Dhaka: Female parliamentarians worldwide have called for immediate reforms to stop sexism, harassment and violence against women in parliaments.

This includes urging all parliaments to set concrete targets and deadlines to achieve equal representation of women and men.

Taking part in the 12th Summit of Women Speakers of Parliament on April 25-26, women MPs urged the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) to lead global reform actions to end all forms of harassment in parliaments, reports the UNB.

Participants specified that by the end of 2018, the IPU should collect best practices and issue concrete guidelines on promoting adequate responses by parliaments to sexism, harassment and violence against women MPs, according to a message received from Cochabamba (Bolivia) on Friday.

Women leaders and MPs at the Summit also declared that more must be done to hold parliaments to account on gender equality.

Both male and female MPs must analyse government policies and legislation from a gender perspective and mainstream gender in the functioning of the parliament.

Additionally, governments and MPs must do more to establish and promote civic education programmes that create a culture of equality at an early age.

The Summit participants meeting in Cochabamba took inspiration from the host parliament’s initiatives to ensure gender parity in parliament.

‘This Summit was a major step in our global work to achieve gender parity in parliaments. The energy and commitment of the participants means that nothing will hold us back from achieving the objectives we set during our meeting,’ summed up IPU President Gabriela Cuevas Barron.

The 12th Summit of Women Speakers of Parliament was jointly organised by the IPU and the Bolivian Chamber of Deputies.

The Summit annually brings together the most senior women parliamentary leaders in the world to advocate for gender equality and influence the global parliamentary agenda.