A/HRC/56/51 United Nations General Assembly Distr.: General 15 May 2024 Original: English Human Rights Council Fifty-sixth session 18 June–12 July 2024 Agenda item 3 Promotion and protection of all human rights, civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights, including the right to development Escalating backlash against gender equality and urgency of reaffirming substantive equality and the human rights of women and girls Report of the Working Group on discrimination against women and girls* Summary In the present report, the Working Group takes stock of its past work, focusing on the past six years, and presents its vision for the future. It warns about the escalating gender backlash, which has reached extreme proportions in certain countries, including gender apartheid, and reaffirms its commitment to countering it, while charting a path towards the equal enjoyment of all human rights for women and girls. It presents the overarching framework that will guide its work for the next six years, one that is centred on developing an understanding of substantive equality for women and girls and the concrete implications that it holds for States and other actors in the face of contemporary challenges. In its recommendations, the Working Group calls for a commitment to substantive gender equality and for coordinated efforts to counter the gender backlash. * Agreement was reached to publish the present document after the standard publication date owing to circumstances beyond the submitter’s control. GE.24-07559 (E) 140524 140524