The First Ukrainian Women’s Congress in Kyiv: “Ten years of supporting gender equality in Ukraine”
The first nationwide Ukrainian Women’s Congress, organized by the Equal Opportunities Caucus of the country’s parliament with support from the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights (ODIHR) and other partners, took place in Kyiv on 22 and 23 November 2017.
The Congress brought together 500 Ukrainian officials from the executive and legislative branches, women entrepreneurs, gender equality advocates, as well as representatives of civil society organizations and academia, to discuss the challenges to and ways forward in advancing women’s rights in the country.
The purpose of the Congress was to unite women around the idea of ensuring “gender equality in various sectors of Ukrainian society including framing the state policy, bringing them to the process of peacemaking, and struggle against gender-based violence”.
In the course of the event ample talks, the diet participants have outlined the key ways for securing gender equality in Ukraine:
1. Triggering multi-level legislational gears ensuring equality for men and women in election process by the agency of amendments to the local legislation which disenable non-observance of gender quotas.
2. Launching an information campaign to raise people’s awareness of importance of gender quoting for party tickets.
3. Killing discriminatory restrictions over engaging women in security and defence areas, and widening a female students access to military education, military service and military offices.
4. Furthering reshaping the security and defence sectors through equal rights and opportunities for men and women, and introduction of a staff post of gender adviser into the security area.
5. Strengthening inter-agency cooperation in order to implement the National Action Plan on UNSCR 1325.
6. Initiating a socio-political dialogue over ratification of the Istanbul Convention.
7. Improving the national legislation to prevent, combat and punish gender-based violence.
8. Popularizing multi-level gender-oriented budgeting.
9. Combating gender discrimination through reduction and upgrade of the list of vocations and works prohibited for women.
10. Implementing of the strategy on gender equality and non-discrimination in education “The Gender Dimension in Education-2020” by the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine.
Worthy of note
The Equal Opportunities Caucus, a cross-faction union at the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine (the Ukrainian Parliament) has been constituted to support national efforts towards gender equality. The body is self-governed and open for joining by other members of parliament, and is set to cooperate with the Parliament’s leadership, parliamentary factions and committees, the Presidential Administration, the Ministry of Ukraine, other state authorities, public organizations and associations.
The Caucus’s mission encompasses strengthening dialogue between civil society and government stakeholders on a broad spectrum of gender equality issues. Its objectives include improving the capacities of gender equality mechanisms, supporting gender mainstreaming in the drafting of legislation and in policy-making through enhanced public consultations, promoting and increasing participation of Ukrainian women, including those belonging to national minorities, in public life, as well as mainstreaming gender equality in the security sector and promoting women’s participation in peace-building.