement to correspondents.

Serving as the Military Gender Adviser in MINUSCA Headquarters since April 2018, Braga helped build a network of trained gender advisers and focal points among the mission's military UNits and promoted the use of mixed teams of men and women to conduct commUNity-based patrols aroUNd the coUNtry, the statement said.

Jean-Pierre Lacroix, the UNited Nations UNder-Secretary-General for Peacekeeping Operations, commented that Braga is "a stellar example of why we need more women in peacekeeping: peacekeeping works effectively when women play meaningful roles and when women in the host commUNities are directly engaged."

Created in 2016, the UNited Nations Military Gender Advocate of the Year Award recognizes the dedication and effort of an individual peacekeeper in promoting the principles of UN Security Resolution 1325 on women, peace and security, said the statement.

(Top image: UN Bangladeshi peacekeepers of the UNited Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti prepare to leave Haiti at Toussaint Louverture International Airport in Port-au-Prince, October 8, 2017. /VCG Photo)