The GAF's Projects:

GAF's Current projects:

1. Support of Gender Alternatives Foundation to affirm gender equality and women’s rights through research, monitoring, counseling, legal representation, strategic litigation, training of professionals, advocacy and lobbying - (NoOCAY-14-499) Funded by OAK Foundation (July 2014 - June 2017)

2. Project BG05 / 755 "Together – to ensure justice for vulnerable groups of people" - The project is funded within the NGO programme in Bulgaria under the European Economic Area Financial Mechanism 2009-2014. Period for implementation: 15 months (31.10.2014 - 31.1.2016)

3.    “Promotion of the rights of trafficked persons in Bulgaria, Slovakia and Romania with emphasis of legal support”, funded by the Prevention of and Fight against Crime Program of the EU Commission-Directorate-General Home Affairs in the period 2013-2015. Leading organization: Animus Association, Partner: Gender Alternatives Foundation;

4.    “Trafficking in Human Beings: from exit to insertion, barriers and leverage”. Project start date and duration: 15.09.2014/15.09.2016, 24 months. Applicant: Amicale du Nid - Paris, France Partner: Gender Alternatives Foundation - Plovdiv, Bulgaria.
This project proposes to identify barriers and leverages to exit and reinsertion and to develop tools to support victims and disseminate the findings. The project is Co-funded by the Prevention of and Fight against Crime Programme of the European Union.

5.  "Effective implementation of the Law on Protection againstDomestic Violence" under a Contract for granting financial help with reg. № 15-00-262 / 2014 signed with the Bulgarian Ministry of Justice. The project started in February 2015 and aims at securing better understanding on the Law and improving the coordination of institutions and civil society in cases of domestic violence.

Implemented Projects:

1.    “Provision of sustainable legal and psycho-social support of persons victims of domestic violence and discrimination in Plovdiv region” funded by the OAK Foundation (2013-2014). The main programs of the project are: legal, psycho-social counseling, couple counseling, job seeking consultancy and work with perpetrators of domestic violence. The team ensures legal representation before national, regional and international courts. The activities are provided in the Counseling center of the Foundation in the city of Plovidv, 38 “4 of January” str., entr. B, fl. 2, apt. 4 
2.    “Provision of sustainable legal and psycho-social support of persons victims of domestic violence and discrimination in Plovdiv region” funded by the OAK Foundation (2012-2013).
3.    “Empowering women economically”, funded by the Global Fund for Women Catapult platform (September 2013-June 2014). The project led to the creation of a Women’s Resource Centre in Plovdiv where Minority women (Roma and Turkish ethnic minorities), victims of domestic violence and single mothers who rely on social welfare are provided skills-building trainings on Information and communication technology (ICT) and English language courses, and Legal and Career counseling to ensure them confidence to meet market demand in a globalizing economy.

The GAF team is well known to the general public in Plovdiv as it has been working for decades against gender-based violence. It used to implement projects as part of the Bulgarian Gender Research Foundation – Plovdiv Branch (BGRF-Plovdiv). Due to the perceived needs for acquiring operational and financial freedom, the GAF was established.

Projects which were implemented by the GAF's Team as part of the former BGRF-Plovdiv Branch:

1    “Pilot scheme for collaboration with Police in helping women victims of gender based crimes with free legal aid” was a program sponsored by OSI – Sofia and COLPI in 2003 and 2004. Its main aim was to create a working scheme for cooperation between the civil society and the police when providing legal aid to women – victims of gender based crimes – domestic violence, trafficking in women, sexual harassment at the work place, rape and lechery.

2    “Enforcement of the Frame Convention for Protection of National Minorities”, accomplished together with the Association of Roma Women and Children – Plovdiv, the Association for Democratic Initiatives – Macedonia and other 6 NGOs from the Balkan region in 2003 and 2004. It was sponsored by the BHRN and the Danish Government.

3     “Sustainable partnership between the Police and NGOs in Sofia and Plovdiv – for creating and enforcing new European standards for helping the victims of domestic violence and sexual violence”, supported by OSI and Canadian Agency for International Development in 2004 and 2005. Its main goal was to implement and elaborate the European standards for supporting and providing help to victims of domestic violence and sexual abuse.

4  “Promoting the Rights of Minorities and Enhancing Intercommunity Understanding in SEE”, accomplished together with the Association “Office for self-help – Stolipinovo”, Association for Democratic Initiatives – Macedonia and other NGOs from the Balkan region. It was sponsored by BHRN in 2004-2005.

5    “Balkan Program of Gender Equality for Employment”, accomplished together with the Foundation “CRRD” – Albania and other NGOs from Macedonia and Kossovo. It was sponsored by BHRN in 2005-2006.

6    The Project “Effective protection for vulnerable groups of people in Sofia and Plovdiv”, sponsored by OSI – Sofia in 2005-2006.

7    “Protection of victims of domestic violence in the region of Plovdiv and providing them with free legal aid”, financed by the Government of Switzerland in 2005-2006.

8     “Coordinated efforts towards building an enabling environment for sustainable and effective implementation of the Bulgarian Law on Protection against Domestic Violence” - a 2-year project of the Bulgarian Gender Research Foundation, “Demetra” Association- Burgas  and Bulgarian Fund for Women, 2007-2008.

9    "Empowering Bulgarian women through counseling and litigation on employment discrimination cases", funded by Filia, 2008.
The project aimed at researching the needs and attitudes of women and at ensuring legal for women victims of employment discrimination, ensuring them counselling and legal                representation, in order to empower them to seek and protect their human rights.

10    “Supporting women victims of domestic violence through litigation”, sponsored by OAK, 2009-2010.

11    “Let’s Say NO to Violence and Discrimination – Your Voice Matters!” – A youth project targeting young people aged 14-25 years. The project focused on violence and discrimination through the methods of non-formal education. It proposed new approaches to combating those negative social phenomena and gave information to young people how to recognize different types of human rights violations. The project was supported by the European Youth Foundation.

12     “Legal support for particularly vulnerable domestic violence victims such as foreign women; migrant women; Bulgarian women married or having relationships with foreigners; disabled women; minority women; and women victims of multiple discrimination”, supported by OAK Foundation, 2011-2012.

13    “Establishing and implementing a complex of innovative social services in the community for prevention and overcoming social exclusion of persons suffered domestic violence in the cities of Sofia, Plovdiv and Dimitrovgrad” – January 2011 – March 2012. The project was funded by European Structural Funds through Development of Human Resources Programme. The main activities of the project included the provision of free of charge social services – legal, psycho-social, married and couple counseling, job search consultancy, therapy sessions with perpetrators of domestic violence. Cooperating with key state and local institutions on the issues of domestic violence was also an essential element of the project.

Partnership agreements, collaboration and membership

 Partnership agreements were signed with all the relevant stakeholders at local level in order to ensure effective implementation of the programmes of the Counseling centre.

These are the Police, the Probation office, the Municipality as well as several district municipalities, the Municipal Commission for fight against trafficking in human beings, the Social services, the Medical services.

GAF works also with many relevant NGOs, including the Bulgarian Red Cross, Our Children Foundation, National Alliance of people with Rare Deceases, Bulgarian Association for Family Planning and Sexual Health, and experts.

In addition, collaborative agreements were achieved with the Court and the Prosecutor office, the Municipal Centre for prevention of crime of Minors and IGA Foundation.
GAF began collaboration with the European College of Economics and Management and the Plovdiv University “Paisii Hilendarsi” – Department of Education.

GAF works in partnership with many other NGOs from Bulgaria, the Balkan region, Europe and the Globe, such as: Foundation “Animus Association”; Association “SOS Families in distress”; “Gender Project for Bulgaria” Foundation; PULS Foundation; Centre “Dinamika”; “Knowledge, success, change” Association; “Amalipe” Foundation; ZONTA Club-Plovdiv; Panacea Foundation - Plovdiv; Social Action and Practices Institute; ROMA Foundation; Association of Roma Women and Children; Coalition “Sexual and Health Rights of Marginalized Communities” – Macedonia; People Opposing Patriarchy – Hungary; Federation for Women and Family Planning – Poland; Center for Support and Development of Civic Initiatives “Resonance” – Moldova; Human Rights Asylum Advocacy Office – Romania; IWRAW-Asia Pacific, and others.

GAF become member of: ASTRA and ASTRA Youth, AWID, WAVE, WIDE, ESCR-Net, You Act.

Mission

Our mission is to work towards the protection and empowerment of women and girls in all spheres of public and private life so that they realize their full potential in a just and unbiased society.

Through our guiding principle, we strive to address a number of structural inequalities which are layered in social organization and mindset, and present the building blocks of gender based discrimination and violence. The issues we devote our efforts to are combating the historical gender inequalities which assign women and girls a subordinate role in society and the family, making their contribution and participation unrecognized and undervalued. We try to work with society and its individual members in parallel so that we ensure raising public awareness on the pervasive negative effects of patriarchal structure and protecting the rights of the vulnerable through giving them the chance to be actors on their own.
     

The main objectives of the GAF and its Team are:

• Achieving a balanced civil society with equal chances and equal representation of men and women and of different ethnic groups in the public and private spheres. 
• Conducting gender research in all spheres of social life.
• Work with young people to secure meaningful youth participation;
• Supporting people in difficult social and economic situation, victims of violence and discrimination, those in need for protection and help for their social integration.
• Protecting and realizing the Universal and European standards for human rights and taking up initiatives for bringing Bulgarian legislation in conformity with these standards.

The Foundation accomplishes its objectives through: 

> Conducting legal, social, economic and other kinds of research, studies, publications, and monitoring in order to keep and promote the human rights and the standards of equality;

> Drafting proposals for amendments in the Bulgarian legislation concerning human rights, freedom from discrimination and equality of men and women in all spheres of life;

> Elaborating, organizing and accomplishing projects related to gender issues;

> Organizing round tables, seminars and other forms of discussions on the issues of gender and human rights;

> Working out a program for gender research and education;

> Implementing education on human rights of workers, entrepreneurs, state administrators, lawyers and students, other non-governmental organizations;

> Creating and publishing practical guides and theoretical studies on gender problems and human rights;

> Activities towards setting up human rights networks in the Republic of Bulgaria and the region and their integration within the international and European structures and other kinds of activities for the purposes of the Foundation within the frame of the Bulgarian legislation in force.

Short history of the GAF’s Team activities:

The Team works on pro-active research, education, legal counseling, campaigning and lobbying for legislative changes in the field of gender equality and women's rights. Violence against women and socio-economic rights of women make the main focus of the its activities.

-    In the period 2002-2003, the Team worked on draft legislation related to women’ rights in Bulgaria: proposing a Draft for a Law on Protection against Domestic Violence (adopted in March 2005), participation in the working groups for the elaboration of a Draft Act on Equal Opportunities, Draft Act on Protection against Discrimination (in force since 2004), Draft Act for combating trafficking in human beings (in force since 2004).
-    Since 2002, the Team is providing legal aid for women victims of domestic violence;
-    Since 2004, the Team is part of the organization of the Women’s Human Rights Training Institute (WHRTI) for young lawyers from Eastern Europe - an initiative of the BGRF, the Network of East-West Women (NEWW) and the Center for reproductive Rights (CRR). The Institute is a 2-years’ programme focused on building litigation skills on three main issues: employment discrimination, violence against women and reproductive rights, with special focus on multiple discrimination. After successful Three rounds (2004-2006; 2007-2009; 2009-2011), a Fourth round is in s process of implementation.
-    Since 2004, the Team has been working with partner organizations on the implementation of the Law on Protection against Domestic Violence through the application of two main approaches - interdisciplinary support for victims of DV (legal, social, psychological support) and coordinated community response to domestic violence;
-    Since 2005, the Team has been part of a programme for combating discrimination on different grounds providing legal aid and support of victims of employment discrimination as well as gender based discrimination and multiple discrimination;

The GAF Team includes:

A network of 7 lawyers (5 women and 2 men), 2 psychologists, 1 social worker, 2 philologists - all of us involved in the implementation of projects for protection and empowerment of women and girls.

We specialize in working with the Bulgarian legislation on violence against women and girls, and discrimination as well as in the use of the regional and international instruments for human rights protection such as the ECHR, CEDAW, ICCPR, EU law.

Milena Kadieva is the Managing Director of the GAF. She is a lawyer who leads the team as well as the decision-making process. She has 11 years of professional experience, 9 of which in the field of women’s human rights protection. One of her tasks is to litigate cases before the ECtHR and UN Human Rights Treaty Bodies. She was a participant at the first round of the Women's Human Rights Training Institute (WHRTI) in 2004-2006 (www.institute.bgrf.org).

Tatyana Riskova is a Lawyer with 10 years of professional experience, 7 of which in the field of women’s human rights protection. She is a member of the Board of the GAF. She was a participant of the second round of WHRTI (2007-2009).

Rada Elenkova is a Philologist with 5 years of experience in managing projects related to women and girls' human rights protection and promotion. She is a member of the Board of Directors and coordinates the activities of the GAF.

Milen Neykov is a Lawyer with more than 17 years of professional experience, 11 of which in the field of women’s human rights protection.

Yanitsa Stoilova graduated Law in 2006 and specialized Psychology in the last 3 years. She was a participant at the second round of the WHRTI (2007-2009).

Janeta Borissova - a Lawyer, with 8 years of professional experience, 3 of which in the field of women’s human rights protection, participant in the third round of the WHRTI – 2009-2011).

Vesselin Kovachev - a Lawyer with 10 years of professional experience, 4 of which in the field of women’s human rights protection.

Mariana Kavardjikova - a Lawyer with 9 years of professional experience, 3 of which in the field of women’s human rights protection.

Mariyana Filipova - a Psychologist with 7 years of experience in the area of women’s human rights protection.

Anna Dimova - a social worker and a pedagogue, with more than 8 years of experience. She is engaged with the program for perpetrators of domestic violence.

Emiliya Mazneva - the newest member of the GAF team. She has a MA in Law and is a promising women's human rights advocate.