BHRS welcomed partners from EU East Partnership countries - Georgia, Moldova, Ukraine and Armenia – in Riga on August 27-28, 2024 for a Human Rights Guide workshop.
With the Guide already launched in Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine BHRS is very happy to welcome a new country to the Guide network – Armenia – where Europe in Law NGO will be responsible for the Guide’s development and expansion. The project will provide Armenia with the Guide - an online, community-oriented, universal and easy-to-use platform for human rights education and self-help.
For Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine it is expected that the Guides in these countries will be supplemented with additional themes, tests, rights and case-law that are most relevant considering the human rights issues prevalent.
The workshop included project partners from the Kyiv Human Rights Hub (Ukraine), the Moldovan Human Rights Embassy (Moldova), the Georgian Foundation for the Support of Legal Education of GYLA (Georgia) and Europe in Law NGO (Armenia), which will ensure the adaptation of the Guide’s content and the implementation of the Guide in their respective countries.
The workshop was coordinated and chaired by Agnese Koligina, Executive Director of the Baltic Human Rights Society, Arina Melse, Lead Researcher, and Eitvydas Zurba, Head of the Guide Network.
The first day of the working group opened with an address by Pauls Gailītis, the Third Secretary of the Development Cooperation Department at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Latvia. The partners discussed the Guide’s status in all countries of the Network, coordinated the project activities for the foreseeable future and talked about dissemination with Elina Rancane, Project and Communication Coordinator, chiming in to talk about the vision of future campaigns on social media.
The first day was concluded with a visit to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Latvia where the partners were welcomed by Egita Lase, Director of Economic Relations and Development Cooperation Policy Department, other distinguished colleagues from the Ministry, as well as Ieva Rācenāja, Director of the Riga Graduate School of Law. The partners had the ability to share information about the human rights situation in their countries and discuss the impact that the Guide already had.
On the second day, partners discussed various practical aspects of the Guide’s implementation in partner countries: research plans, content elaboration and opportunities for the future of the Guide.
The project is financially supported by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Latvia under the "Development Cooperation Projects and International Aid" Programme. The project in Eastern partnership coutries is being supported by its associate partners the Ombudsman of the Republic of Latvia, the Riga Graduate School of Law, 2022 Nobel prize winner Center for Civil Liberties (Ukraine), the People's Advocate of Moldova, the Equality Council of Moldova and the Grigol Robakidze University Georgia.
