Draft:Rosa-Anna Weiss

Rosa-Anna (Rosy) Weiss is an Austrian women's right activist and a former government official who served as the 12th President of the International Alliance of Women (IAW) from 2004 to 2010. She still serves as IAW's main representative fo the United Nations Headquarters in Vienna.

Biography

She is married to musician Helmut Weiss and is a mother of three and a grand-mother of four.

Weiss graduated from the University of Vienna as French translator and interpreter in 1963. After years of free-lance work she joined the Austrian Federal Ministry of Environment in 1987 and continued her engagement as special advisor in international negotiations within the Federal Ministery for Social Security, Generations and Consumer Protection, department for international youth and family affairs, where she retired in 2003 as its deputy-director.

On the evironment side, key qualifications encompass among others the environment for Europe process, experiene with PHARE projects (EU programme of community aid to the countries of Central and Eastern Europe), preparations of and participation in the Rio+5 Progrmamme Committee, delegate to the UN Commission on Sustainable Development, secretary of the Austrian UNCED Commission. On the social side, she was Austrian Project Leader of the EU Twinning project "Child Welfare Reform" in Bulgaria, Austrian representive to the EU DAPHNE Programme Committee (to prevent and combat gender-based violence and violence against children), involved in the negotiations of the Cairo+5 and Copenhagen+5 processes, delegate to the European Committee for Social Cohesion and member of its Board from 2002 to 2003 (Vice-Chair 2003), delegate to the Forum for Children and Families and special advisor and member of Austrian delegation to Ministerial Family Conferences.

Her community experience includes initiatives for projects for non-governmental family organisations together with the Vienna NGO Committee on the Family; Local Agenda 21 Projects with local municipalities in Austria together with the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Environment and the organisation of international seminars as Board member of the Institute for Study in Salzburg. From 2001 to 2002 she was elected President of the Frauenzirkel Austria. As a member of the Austrian Federation of University Women she served as long-term editor of the VAÖ Newspaper. As a member of the Austrian delegation to the 50th session of the UN Commission on the Status of Women in 2006 she became designated liaison person between the Austrian presidency and the women NGOs and served as chair of the Regional Preparatory Conference (The Hague Forum) for the International Conference on Population and Development (ICDP+5). She also served as co-author of the Austrian shadow reports to CEDAW 2006 and 2013 and to the Universal Periodic Review. From 2006 to 2009 she seved as elected chairperson of the Vienna NGO Comittee on the Status of Women.

She joined the Austrian Green Party in 2003 and became elected councillor for the 3rd district of Vienna for the period 2005 to 2015.

Publications

Memoirs: Traveling in Politics and Friendship, 1982-2010.

Contributions to the International Women's News (IWN) of the International Alliance of Women, 1985-2014

• IWN Vol 80 No 4 1985, p. 39 "Throwing violence out of the home".
• IWN Vol 82 No 4 1987 "Femme et homme interdépendants" (Report Salzburg Seminar)
• IWN Vol 91 No 3 1996 "Get going Now"
• IWN Vol 93 No 1 1998: Rapport Autriche: Suivie de Pékin
• IWN Vol 94 No 2 1999: "Towards Copenhagen +5". "Famille et travail en équilibre"
• IWN Vol 97 No 3 2002: "Make Masculinism Visible".
• IWN Vol 98 No 1 2003: "A Decade of Human Rights".
• IWN Vol 103 2 2008: Gender Equality and combatting sexual harassment: The Politics of the European Union, introductory remarks, Athens, 9 June 2008
• IWN Vol 103 3 2008: critique du livre "les nations désunies" de Malka Marcovich
• IWN Centenary Edition 1904-2004: "Introducing violence against women to the international agenda"
• IWN Vol 107 1 2012: 2011 Global Military Spending
• IWN Vol 108 1 2013: UNODC: Suivi de l'évolution de la criminalité organisée en Afrique de l'Ouest
• IWN Vol 109 1 2014: Militarism and Gender Violence.