The EU-funded Twinning project ‘Strengthening the Capacity of State Bodies and Local Level Referral Mechanisms to Provide Safety and Support to Victims of Domestic Violence in Azerbaijan’ held the second meeting of the Project Steering Committee remotely on 18February 2021.

The online meeting was attended by Project Leaders from both MS and BC partner organizations, Component Leaders, key project team from BC and MS and a representative of the EU Delegation to Baku.

Opening the meeting, Ms. Sadagat Gahramanova, BC Project Leader and Deputy Head of the State Committee for Family, Women and Children’s Affairs, welcomed the MS Project Leaders and other participants of the meeting. She provided a quick overview of the activities carried within the project over the second quarter.

“I believe we have made a successful start of the project and we will have good results at the end, too,” Ms. Gahramanova noted.

Later, MS Project Leader Ms.Audra Mikalauskaitė took the floorand said the project is progressing as planned. 

In his turn, Resident Twinning Advisor Mr. LaurynasTotoraitisshortly briefed the meeting participants about the achievements made over the first and second quarters and the activities planned for the upcoming period.

“Majority of the missions carried out in the 1^st quarter focused on fact finding, focus group meetings and distributing online questionnaires in order to collect necessary information” the RTA said.

“However, the second quarter focused on providing recommendations and proposals to specific legislative documents on domestic violence to align them with the best European practices.”

“Some of the measures set out in the recently adopted National Action Plan on Prevention of Domestic Violence for 2020-2023 well correspond with activities of the Twinning project. There is a strong will from our side as well to contribute to implementation of the Action Plan,”Totoraitis added.

Later, short-term experts Ms. Jurgita Paužaitė-Kulvinskienė and Ms. Dovilė Pūraitė-Andrikienė described in detail the proposals and recomendations developed to the legislative acts in the field of domestic violence including criminalization of domestic violence.

 

In her turn,Ms. Marjam Haji-Ismayilova, a Programme Manager at EU Delegation, said much has been implemented by the project over a short period of time. “I thank the experts for their hard work and BC for its support ,” she said

Later, Ms. Sadagat Gahramanovafinalized the meeting and thanked everyone for participation.