ratification of the Convention, and urges all States that have not yet ratified or acceded to the Convention to do so; 12. Urges States parties to consider signing and ratifying the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women; 13. Also urges States parties to limit the extent of any reservations to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, to formulate any such reservations as precisely and as narrowly as possible, to ensure that no reservations are incompatible with the object and purpose of the Convention or otherwise incompatible with international treaty law and regularly to review them with a view to withdrawing them, and to withdraw reservations that are contrary to the object and purpose of the Convention or which are otherwise incompatible with international treaty law; 14. Stresses that States have an affirmative duty to promote and protect the human rights of women and must exercise due diligence to prevent, investigate and punish acts of all forms of violence against women, and calls upon States: (a) To apply international human rights norms and to ratify and implement fully international human rights instruments that relate to violence against women and girls; (b) To take all measures to empower women and strengthen their economic independence and to protect and promote the full enjoyment of all human rights and fundamental freedoms in order to allow women and girls to protect themselves better against violence; (c) To condemn violence against women and not invoke custom, tradition or practices in the name of religion or culture to avoid their obligations to eliminate such violence; (d) To intensify efforts to develop and/or utilize legislative, educational, social and other measures aimed at the prevention of violence against women, including the adoption and implementation of laws, the dissemination of information, active involvement with community-based players and the training of legal, judicial and health personnel, and, where possible, through developing and strengthening support services; (e) To enact and, where necessary, reinforce or amend domestic legislation, including measures to enhance the protection of victims, to investigate, prosecute, punish and redress the wrongs done to women and girls subjected to any form of violence, whether in the home, the workplace, the community or society, in custody or in situations of armed conflict, to ensure that they conform with relevant international human rights instruments and humanitarian law, and to take action to investigate and punish persons who perpetrate acts of violence against women; (f) To formulate, implement and promote, at all appropriate levels, plans of action to eliminate violence against women, guided by, inter alia, the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women, as well as relevant regional instruments pertaining to the elimination of violence against women; (g) To support initiatives undertaken by women’s organizations and non-governmental organizations on the elimination of violence against women and to establish and/or strengthen, at the national level, collaborative relationships with relevant non-governmental and community-based organizations, and with public and private sector institutions, aimed at the development and effective implementation of provisions and policies relating to violence against women, including in the area of support services for victims; (h) To intensify efforts to raise collective and individual awareness about violence against women, to highlight men’s role in the prevention and elimination of violence, and to encourage and support initiatives that encourage behavioural change on the part of perpetrators of violence against women; (i) To develop and/or enhance, including through funding, training programmes for judicial, legal, medical, social, educational, police, correctional service, military, peacekeeping, humanitarian relief and immigration personnel, in order to prevent the abuse of power leading to violence against women and to sensitize such personnel to the nature of gender-based acts and threats of violence; page 3