The Working Group was created at the 25th IAU General Assembly in Sydney, Australia, in July 2003 by the IAU Executive Council as a Working Group of IAU Executive. The aims of the Working Group are to evaluate the status of women in astronomy through the collection of statistics over all countries where astronomy research is carried out; and to establish strategies and actions that can help women to attain true equality as research astronomers, which will add enormous value to all of astronomy.