Western Balkans: «Women are not included in the Serbia-Kosovo Agreement negotiations. With the increasing nationalism reported throughout the region, the situation for Women’s rights is likely to worsen».

Meeting held in Prishtina between the President of Kosovo, Atifete Jahjaga, and a group of young women from Kosovo and Serbia participating in the first module of the YWPA project (Kvinna till Kvinna)

The original photo has been removed due to security concerns. This group of young women from the YWPA work in a very hard environment prompted by nationalism in the Western Balkans region.

Interview with Emilija Dimoska, Program Officer for the Kvinna till Kvinna project «Young Women’s Peace Academy (YWPA) Kosovo & Serbia». This interview was made in the wake of the meeting held in Prishtina last April 22^nd between the President of Kosovo, Atifete Jahjaga, and a group of young women from Kosovo and Serbia participating in the first module of the YWPA project.

Kvinna till Kvinna (KtK) is a Swedish organisation that cooperates with women’s organisations working for women’s rights and peace. Today they support more than 130 women’s organisations in five regions afflicted by conflict: Central and Western Africa, the Middle East, the South Caucasus and the Western Balkans. In 2002, Kvinna till Kvinna received the “alternative Nobel Prize”, The Right Livelihood Award (http://www.rightlivelihood.org/).

The Young Women’s Peace Academy (YWPA) is young women empowerment project implemented by Kvinna till Kvinna in the Caucasus and Balkans. It aims at increasing young women's leadership, advocacy and communication skills and strengthening their capacity to influence policymakers at a local and international level for a positive change. Throughout the Academy, young women from Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia and Kosovo, Azerbaijan and Armenia are trained to become peace builders in their societies, to empower them to participate in formal an non formal peace processes, and to make young women´s voice heard in peace processes.

• Emilija, how did this initiative (the visit to the Kosovo's President by the group of Kosovan and Serbian Young Women) emerge?

One of the goals of the Academy is to encourage and support young women play an active role in lobbying and advocacy with relevant stakeholders, by transforming their knowledge and skills into specific actions. The meeting with the President Jahjaga was exactly one of those concrete actions.

The invitation for the meeting came by President’s Cabinet after they have heard about the initiative from one of our colleagues Igballe Rogova, distinguished activist and feminist from Kosovo who was invited as a speaker at the YWPA meeting held in Prishtina.

• The points which were discussed during the visit?

“Women are agents for peace. And Youth (both, girls and boys together) have a critical role to play in peace building, but also in country processes as for instance EU integration”, President Jahjaga declared. She also said that girls and women are advocates for peace and change in their communities, highlighting that it has been more than evident in the last decade in the relations between Kosovo and Serbia, that exactly women made the first steps towards building bridges of understanding and cooperation. Still, as she said, “Only one person, even me as a President cannot make a change, but young people jointly can do it. Young people are those who can create critical mass of thinking”.

One of the topics also discussed during the meeting was gender equality and women’s participation in decision-making. The President stated the challenges she faces on daily basis as a female politician, highlighting the gender insensitive role and influence of Media. Speaking of her role as a female high level politician in a mainly male-dominated area, President stated: “Roles and responsibilities of every President are the same, but it required more than efforts for me as what I have to prove every single day is that women can do it. We are still not equal. We pay tremendous price for being women and we have lot of challenges ahead”.

In the end of the meeting, while commending the Young Women’s Peace Academy, President Jahjaga offered young women who are part of this platform support and recommended to expand this initiative and include all countries from the entire Western Balkans region.

• Emilija, what about the result of the visit, conclusions, highlights, further commitments, etc.?

The meeting was in general short, but very inspirational for participants at the Academy who committed to continue their collaboration as part of a Platform/Network of young women from Kosovo and Serbia. The President offered young women support to launch the Platform under President’s patronage.

As activities with the same group of women from Kosovo and Serbia continue within the frames of the Young Women’s Peace Academy, more specific structure for the suggested Platform will be discussed and developed in the coming period.

• The participation in the Young Women's Peace Academy for Kosovo & Serbia, does it include Young Women from the Kosovan-Serbian community in Kosovo?

Yes. Within the Young Women’s Peace Academy, Kvinna till Kvinna is implementing activities with two groups of young women including ethnic Serbs from Kosovo, but also representative of the Boshnjak and Roma community.

• What's your opinion about the role played by Women in Kosovo and Serbia societies?

In general, Women from both Kosovo and Serbia societies have significant contribution towards democracy, promotion of the rule of law and peace building. Unquestionably women activists and women human rights defenders from both countries were the first and only after long period of time to talk to each other and start cooperation through different projects and initiatives, hence playing their role towards building sustainable peace.

• The fact that Kosovo's President is a woman does it have a special meaning for her country?

I don’t know the general people’s opinion, nevertheless, the fact that Kosovo as principally patriarchal and conservative country is run by a woman, certainly has a very positive indication and sets a good base for further advancement of the position of women in public sphere and decision-making positions and processes.

• What's the situation of Women's Rights and Gender Equality in both countries?

Although there have been some progress made mainly in terms of legislative developments re women’s rights and gender equality, there is still great number of concerns for both Kosovo and Serbia. While countries have a legislative framework in place for gender equality and anti-discrimination, there are significant gaps between legislation and implementation. Similarly, there has been positive developments regarding gender equality mechanisms and institutions, however they are weakened by insufficient political support and financing, and thus cannot operate effectively, if at all.

In addition, patriarchal values and gender stereotypes are deep-rooted and widespread throughout the Western Balkan region including Kosovo and Serbia, which makes the struggle for women’s rights highly challenging.

In terms of decision-making, there is a clear under-representation of women in political and public positions across the region. In this regard, the CEDAW Committee also express concern that women are not included in negotiations regarding outstanding issues stemming from the conflicts, e.g. the Serbia-Kosovo agreement.

Violence against women is noted as a great problem, with numerous shortcomings as regards the authorities’ response to address it.

Finally, women’s NGOs across the region report that women’s human rights activists increasingly face harassment and threats, mainly from far right groups or religious institutions, often closely linked to the political establishment. With the increasing nationalism, reported throughout the region, the situation for women’s rights is likely to worsen, as nationalist politics usually go hand in hand with a restriction of women’s rights.

• Further projects or initiatives inside of the Young Women's Peace Academy for Kosovo & Serbia to be carried out in the Western Balkans by Kvinna till Kvinna?

The Young Women’s Peace Academy Program is composed of several different components. The first training module that included fundamental concepts and theories on conflict analysis, conflict resolution, advocacy, communication and negotiation is completed. Next to come is the second module in June i.e. follow-up training with the same group of young women that will provide advanced skills and theory on the topics mentioned.

Following, the program also has a mentor scheme with peace activists that will be included in the program to ensure transfer of knowledge and experiences between participants. The aim is further to strengthen the young women, their self-esteem, and self-confidence as peace builders and support their personal development. Another component is the “small project ideas” to be implemented by participants. Young women will be able to initiate small peace projects at the level to reach out to other young, men and women potential promoters of peace.

The final component of the YWPA prescribes participation in international training with young women from all countries where the Academy is implemented (Kosovo, Serbia, BiH, Armenia, Azerbaijan). The program will culminate in the development of a Young Women’s Charter, where selected YWPA participants together will articulate their demands on international actors in the peace process to include them. The Charter will then be the key part in international and national advocacy and communication activities.

• Emilija, do you consider that Civil Society is well structured there? There is an adequate framework to promote Civil Society's participation in social and politics matters in Kosovo and Serbia?

The women’s movement in Serbia is identified/equal to Peace movement. It is very well organized and structured in spite of the lack of funds and support from the state and other actors. Similarly, the women’s movement in Kosovo is well structured. There is a very strong platform “Kosovo Women’s Network” that addresses variety of issues, especially with focus on women, young women and girls, and advocate for women’s rights; the Network impacts policy making and keeps the government accountable. Women’s movements and activists from both Kosovo and Serbia have a very good ongoing cooperation and represent an excellent example for State institutions and officials.

Nevertheless, civil societies are still struggling to improve performance in terms of impact, constituency building, public trust, sustainability, networking and advocacy to influence decision-making. Consultation of civil society in the legislative process and the involvement of relevant interest groups in policy processes remain insufficient and of low quality. In the recent years CSOs have been consulted on some particular legislative initiatives, yet no systematic dialogue or proper mechanisms are in place. Furthermore, even when civil society groups are called to consultations those remains often very formal with no concrete results regarding the policy output.

With the donors phase-out of many donors from the countries, the “shrinking space” for CSO’s is expanding.

• Please, your general assessment of the initiative.

Speaking of the YWPA in general, I’m very happy to say that there is a great commitment and readiness by participants to accept everyone on equal basis and cooperate within the group. Not all of the girls had the opportunity earlier to learn and/or hear about the topics presented and as one of them said “I have so far always used and/or understood the word “conflict” in a negative sense, but I’m very happy I now learn about its aspects and how to transform it into a positive thing”.

What has been especially touching for me personally was the statements of several girls from both Albanian and Serbian ethnic background from Kosovo who said that, though living in the same country forever, they have never had the chance to ever meet or talk to someone from the other ethnic group.

In relation to the meeting with the President of Kosovo, as mentioned before, the meeting has been very encouraging for participants at the Academy to continue with their commitments and dedicated work towards creating societies free of prejudges and violence, societies with tolerance and positive peace.

Thanks, Emilija.