Regional Focal Point for South Asia

Prativa Khanal is a human rights lawyer from Nepal holding a Master’s degree in Law from the Kathmandu School of Law. Prior to joining GNWP, Prativa worked on issues of human rights; gender equality; transitional justice and peacebuilding; and women, peace and security at various organizations including American Bar Association Rule of Law Initiative Nepal Country Office, Centro Cooperazione Sviluppo Onlus (CCS) Italy Nepal Country Office, Forum for Protection of Public Interest (Pro Public), Transitional Justice Resource Centre, UN Women, and World Vision Advocacy Forum.

As the second Cora Weiss Peacebuilding Fellow and Senior Program Officer at the GNWP, Prativa was mostly involved in the GNWP’s work on Girl Ambassadors for Peace; Youth, Peace and Security; Preventing Violent Extremism in Bangladesh and Indonesia; NAP development and implementation (including through localization) in Georgia and Nepal; Synergies on the implementation of WPS and General Recommendation 30 in Nepal. During her fellowship, she also worked closely with Women’s Peace and Humanitarian Fund (WPHF) and served as panelists in various events during 62nd Commission on the Status of Women. Prativa has also co-authored various GNWP publications such as: A Toolkit for Young Women and Girls on Literacy, Leadership, Economic Empowerment, Media and Theater (2019), Leadership from the ground up: A Study of Civil Society Perceptions of the meaning of Sustaining Peace for Local Populations, especially Local Women (2018), and Survey Report on a New Security Council Resolution on Women and Peace and Security (2017).

After GNWP, she served as Consultants for TRIAL International/Human Rights and Justice Centre (HRJC) and Forum for Women, Law and Development (FWLD) on issues of conflict-related sexual violence in Nepal and statelessness from gender and legal perspective in Nepal respectively. Furthermore, she was also involved as one of the Core Writing Committee for the CEDAW (Sixth Periodic) Shadow Report for Nepal and contributed mainly on the WPS aspect of the Shadow Report. She was also recently certified as the Peace and Conflict Consultant by the Academy for Conflict Transformation/Forum Civil Peace Service, Germany.

Prativa has a strong bond and interest to work for the better implementation of international human rights law and WPS through legal and institutional reforms in countries in transition or conflict, particularly in South Asian region.