Partnersglobal

Crs serbia- the civil society resilience activity (csra) in serbia is a five-year project funded by the united states agency for international development (usaid) and the swiss agency for development and cooperation (sdc) that seeks to contribute to a more inclusive and pluralistic serbian society by improving the legal environment for civil society, public understanding of civil society's contributions to the development of serbian society, and the ability of civil society in serbia to be more transparent, accountable, and representative of its constituents. Csra is implemented by partnersglobal (partners) in partnership with dt institute, the european center for not-for-profit law (ecnl), gradjanske inicijative (civic initiatives), and partneri serbija (partners serbia). The goal of the proposed csrs project is as follows: civil society is more resilient to shrinking civic space challenges and able to better perform its watchdog, advocacy, and citizen engagement roles because of an improved enabling environment. When achieved, the program goal will support the overarching usaid/serbia development objective one: "resiliency of democratic actors increased, and intermediate result 1.2: "informed citizen participation increased.during this fiscal, the activities focused on the 25 resiliency nodesthe key actors of the project in catalyzing change by serving as local resource hubs connecting diverse civil society actors within and between their communities. The nodes networking and planning event held in july 2024 was the catalyst for their activities, providing an opportunity for the nodes to map their organizational ecosystems, articulate clear three-year resiliency goals, and deepen their understanding of csra's mission and their role within the program.

Gender based violence (gbv) is a significant and pervasive problem in iraq in general and basra governorate specifically, driven by a variety of social, cultural, economic, religious, and political factors. Partnersglobal, in collaboration with baghdad-based office partners iraq and local partner iraqi al firdaws society, will work to create the conditions necessary to reduce cases of gbv. Safe spaces supports the ministry of the interior (moi) in basra to create a supportive and safe environment for survivors to report cases of gbv. At the same time, the project engages communities through trusted leaders to build more supportive and survivor-centered attitudes and behaviors. The project's results will be shared with the government of iraq to encourage replication and scaling of successes.in this fiscal, the project focused on two primary activities: the police training under activity 1.4 and the media campaign under activity 2.2. Despite the challenges posed by the religious months of muharram and safar, which led to the postponement of some training sessions, we successfully completed the final groups for the gender sensitivity and human rights training for police in basra. These sessions, which were developed based on the gender assessment, targeted trainers working with female police officers and were designed to foster a more gender-sensitive police force. By finalizing activity 1.4, we have laid a solid foundation for the subsequent activities under objective 1. Simultaneously, our media campaign under activity 2.2 remained in full operation throughout the july-september 2024 quarter. This campaign has been vital in raising awareness about gbv and promoting a supportive environment for survivors. In the following sections, we will delve into the progress made for each objective, providing a detailed breakdown of how each activity and indicator has contributed to our overall project goals. Al-firdaws resumed activity 1.4, which involves police training in basra, after a break for ramadan and eid. A new cohort of police officers participated in a four-day training on human rights, led by dr. Khouloud al-khatib, the gbv expert for the program. Furthermore, the media campaign continued with the launch of the program's pages on facebook, instagram, and x, along with other campaign tools, in collaboration with al-firdaws organization team. Additionally, al-firdaws conducted regular steering committee meetings to discuss the activities and outcomes of the program within this quarter including the community dialogues and police training.

The project implements its proposed plan of action to reduce gender gaps in human rights institutions and in society and prevent tfgbv (technology facilitated gender based violence) against women in politics and w/hrds by supporting active youth groups, as well as supporting women's institutions and giving priority to the comprehensive safety of the institution and its employees. This project specifically addresses gender-based violence (gbv) online as well as its correlation to offline gbv through in-depth research that will provide an evidence-base to outline needs and recommendations to address this issue, as well as trainings in digital security specifically addressing and considering the gender perspective. In order to increase long-term positive impacts of this project, partnersglobal in coordination with 7amleh provided trainings to trainers on gender-sensitive digital security in order to increase the availability of digital security trainers skilled in this topic, and create a guidebook on gender-sensitive digital security.