By including women in decision-making, city governments will be in a better position to fulfill their responsibility to ensure the safety of their residents, especially women and girls.

My top priority for 2012 will be to make a renewed push for women's economic empowerment and political participation.

I don't like stereotypes - no kind of stereotypes.

During my lifetime, I realized that discrimination was not accidental, that there were structural roots and causes to it. So if we wanted to change women's lives, we need to deal with those root causes.

The current global landscape is quite different from the not-too-distant past. The process of globalization has intensified, and the world is moving towards new forms of governance.

All boys and girls should have the opportunity to receive a high-quality education, no matter what part of the country they live in and irrespective of whether their parents are rich or poor. It is the state's duty to make sufficient money available for the establishment of good public schools. A well-educated youth is crucial so that Chile can continue to grow economically.

U.N. Women was created due to the acknowledgement that gender equality and women's empowerment was still, despite progress, far from what it should be. Transforming political will and decisions, such as the Member States creating U.N. Women, into concrete steps towards gender equality and women's empowerment, I think is one of the main challenges.