This document includes specific steps designed to create conditions to ensure equal participation of women and men in conflict resolution, peace-building and recovery processes.
According to the coordinator of “Coalition 1325 – Zakarpattia”, gender expert Marianna Kolodiy, the adoption of such action plan used to be rather a formal process that mainly consisted of copying strategic goals from the National Action Plan. This time, taking into account the realities of the full-scale war, the activists decided that the plan should be as practical as possible, encouraging the participation of public organizations and funding from the regional budget. The latter was taken by the local deputies with far less enthusiasm.
At first [they] proposed to allocate, for example, about 40 thousand hryvnias per year for the implementation of various activities. It was clear that it doesn’t make sense to allocate these funds, because it would only create the illusion of something being done [instead of the real work], Marianna Kolodiy notes.
Representatives of the public sector were told to forget about fundings from local or regional budgets, because all that money was supposedly being allocated to defense and security needs.
And we were explaining that Plan 1325 was also about defense and security, about the individual safety of specific people, the safety of people within the community, the groups where they work, study or live. The response often sounds like that: “Where is the UN Security Council? Sitting in New York? What are they doing? What does it have to do with the safety challenges or security needs of our community?”. And we are trying to show that if you develop an action plan that is focused on the needs, interests and opportunities of the local residents, different groups of women and men… you will get a kind of a road map, with the help of which you’ll be able to respond to security challenges within your community, step by step, Marianna Kolodiy notes.
Heated discussions continued until July 2023, when it got to the point where action plans were adopted everywhere in the other regions of Ukraine (generally without any funding), but there was still no consensus in Zakarpattia. That was because the organizations from the coalition pressured the regional state administration to not accept the action plan until it met their requirements.
In the end, 4 months after the deadline, a regional action plan was approved in Zakarpattia Oblast — with allocated funding, specific people responsible for implementation of each target and indicators of completion for each task.
“It was quite a victory. A precedent was set that it’s possible for the regional action plans on the implementation of Resolution 1325 to be approved in such format; to involve the general public and NGOs from the coalition and beyond, strengthening the implementation of the activities of the regional plan,” says Marianna Kolodiy.
For the year of 2023, 300,000 hryvnias were allocated from the regional budget as part of the implementation of target regional programs, and about 1 million hryvnias were supposed to be contributed by public organizations that were involved in the implementation of the plan. In fact, 410 thousand hryvnias were allocated from the regional budget, and the public organizations managed to provide more than 3 million hryvnias from their own funds and donor support.
At first 68 events were planned, but 72 were actually held. In Uzhhorod there were more workshops, trainings and work groups, and in territorial communities took place more specific events. For example, many events on preventing domestic violence took place in the city of Mukachevo, as well as in the Kamianska hromada, and in Irshava a security audit was conducted.
“We created a work group in the community to conduct a security audit with the participation of the first deputy head of the community. The work group went around the territory of the whole community and outlined seven routes that needed to be analyzed using the safety audit methodology. They identified key problems in their community and had them written out. Then they applied to a few donors at once to solve these security issues. Public transport stops were properly equipped, and video surveillance cameras were installed in the places with the largest concentration of people that sometimes resulted in conflicting situations,” Marianna Kolodiy explains.
The Solotvynska hromada, for example, has set up a class where children are taught about safety —in their daily lives, near the water, fire safety, information safety, mine safety, etc.
Safety and security points in the action plan cover a wide range of issues — from street lighting and pedestrian crossings to prevention of domestic violence. This also includes holding events for families of servicemen, missing persons or prisoners of war, as well as planning the work with veterans and responding to challenges related to rehabilitation and mental health support.
For the year of 2024, 300 thousand hryvnias were allocated from the regional budget, and it is planned that public organizations will allocate about 1 million hryvnias.
*The publication was made possible thanks to the support of the Government of the Kingdom of the Netherlands within the framework of the project “Women, Peace and Security Agenda Brings Results Locally in Ukraine”, implemented by the Ukrainian Women’s Fund.