Anzhelika Bielova presented Voice of Romni at a meeting of members of the Coalition 1325 in Zakarpattia region.

Our organization has been part of the Coalition for several years now, guided by our conviction that community recovery must include women of diverse backgrounds — Roma women among them — who are so often underrepresented in decision-making processes.

The meeting focused on an initiative to establish a regional Coalition for Gender-Responsive Recovery, part of the project “Building Gender-Inclusive Recovery Together with Ukraine’s Women’s Movement” / GEN-Recovery, implemented with the support of the Government of Norway.

During the two-day meeting, participants worked together to agree on the Coalition’s core documents and provisions, defining its goals and objectives, membership, coordination principles, and the format of future cooperation. Special attention was given to concrete steps that can be taken right now, and to building forms of cooperation that will have a real, practical impact on people’s lives in their communities.

For Voice of Romni, taking part in the Coalition is above all an opportunity to amplify the voices of Roma women in recovery processes — to make their needs visible and ensure they are taken into account in decision-making. We believe that recovery cannot be just if it fails to account for the experiences and needs of every group living within a community. That is why it matters to us not only to speak about inclusion, but to be directly involved in shaping the decisions and mechanisms that will determine the future of these communities.

We thank all the participants of the meeting for their openness, initiative, and willingness to work together. There is much work ahead. But it is precisely these kinds of partnerships that lay the groundwork for a recovery in Ukraine that is gender-responsive, inclusive, and one in which every woman’s voice truly matters.