In 2017, the UN Trust Fund received 1,301 applications from 109 countries and territories for a total value requested of $528 million. In total, 31 organizations in 25 countries and territories for a total amount of USD 11 million were awarded grants for the 21st grant-making cycle.

Funding includes awarding 5 new projects in 5 regions for projects to support the needs of women and girl refugees and internally displaced survivors of violence in the context of forced displacement and humanitarian crises. The UN Trust Fund has also awarded 9 grants in this cycle to prevent and end violence against women and girls with disabilities, respecting the twin-track approach of supporting the work of women’s and disabled persons organizations (DPOs) in order to capitalize on the knowledge of their consolidated expertise to the benefit of women and girls with disabilities.

The UN Trust Fund’s 21^st Call for Proposals also prioritized support to women-led, women’s rights and small organizations. The portfolio of grants awarded in 2018 supports 28 women-led organizations, 18 women’s rights and 11 small organizations.

 

AFRICA

Centre for Rights Education and Awareness

Kenya

Project Title: Strengthening Accountability for Implementation of GBV Laws and Policies in Nairobi, Narok, Isiolo and Nyeri counties.

Duration: Three years

Project Focus: Strengthening Institutional Response

 

Description:

Despite progressive measures introduced in Kenyan laws and policies to address and end violence against women and girls, the prevalence rates are still high. For example, more than a third (39 per cent) of women experience physical or sexual intimate partner violence, while child marriage affects almost a quarter (23 per cent) of girls. [1]

The project funded by the UN Trust Fund and implemented by a women-led organization the Centre for Rights Education and Awareness, addresses the implementation of the legislation gap, specifically targeting women and girl survivors of violence aged between 10 and 24 in three target counties using a three-pronged approach:

1. improving access to essential services for survivors by training service providers and strengthening referral pathways;

2. enhancing violence prevention using the SASA! community mobilization methodology in communities and in educational settings; and

3. working with duty bearers to improve training and mentoring for those responsible for implementing and developing relevant laws and policies.

The project focuses specifically on intimate partner violence, sexual violence within the family and community, sexual harassment in public spaces and violence in schools.

The project adopts a number of strategies to achieve its overall goal of better protection for women and girls. These include building an evidence base, coalition and partnership building, coaching and mentoring female legislators and advocacy, in partnership with women-led groups.

Refugee Consortium of Kenya

Kenya

Project Title: Towards Improved Prevention of VAWG among Urban Refugees in Nairobi and Garissa

Duration: Three years

Project Focus: Preventing Violence

Description: The Kenyan cities of Nairobi and Garissa are home to a large number of Somali refugees, many of whom have settled there for almost two decades. In addition to an increasingly difficult socio-economic situation, women and girl refugees also face a higher risk of gender-based violence, which reflects the high prevalence of violence against women in both countries.

This project, funded by the UN Trust Fund and implemented by the Refugee Consortium of Kenya, a woman-led organization, works to improve behaviours, practices and attitudes in order to reduce the incidence of gender-based violence, with a special focus on refugee and internally displaced women and girls.

The project increases survivors’ access to justice as well as increases the rate of successful prosecution through better access to legal aid, representation and support.

Moreover, capacity building and training among stakeholders, as well as partnerships forged by the Refugee Consortium of Kenya with the government, help ensure the sustainability of these improvements in the lives of the refugee women and girls.

Women Challenged to Challenge

Kenya

 

Project Title: Preventing and Responding to Violence against Women and Girls with Disabilities in Kenya

Duration: Three years

Project Focus: Improving Service Delivery

Description: The project, supported by a grant from UN Trust Fund and implemented by Women Challenged to Challenge, focuses on three ethnically diverse locations in Kenya to reduce violence against women and girls with disabilities and increase the rate of conviction of abusers. They work with service providers and front-line responders to improve attitudes, protection mechanisms and multisectoral services.

Women Challenged to Challenge works with two partners: Advantage Africa, a UK-based NGO with extensive experience of community development in East Africa, and the Kibwezi Disabled Persons’ Organisation. The project engages women in empowerment activities, supports the capacity of service providers and develops and delivers community theatre programmes through the community drama group Twaweza, which has experience in devising and performing plays about violence against women in community settings.

Episcopal Relief & Development

Liberia

Project title: Scaling Up Faith Leaders Engagement to Prevent and Respond to Violence against Women and Girls (VAWG)

Duration: Three years

Project Focus: Improving Service Delivery

 

Description: Episcopal Relief & Development was invited to submit a second proposal based on the success and learning potential of a previous UN Trust Fund supported project, which showed the potential for and impact of ending faith leaders’ silence on gender-based violence.

Liberia has some of the highest rates of violence against women and girls in the world: 39 per cent of women experience physical or sexual intimate partner violence. ^[2] The project works to reduce intimate partner violence and increases access to services for survivors in both rural and urban settings in 14 districts in four counties, including Grand Cape Mount, Rivercess, Bong and Grand Gedeh.

Considering the findings and lessons learned from the pilot project, Episcopal Relief & Development continues its effective faith-based methodology. This includes expanding the faith leader toolkit on preventing and responding to gender-based violence; further developing the facilitation guide to help empower Christian and Muslim faith leaders to speak out against violence against women in their communities and to support survivors more effectively; and expanding and integrating youth engagement work.

The project works to change attitudes and behaviour using Facts, Association, Meaning and Action Learning (FAMA) methodologies as well as more peer-to-peer learning. Sustainability will be ensured through continued engagement with the Inter-Religious Council of Liberia and the Ministry of Gender and Social Protection, as well as the grantee’s work to support survivors through services, specifically a safe house in each county.

 

Association Ennakhil

Morocco

 

Project title: Combatting GBV in Schools through the Promotion of Positive Masculinity in the Marrakech Safi Region

Duration: Three years

Project Focus: Preventing Violence

 

Description: In partnership with local organizations, Association Ennakhil established eight centres that provide listening services, legal and psychological support to women survivors. It has also piloted an initiative to improve coordination with and among local hospitals, the legal sector and the police.

A UN Trust Fund grant enables Association Ennakhil to implement a project in the Marrakech Safi region, considered one of the poorest regions of Morocco.

The project brings about positive change in the lives of women and girls aged between 10 and 19 by engaging with members of civil society and faith-based organizations as well as with men and boys. The project works to empower school students and involves key players from the education, political and social sectors, in order to challenge norms. Specifically, the project improves government policy on gender-based violence in schools and increases the understanding of gender-based violence among young boys and girls.

Rwanda Organization of women with disabilities (UNABU)

Rwanda

Project Title: Eliminating Violence against Women and Girls with Disabilities in Rwanda

Duration: Three years

Project Focus: Preventing Violence

Description: A UN Trust Fund grant supports UNABU, an organization managed by women with disabilities for women with disabilities, to implement a project to reduce economic and sexual violence among this particularly at-risk group in five districts in Rwanda.

The project works to change attitudes and behaviours by increasing knowledge and awareness of human rights and gender-based violence among women with disabilities in 120 self-advocacy groups, as well as among community members. It also strengthens access to inclusive essential, safe and adequate multisectoral services for women and girl survivors of violence.

The project pursues a two-pronged strategy. On the one hand, it will support women with disabilities in organizing themselves. At the same time it engages new actors, including disabled people’s organizations, women’s and human rights organizations, relevant government institutions and other key stakeholders, to ensure that women with disabilities are included more effectively in efforts to prevent and respond to gender-based violence.

 

 

Strategic Initiative for Women in the Horn of Africa (SIHA) Network

South Sudan

 

Project title: Challenging Patterns and Drivers of Sexual Violence against Women and Girls in Wau State, South Sudan

Duration: Three years

Project Focus: Preventing Violence

Description: The UN Trust Fund supports a project by SIHA to promote positive changes in attitudes, behaviours and practices to end sexual violence against women and girls in four camps: the Nazareth, Masna and Lokoloko camps for internally displaced people and Alel Chok camp in Wau. The project empowers women and mobilizes communities, improves protection mechanisms and ends the culture of violence, which is regarded as the root/leading cause of the problem.

Applying participatory learning methods incorporating local community knowledge and expertise, the project works to engage over a thousand young women and girls in training and extracurricular programmes around gender equality and violence against women and girls. The project encourages 75 activists to participate in capacity building, dialogue and awareness-raising sessions. The project also strengthens grassroots women’s organizations through capacity building and addresses patterns of sexual violence against women and girls through education, community awareness and the direct engagement of and with men.

SIHA will collaborate with the Ministries of Education and of Gender, Child and Social Welfare; academic institutions, community members, students and educators, men and youth, traditional leaders and civil society organizations.

 

African Partners for Child Poverty (APPCO)

Uganda

 

Project Title: Combating Stigma against Sexual Violence Survivors and their Children Post-Conflict

Duration: Three years

Project Focus: Preventing Violence

Description: APPCO is using a UN Trust Fund small grant to implement a project to change community attitudes towards survivors of sexual violence and their children from the almost 30 years of conflict in the country. The organization recognizes many structural and social factors that reduce access to justice. The project works to improve community attitudes towards survivors of sexual violence and their children.

The project works strategically with community champions, including faith leaders, children and youth groups, and community members, including survivors of violence, in the target communities. Moreover, the project works to identify and empower marginalized women, women with disabilities, and women and girls subjected to sexual exploitation.

APPCO envisions that by the end of the project, faith leaders will be advocating for their communities to support sexual violence survivors and their children, including ensuring survivors are referred to comprehensive support services. By focusing on strengthening existing community systems, the project aims to create the conditions for sustainable change extending beyond the life of the project.

 

National Union of Women with Disabilities of Uganda

Uganda

Project Title: Reducing Violence against Women and Girls with Disabilities in Amuria District

Duration: Three years

Project Focus: Preventing Violence

Description: A grant from the UN Trust Fund supports the National Union of Women with Disabilities to implement a project to reduce violence against women and girls with disabilities in Amuria district in the Eastern Region of Uganda.

The project works to increase awareness and knowledge among local leaders, families and the women and girls themselves about the rights of women and girls with disabilities and the legal framework protecting them.

By working to increase women and girls’ confidence and knowledge about rights and forms of violence, the project empowers them to take appropriate action. Selected women and girls with disabilities will receive training to act as community-based paralegals to promote awareness raising and mobilization and to engage local leaders. The project will also support women and girls with disabilities to form local groups for peer-to-peer learning, enhancing confidence over the longer term and enabling them to speak out.

 

Leonard Cheshire Disability Zimbabwe

Zimbabwe

Project Title: Access to Justice for Girls and Women with Disabilities in Zimbabwe

Duration: Three years

Project Focus: Improving Service Delivery

Description: Leonard Cheshire Disability Zimbabwe (LCDZ), a former UN Trust Fund grantee, was invited to submit a second proposal for funding based on the impact and learning potential of an earlier project.

This project focuses on six rural and underserved districts with high rates of poverty and HIV/AIDS and which reportedly have very high incidences of sexual violence against girls and women with disabilities. The project replicates existing strategies to provide practical assistance to women and girls with disabilities; to enhance their access to justice in cases of sexual violence; and to build the capacities of key service providers.

A new aspect introduced with this project is a focus on working with the Ministry of Health and Child Care to standardize and decentralize psychiatric assessment. This is a direct result of lessons learned in the first project, which found that the legal requirement to travel to Harare for psychiatric assessment was a significant barrier to justice.

LCDZ is already working closely with the Government’s Victim Friendly System, which brings together different stakeholders offering post-violence services to survivors of sexual violence in the country, and has established strong partnerships with 35 disabled people’s organizations and other community groups across the country. LCDZ collaborates with the joint UNESCO, UNFPA and UNDP initiative “Advancing the Rights of Women and Girls with Disabilities in Zimbabwe”.

 

 

ASIA AND THE PACIFIC

 

Action on Disability and Development (ADD) International

Cambodia

Project title: Preventing violence against women and girls with disabilities in Cambodia: a community mobilization model

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Preventing Violence

Description: A project implemented in Cambodia by ADD International, an international organization based in the UK, works to improve the protection needs of girls and women with disabilities. Although women with disabilities experience higher rates of violence from members of their household, primary prevention strategies in Cambodia do not specifically address their experiences. This project works in six provinces, to build on and expand the work of the Cambodian Women’s Crisis Centre, a current UN Trust Fund grantee, and work with girls and women with disabilities who have either survived or are at risk of violence in the family.

Working in partnership with two local women’s organizations, two local disabled persons’ organizations and three women’s networks ADD International strengthens the capacity of disabled women’s networks to lead primary prevention efforts. These include adapting the SASA! community mobilization methodology, using positive role models to contribute to changing social norms and carrying out research to better understand intersectional approaches to primary prevention.

 

 

femLINKpacific

Fiji

 

Project title: Transformative Media: Communicating the Root Causes of Violence, Enabling Peaceful Communities

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Preventing Violence

Description: The UN Trust Fund is supporting a femLINKpacific project which raises awareness of the root causes of violence against women and girls in Fiji using its existing Rural Women Leaders Community Network and Women’s Weather Watch system, the project’s objective is to strengthen prevention measures against intimate partner violence.

Although recent years have showed an improvement in legal and policy efforts to end violence against women and girls in Fiji, cultural, structural and information gaps continue to hinder this change, particularly in rural areas.

The project therefore works with existing networks in rural, urban and informal settlements at 10 centres in three Divisions of Fiji (Central, Western and Northern). The project will adopt an innovative application of media technology to amplify prevention measures, including during disasters. The project will also strengthen the women-led media network, enabling women and girls from diverse backgrounds to use community media platforms to discuss the prevalence and causes of gender-based violence and how to end it.

 

Per centsatuan Kesedaran Komuniti Selangor (EMPOWER)

Malaysia

 

Project title: Counting the Role and Impact of Sexual and Gender-Based violence on Women’s Freedom of Expression and Decision-Making in Public and Political Spaces

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Preventing Violence

 

Description: The internet and social media platforms have increased the spaces for women to voice their opinions and express themselves. However, these spaces have also proliferated sexual and gender-based abuse. Preliminary research conducted by EMPOWER in Malaysia found that up to 50 per cent of women respondents had withdrawn from online digital spaces due to online sexual and gender-based violence and harassment.

EMPOWER uses a UN Trust Fund grant to provide both cisgender and transgender women with the language, tools, know-how and support to counter sexual and gender-based violence. The project, implemented in six states, seeks to defend and promote women’s right to freedom of expression and engagement in decision making in public and political spaces.

The project employs a mixture of research, documentation, monitoring, advocacy, capacity development, awareness raising, networking, support and institutional strengthening to highlight and address the fact that women are prevented from participating in the public and political spheres because in doing so, they become targets for sexual and gender-based violence.

 

Raksha Nepal

Nepal

 

Project title: Sustainable Rehabilitation of Survivors of Violence and Trafficked Women

Duration: Three years

Project Focus: Improving Service Delivery

Description: The UN Trust Fund is supporting Raksha Nepal with a small grant to provide alternative and sustainable livelihood options to women and girl survivors of trafficking in human beings. The project provides comprehensive services, including initial trauma care and counselling to ensure survivors are empowered. In addition, empowers survivors economically to assist them in reintegration into Nepali society. Focusing on intensive economic and leadership training, the project aims to train at least 180 women survivors of trafficking, rape and other forms of violence with tools to start small businesses.

Although the project focuses on reaching women and girls already served in some capacity by Raksha, it also uses a broad participation approach to reach other women and girls affected by violence in the project sites. The approach also includes awareness raising, building trust and confidence, and skills development.

ARAB STATES

Al Shehab Institution for Comprehensive Development

Egypt

Project title: Community-Based Intervention to Alleviate the Different Forms of Violence against Women and Women’s Vulnerability to HIV “Scale-Up Phase”

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Improving Service Delivery

Description: Al Shehab Institution for Comprehensive Development was invited to submit a second proposal based on the success and learning potential of a previous UN Trust Fund supported project, which focused on the intersection between HIV/AIDS and violence against women in Egypt.

This project, which primarily targets sexual and physical violence in the family, builds on the previous pilot project to scale up the provision of essential services, including psychosocial, legal, HIV counselling and testing and medical services, for the most marginalized and left behind women in four informal, urban communities in Greater Cairo.

Considering the key findings of the earlier project, this project increases its emphasis on prevention and changing attitudes and behaviours by working with men and boys. The project also engages influential faith and community leaders to promote behavioural change and protect women’s rights at the community level as well as to help strengthen the institutional capacities of service providers to ensure services are sustained beyond the lifetime of the project. Al Shehab also advocates for relevant national policies and strategies on HIV and violence against women to be more responsive to the needs of marginalized women.

 

Egyptian Foundation for Family Development (EFFD)

Egypt

 

Project title: Confronting Domestic Violence

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Preventing Violence

Description: Over a quarter (26 per cent) of women in Egypt report experiencing physical and/or sexual intimate partner violence in their lifetime. ^[3] Protection and access to services for survivors are hampered by the prevailing belief that such forms of violence are a private family matter.

The EFFD project, implemented with a small UN Trust Fund grant, focuses on eliminating domestic violence at the community level. In particular, the project seeks to address abuse in the extended family, where EFFD has found violence to be particularly pervasive. This project is implemented in the suburbs of Giza Governorate, a rural area where the prevalence of violence within families is high.

EFFD’s strategy is to engage communities, particularly community and religious leaders, to participate in violence prevention. Simultaneously, the project will implement economic empowerment activities, mainly craftwork and marketing skills for women.

The main activities are conducted through a mobile outreach team, which was successfully piloted in the earlier project. The methodology works with individual members within each household, including elders and mothers-in-laws as well as within the community. The aim of the project is to create a group/base of female community members, religious and other leaders who will become influencers, role models and catalysts for positive change.

Stars of Hope Society

State of Palestine

Project Title: HEMAYA

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Improving Service Delivery

Description: The disabled people’s organization Stars of Hope is the only association in Palestine that is run by women with disabilities for women with disabilities. It works to address and end discrimination, empower women and girls with disabilities to claim their rights, and promote their inclusion.

The Stars of Hope Society project, supported by the UN Trust Fund, improves access to essential, safe and adequate multisectoral services for women and girls with disabilities. It enhances the inclusion of girls and women with all types of disability in programmes and systems to end violence against women and girls.

The project is being implemented in the West Bank and Gaza in collaboration with Al Marsad, an organization of academics and researchers who work on economic, social and civil rights in Palestine. It focuses in particular on marginalized communities in refugee camps, Area C territories, and Bedouin communities. Its activities include analysing the factors affecting girls and women with disabilities, capacity building, advocacy, sensitization and networking to influence key actors and institutions.

 

Women's Affairs Technical Committee

State of Palestine

 

Project title: Gender Justice to End Violence Against Women and Girls

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Improving Service Delivery

Description: The Women’s Affairs Technical Committee, with the support from the UN Trust Fund, is implementing a project in six communities in Area C of the West Bank to address issues around access to justice.

The project primarily focuses on women and girls who are displaced or at risk of being displaced, among them refugees, survivors of violence and women living in shelters as a result of gender-based violence. The project also reaches formal and informal justice actors, police officers, community members, legal officers and media personnel.

The project adopts a three-fold approach to address the gaps identified which hinder access to justice for at-risk women: (1) in-depth coordinated actions with key formal and informal justice actors and institutions; (2) building women-led community forums to pursue justice and advocate for an end to violence against women and girls along with key justice stakeholders; and (3) promoting online female digital campaigning, awareness raising, knowledge building and advocacy.

EUROPE AND CENTRAL ASIA

 

Woman Forum Elbasan

Albania

 

Project title: Improved Access for Women and Girls Survivors of Violence in Elbasan Region

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Improving Service Delivery

Description: Gender inequality exists in many spheres in Albania, including leadership, decision making, employment and education. However, the Albanian Government has shown a political commitment to address gender discrimination. For instance, the Government has signed the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence and translated its provisions into national legislation and a strategic action plan. This contributes towards taking concrete steps to reduce domestic and gender-based violence in the country.

Woman Forum Elbasan has 18 years of experience in providing free social, psychological and legal services through their Counselling Centre, Advocate Studio and Day Care Centre. They provide face-to-face counselling, phone counselling, support in judicial reviews and court hearings and legal counselling.

Using a small grant from the UN Trust Fund, Woman Forum Elbasan works to improve access to services for survivors of violence and raise awareness of domestic violence in the community in seven municipalities in the Elbasan Region. By working with the police and health professionals the project will also ensure more effective and efficient responses by local institutions through capacity building and improved coordination.

 

Medica Kosova

Kosovo under UN Security Council Resolution 1244 (1999)

 

Project title: Women’s Organization Address Implementation of the National Strategy against Domestic Violence

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Strengthening Institutional Response

Description: Under UN SCR 1244 (1999) Kosovo is a signatory to the Council of Europe’s Istanbul Convention to prevent and end violence against women and domestic violence. The Convention was used as the guide in preparing the National Strategy against Domestic Violence 2016-2020. However, while this marks a step in the right direction, not all measures in the National Strategy have been implemented in line with the Convention.

These implementation gaps particularly affect women’s organizations in smaller municipalities. These underserved communities include Serbian, Gorani and Roma minority women in Northern Mitrovica, Fushe Kosove, Dragash, Gjakova and Deqani.

The UN Trust Fund grant supports a project to develop the awareness of the Istanbul Convention among women’s organizations and strengthen their monitoring capacity and reporting mechanisms, based on the development of a legal handbook.

The project also supports women’s organizations to conduct joint advocacy and improve collective monitoring and reporting on the implementation of the National Strategy. Moreover, the project will also establish dialogue mechanisms with national and local government bodies related to gender based-violence and work to increase their capacity to implement the National Strategy.

 

Centre of Research of Democratic Processes

Kyrgyzstan

 

Project title: Multisectoral Approach in Prevention of Sexual Violence against Women and Girls

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Preventing Violence

Description: In Kyrgyzstan, early marriage and abduction of minors for marriage (bride kidnapping) are a persistent reality. Available data shows that the majority of parents do not know how to recognize the signs and the risks of sexual violence against their daughters as well as actions to take when faced with such risks. Girls also lack adequate information about gender-based violence and are unaware of existing services.

Using a small grant from the UN Trust Fund, the Centre of Research of Democratic Processes and its project partners work to increase awareness among parents and girls as well as teachers and communities of issues related to sexual violence.

At the individual level, the project involves awareness-raising activities with parents and school students to build skills in recognizing risk factors and to share information about available services.

Using a multisectoral and survivor-centred approach, the project works with institutions, community actors, including educational professionals, social workers, school psychologists and the police and Juveniles Affairs Inspectors (JAIs), who constitute the primary government liaison for criminal issues related to juveniles.

The Centre of Research of Democratic Processes also develops a mandatory training module for training JIAs across 40 districts and 14 cities. The JIA’s will then train others, thereby ensuring the sustainability of these initiatives.

 

ATINA Citizens for Combatting Trafficking of Human Beings and All Forms of Gender-Based Violence

Serbia

 

Project title: Community Approaches to Preventing Violence against Adolescent Girls

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Improving Service Delivery

 

Description: ATINA uses a grant from the UN Trust Fund to implement a project aimed at women and girl refugees and asylum seekers– among them, victims of trafficking and sexual exploitation. The project operates in several areas of Serbia, where large refugee populations resides. These areas include, asylum centres in Krnjaca in Belgrade, Presevo, Bujanovac, Banja Koviljaca, Adasevci and Bogovadja; the Maternity House in Belgrade; and ATINA’s safe houses.

After the closing of the Balkan route in March 2016, about 4,200 officially registered refugees and migrants, most of them women and children, remained in Serbia. The overwhelming majority are from Afghanistan, Iraq and Pakistan, reflecting countries with high rates of violence against women. As refugees and asylum seekers, they are furthermore at increased risk of abuse from a variety of perpetrators – police officers, humanitarian workers, traffickers and smugglers.

ATINA provides access to information and services and empowers these women and girls towards active participation and leadership. Mobile teams, consisting of a social worker, psychologist and cultural mediator, operate in reception centres and in the field to provide support and further referral for appropriate services, including counselling, legal assistance and economic empowerment. ATINA also holds workshops to enable women to advocate for their own needs and work to sensitize local institutions on the special requirements of women and girl refugees.

Mental Disability Rights Initiative (MDRI-S)

Serbia

Project Title: Accessible Services for Women with Disabilities Survivors of Custodial Violence

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Improving Service Delivery

Description: This project upscales and builds on earlier work with women and girls in custodial institutions funded by the UN Trust Fund – that is, residential and psychiatric institutions, community living or supported living arrangements. Women in such institutions are at risk of a range of forms of gender-based violence including invasion of privacy; harmful practices (such as seclusion and restraint); the administration of contraceptives without consent and forced abortions; and physical and sexual harassment and violence.

The earlier project was effective in changing the perspectives of women and girls themselves and in generating interest in the issue among service providers.

This project ensures that women and girls with mental disabilities in Serbia have greater support and feel empowered to live their life free of custodial violence through knowledge and confidence building and by providing services if such abuses occur. The project will also offer intensive training courses, models and standards to service providers in order to help improve services for women with disabilities, some of whom are survivors of custodial violence.

LATIN AMERICA AND THE CARIBBEAN

 

FUSA para la salud integral con perpectiva de género y derechos asociación civil

Argentina

 

Project title: Promoting Access to Sexual and Reproductive Rights for Women and Girls with Disabilities in Argentina

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Improved Service Delivery

Description: A project supported by the UN Trust Fund and implemented by the civil society organization FUSA works to help women with disability overcome the obstacles they face in accessing sexual and reproductive health services and information in Argentina.

The project aims to reach 4,320 women and girls with disabilities and 300 health professionals and government officials and focuses on the measures needed to achieve positive change, including the empowerment of women with disabilities to recognize and claim their rights; a transformation in the attitudes of health professionals; and the adoption of inclusive public policies incorporating gender equality and disability.

· To address patterns of violence and discrimination against women with disabilities, the project adopts strategies at the individual, institutional and structural levels:

· At the individual level, the project provides training and capacity building for women with disabilities to recognize and claim their rights;

· At the institutional level, the project provides training and capacity building for health service providers (doctors, nurses, midwives) to become leaders and focal points for information and services related to sexual and reproductive health; and

· At the structural level, the project advocates with key State actors and civil society organizations (scientific societies and women's and disability movements) to promote legal, political and social changes to guarantee the provision of sexual and reproductive health services to women with disabilities.

 

Fundación Servicios Integrales para la Mujer- Si Mujer

Colombia

 

Project title: Young People Challenging Gender Norms to Break the Silence that surrounds Sexual Violence in South-West Columbia

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Preventing Violence

Description: After more than 50 years of armed conflict, the signing of a peace agreement between the Colombian Government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in 2016 marked an important milestone. However, the legacy of conflict remains profound, not least in the normalization of violence over such a long period of time.

During the conflict sexual violence was often used as a weapon of war and remains prevalent in society today. Colombia also has the largest internally displaced population in the world; according to the UNHCR, there are more than 7 million internally displaced people ^[4] in the country. Women and girls who have been affected by internal displacement are at a heightened risk of sexual violence.

The UN Trust Fund is supporting a project by Fundación Servicios Integrales para la Mujer- Si Mujer to challenge gender norms and practices and to reduce the risk of sexual violence in and around the city of Cali, which has a large internally displaced population.

The project targets internally displaced young people and adolescents, who are at disproportionate risk of sexual violence, with the aim of empowering them to disclose their experiences of sexual violence and seek comprehensive care. The project also focuses on improving survivors’ access to medical and psychological care and legal support and on raising awareness among women, girls, boys and men about violence against women and girls.

 

Fundación Centro de Derechos Sociales de la Persona Migrante (CENDEROS)

Costa Rica

 

Project title: Improving Capacities to Protect, Assist and Integrate Central American Women Victims of Violence

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Preventing Violence

Description: A project implemented by the women-led organization CENDEROS with a small grant from the UN Trust Fund works to address violence against women and girls in the context of the refugee crisis in Costa Rica.

Costa Rica has the highest percentage of migrants in Latin America relative to its to population. In 2011, according to official statistics, about 386,000 migrants were registered as living in the country. The country’s political stability and its position as a strong emerging economy makes it one of the preferred destinations for asylum-seekers in the region.

This project specifically targets refugee women and girls from Nicaragua in two districts in the canton of Upala (the San José district and the Delicias district) who are at risk of or who have experienced gender-based violence.

The project empowers and protects women and girls from violence by providing them with information about their rights and referring them specialized services and networks for financial and psychological support.

CENDEROS also works to raise awareness among government officials, community groups, lawyers, the police and other organizations on how to prevent violence and discrimination against refugee women and girls.

Mujeres Transformando el Mundo (MTM)

Guatemala

Project Title: Acceso a la Justicia y empoderamiento de las mujeres, adolescentes y ninas con discapacidad y victimas de violencia.

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Preventing Violence

Description: A UN Trust Fund grant supports the women’s organization MTM to implement a project to address the needs of some of the most marginalized groups of women and girls at risk of gender-based violence in regions with the highest rate of violence against women and girls in Guatemala. The project encourages positive changes in the lives of women and girls with disabilities through a variety of approaches.

MTM works to facilitate strategic litigation and promote a comprehensive legal, psychological and social approach to ensure effective support to survivors. The Project also provides capacity building and training on human rights and access to justice; offers institutional capacity building for the NGOs and other stakeholders collaborating on the project; and maintains ongoing advocacy and dialogue with government authorities.

Beyond Borders

Haiti

Project Title: Safe and Capable: Haitian Communities Preventing Violence against Girls and Women with Disabilities

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Preventing Violence

Description: Beyond Borders is a human rights organization that helps people build movements to liberate themselves from oppression and isolation. With this project it addresses the lack of existing knowledge and focus on the intersection of violence against women and disability in order to contribute to changes in social norms, social attitudes and violence prevention.

Working with two partner Haitian organizations that are led by, and represent and serve people with disabilities, the project focuses on girls and women with disabilities of all ages and partner organizations, members of the SASA! community network and the general public in Lavale, in Haiti’s South-Eastern Department, which mostly comprises rural villages.

The UN Trust Fund supported project includes carrying out research into the experiences of girls and women with disabilities; creating context-specific materials in Creole for use in interventions using SASA!/Power to Girls methodologies; carrying out community mobilization using SASA!/Power to Girls; advocating for the implementation of relevant laws and policies; providing capacity building and technical support to project partners and increasing their knowledge management capabilities.

 

Ciencia Social Alternativa

Mexico

 

Project title: Preventing and Addressing Violence against Girls with Disabilities in Yucatan State

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Preventing Violence

Description: A project implemented by Ciencia Social Alternativa, with support of a small grant from the UN Trust Fund, addresses violence against girls with disabilities in the state of Yucatan. The project engages key government and civil society actors, schoolgirls with disabilities and their families, as well as municipal and state authorities in relevant sectors, such as education, health and criminal justice.

The project works to create positive changes in the lives of girls with disabilities by developing an intervention model for prevention and multisectoral responses to violence in the family and the community. The project also empowers girls with disabilities and generates a change of attitudes and behaviours to reduce the risk of their experiencing multiple forms of discrimination.

 

Coordinadora por los derechos de la infancia y la adolescencia

Paraguay

 

Project title: Paraguay Includes Rights of Girls and Adolescents with Disabilities

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Strengthening Institutional Response

 

Description: Coordinadora por los derechos de la infancia y la adolescencia is a network of 30 civil society organizations working to defend, promote and monitor children’s human rights in Paraguay.

With the support of a small grant from the UN Trust Fund, this project focuses on addressing violence against the girl child; violence in the community, including sexual violence by non-partners; violence in schools and public spaces; and trafficking. The project is being implemented in four departments (Central, Caaguazú, Paraguarí, Alto Paraná) as well as the capital, Asunción, but also has an impact at the national level.

In Paraguay, women and girls with disabilities from rural and indigenous communities face discrimination, social and economic exclusion. They have little or no access to education and health services and, consequently, are at a heightened risk of violence. Families in economic distress often place their children with other families where they can end up in situations of domestic slavery.

The aim of this project is to provide members of civil society organizations and community-based groups, education professionals and government officials with information, training, tools, analytical data and technical assistance to enhance inter-institutional and inter-sectoral coordination and to increase the effectiveness of efforts to prevent violence and address its consequences.

 

Comité de América Latina y el Caribe para la defensa de los derechos de las Mujeres (CLADEM)

Peru

 

Project Title: Advocating for Victims of Sexual Violence, Forced Child Pregnancy and Childhood Maternity in Peru

Duration: Three years

Focus Area: Preventing Violence

 

Description: A project by CLADEM, implemented with the support of a small grant from the UN Trust Fund, focuses on girls under 15, including those with fewer resources and living in remote areas. The project ensures that girls under 15 years old and specifically those who experience sexual violence and forced pregnancies have better access to education, justice and health services. In addition, the project also enhances efforts to prevent violence.

The project works to build the capacities of the education, health and justice sectors to prevent gender-based violence and to support girl survivors of sexual violence, forced pregnancy. In addition, the project seeks to increase awareness of the issue of gender-based violence within Peru and work towards ensuring that the state, as a duty-bearer at the national and international level, is held accountable for this problem. The project also works to improve knowledge and increase awareness about the problem and raise the issue in international human rights forums.