Projects

Active projects

Monitoring Hate Speech at a Local Level

The Helsinki Committee for Human Rights started the implementation of the 12 months project "Monitoring Hate Speech at a Local Level" The main goal of this project is to provide a system for monitoring hate speech at local level By carrying out the activities, the team will collect primary field data, and subject it to processing, that will be published in the form of quarterly monitoring reports A novelty in this concept is that the scope will extend to detecting and registering hate speech on and out of social media The goal is to detect other media that spread hate speech, but at the same time, to determine the source through the monitoring system Тhe focus shall be on the monitoring of the discourse between sports fan groups, public events in those municipalities, the writing of graffiti (with such content), cultural and artistic events and so on The aim is to provide as much coverage as possible to the sources of hate speech and thus to give a clearer picture of this... »
Donor: FOSM
Timeframe: December 2018 - December 2019 Budget: 33.932 USD

The time is now

“The Time is Now: Consolidating Regional Efforts for Advancing LGBTI Rights and Equality in the Western Balkans and Turkey”, is a regional project implemented by the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights of the Republic of Macedonia – LGBTI Support Center; ERA-LGBTI Equal Rights Association for Western Balkans and Turkey, Serbia; IGLYO (Belgium) and other organizations from Albania, Kosovo, Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Turkey, Serbia and Montenegro The project will be implemented for a period of three years starting from January 2018 This project is perceived as the right step in further consolidation of regional cooperation, networking and partnerships among LGBTI organizations but also other important partners such as governments, public authorities, human rights institutions, international organizations and the broader community of friends and supporters of LGBTI people globally The overall objective of this project is to advocate and improve protection of human rights... »
Donor: EU
Timeframe: 2018 - 2010 Budget: 1.100.000 EUR

Women have rights!

The project objective is to improve the mechanisms for protection of women’s rights in the country through several interventions Initially, it develops capacities of CSO’s to use the Operational Protocol for CEDAW to initiate communications in front of the Committee; to advocate and represent women’s human rights in cases of gender-based discrimination and violence; to increase public awareness among women regarding the human rights and protection mechanisms arising from OP–CEDAW and to train officials in institutions on the standards of the Istanbul Convention Through a separate component, the project provides free legal aid in and outside of Skopje for women and girls who survived gender-based violence, thus providing representation at court for girls and women, victims of gender based and domestic violence Duration: 01012018 –... »
Donor: UnWomen (through EU financed programme)
Timeframe: 01.01.2018 – 01.11.2019 Budget: 2.770.430 MKD

Towards a safe, stimulating and rehabilitative prison environment for children and juveniles in conflict with the law in Albania, Kosovo and Macedonia (2017 – 2021)

This project is implemented by the Netherlands Helsinki Committee in partnership with the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights of the Republic of Macedonia, the Albanian Helsinki Committee and the Kosovo Rehabilitation Center for torture victims The Helsinki Committee, is a partner in implementing a regional project in order to contribute to the reform of the prison systems in Albania, Kosovo and Macedonia The project aims to improve the opportunities for successful reintegration of children in conflict with the law that are serving a sentence in a correctional institution Within the project, the activities envisage introducing official working methods for the staff in the institutions and integrating these methods into official policies and curricula in educational institutions At the same time, the project team will work on the strengthening of capacities of prison staff and management and representatives of the Ministries of Justice in all three... »
Donor: Тhe Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Kingdom of Netherlands
Timeframe: May 2018 - May 2022 Budget: 28.575 EUR

Life behind bars!

The Helsinki Committee for Human Rights will implement a ten-month project to address the violations of prisoners’ human rights, which occur as a result of the corruption in the prison system in the Republic of Macedonia Within the project, the Committee will monitor the situation and conditions in the penitentiary system through field visits to all prisons in the country and will provide free legal assistance to convicted persons The activities shall raise public awareness about the corruption in the prison system, aiming to change the discriminatory perception in the public towards this vulnerable... »
Donor: Тhe US Government through the US Embassy
Timeframe: 15.08.2018 - 31.07.2019 Budget: 24.000 USD

Enhancing Human Rights

The aim of the Project is to strengthen the national anti-discrimination mechanisms through capacity building of the relevant state institutions and civil society organizations, as well as to further develop the legal framework and increase public awareness for these phenomenaThe Project also aims to tackle hate crime and hate speech through improved legislation, awareness raising, continued capacity building and monitoring and registering of bias... »
Donor: OSCE Mission
Timeframe: 15.02.2019 – 15.12.2019 Budget: 27.500 EUR

Legal empowerment of textile workers for self-advocacy

The project, financed by FOSM, aims to prevent and reduce violations of labor rights of textile workers through their legal empowerment and documentation of cases of violation of their labour rights The legal empowerment will include training of paralegals among the textile workers, which will work on raising awareness and informing the other textile workers regarding their labour rights The paralegals will provide paralegal aid by documenting cases of violation of labour rights and referring those cases to legal adviser which will address those cases in front of the relevant institutions The project should encourage and stimulate the self-advocacy of the textile workers in the policy making processes by providing them the opportunity to participate in the working groups for drafting the relevant policies, laws and bylaws and by stimulating the textile workers for establishing trade unions The activities will also raise awareness through infographics which will inform the general... »
Donor: FOSM
Budget: 40.000 USD

Improved productivity through better labour legislation in Macedonia

The goal of the project is to increase the productivity of workers in Macedonia by improving the legal framework for labour relations The project will provide two analyses which on the one hand will offer a comprehensive overview of the current situation and on the other hand will give recommendations for the improvement of the legal framework in accordance with international standards In addition, the project team will be monitoring the inspection supervision and will constantly inform the public about the situation with labour rights, which will contribute to the raising of public awareness about access to services for protection of workers' rights The project will also provide legal assistance to victims of violations of labour rights for at least 40 cases in order to improve access to justice for... »
Donor: The Good Governance Fund of Great Britain
Timeframe: 1.08.2018 – 31.03.2019 Budget: 56.122 GBP

Improved productivity through better labour legislation in North Macedonia (II)

The goal of the project is to increase the productivity of workers in North Macedonia by improving the legal framework for labour relations The project shall provide a comprehensive overview of the current situation and it will give recommendations for the improvement of the legal framework in accordance with international standards In addition, the project team will be monitoring the inspection supervision and will constantly inform the public about the situation with labour rights, which will contribute to the raising of public awareness about access to services for protection of workers’ rights The project will also provide legal assistance to victims of violations of labour rights for at least 120 cases in order to improve access to justice for... »
Donor: The Good Governance Fund of Great Britain
Timeframe: 15.04.2019 – 31.03.2021 Budget: 188.320 GBP

Community-based legal empowerement in the process of deinstitutionalization

The project addresses the unequal access to services for children with disability and their families Having in mind that the goal of the process of deinstitutionalization is providing help and support through the non-institutional forms of social protection, this project will provide direct legal aid and support to the children with disability and their families through the day-care centers, within their local community The activities will include conducting training for parents, guardians and care givers for recognizing discrimination or violation of rights and the available mechanisms for protection, training of officials from the free legal aid departments, as well as providing free legal aid in cases of discrimination and violation of... »
Donor: Unicef
Timeframe: August 1 2019 - July 31, 2020 Budget: 2.063.342 MKD

Против говорот на омраза во Западен Балкан

За време на пандемијата имаше евидентен пораст на говорот на омраза низ регионот на Западен Балкан и станува очигледно дека јавната свест за препознавање на различни форми на дискриминација и можноста за нејзино спречување и заштита е ниска, особено во однос на здравствената криза со каква што досега не сме се соочиле Според сопствената мониторинг анализа и регионалното мапирање, Хелсиншкиот комитет регистрираше удвојување на говорот на омраза од појавата на пандемијата – особено говорот на омраза кон групите во неповолна положба... »
Donor: Civil Rights Defenders Timeframe: јули 2021- декември 2024 Budget: 59.000 ЕУР

Anti-hate speech in Western Balkan

During the pandemic there was an evident rise of hate speech across the region of Western Balkans and it becomes evident that the public awareness for the recognition of various forms of discrimination and the possibility of its prevention and protection is low, especially in light to a health crisis like we have not faced before According to its own monitoring analysis and regional mapping, the Helsinki Committee registered doubling of hate-speech since the emergence of the pandemic – especially hate speech against disadvantages groups This calls for the need of awareness raising and campaigning, during the crises and in the after-crises period On the basis of Helsinki Committee’s vigorous monitoring of fundamental rights vs the spread of the pandemic in the country and the consequent mitigation measures, we were able to produce original data that would fundamentally benefit the public on enabling sense of tolerance among citizens Finally, from this action decision-makers will... »
Donor: Civil Rights Defenders
Timeframe: July 2021- December 2024 Budget: Budget: 59.000 ЕУР

Enhancing Access to Justice in North Macedonia

MHC has been providing monitoring of human rights in North Macedonia since the beginning of its work, while starting from 2015 this service has been established a special program and tailored to the needs of the vulnerable and marginalized groups in the society Since then the sustainability of this program is one of the main priorities of MHC, therefore we have developed a sustainable program for provision of free legal aid with which this service remains active for all targeted groups aside from the available project funding The free legal aid service has been recognized and utilized by a wide range of people in need, which is evident from the number of free legal aid requests we receive annually The institutional monitoring system that will be devised and put in place with this project that will enable the Committee to actively participate in the policy making process among institutional beneficiaries This will enable the organizations to timely and adequately react to certain... »
Donor: Ministero degli Affari Esteri e della Cooperazione Internazionale
Timeframe: 01.12.2021-20.11.2022 Budget: 26.981 EUR

Empowering local organizations for advocacy on gender equality (as part of the action: Furthering Gender Equality through the EU Accession Process)

The overall objective of the Action is to increase participation of local CSOs in creating gender sensitive policies within the EU integration processes through joint advocacy initiatives The long term aim is to enable knowledge sharing mechanism to exchange for lessons learned and best practices in advocating local needs and constraints of selected target groups in the EU accession process, particularly gender equality This long aim will be achieved through direct engagement of target groups (as represented through the selected CSOs) to produce filed-based and evidence-based inputs on selected issues regarding gender equality In addition, this aim will be achieved through mentorship and direct support to develop and sustain internal capacity to analyse, identify and advocate for key issues within a structured format The expected impact of the Action is enabling structured mechanisms of local CSOs in the area of gender equality to successfully engage in policy making processes... »
Donor: Funded by the European Union and co-funded by the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency
Timeframe: January 1, 2022 – December 31, 2024 Budget: 15.000 EUR