Ahead of International Women’s Day, new UNICEF, Plan International and UN Women report highlights that gains have been made, but efforts remain insufficient.

This report has been elaborated by the Ministry of the Interior in collaboration with the Women’s Law Centre in the context of the work of the Commission on Monitoring and Analysis of Domestic Violence Cases Resulting in Death or Serious Injury of Victims with the financial support of UN Women and Sweden.

Femicide represents the most extreme manifestation of gender-based violence against women and girls. Very often such killings are not isolated incidents but rather the culmination of pre-existing forms of gender-based violence that affect all regions and countries worldwide. Broadly speaking, femicides or gender-related killings of women and girls are committed in different settings, within the private sphere and beyond, for gender-related motives. Such motives are rooted in societal norms and stereotypes that consider women as subordinate to men, as well as in discrimination towards women and girls, inequality and unequal power relations between women and men in society. Gender-related motives characterize the context in which these crimes are committed, which also distinguishes them from other intentional killings of women and girls unrelated to gender motives. This report was originally released by UN Women HQ.

In its first year of operation, the Integrated Regional Service for Victims of Sexual Violence in Moldova assisted 58 victims. Located in Ungheni, the service offers medical, legal, psychological and social support in one place, covering six districts—Ungheni, Fălești, Sîngerei, Călărași, Nisporeni and Telenești. The service is funded by the EU and piloted by the International Centre “La Strada” through the EVOLVE4GE project, implemented by UN Women.

Since the Ukraine war began in February 2022, Moldova has been a crucial transit and destination country for refugees. By August 2024, Moldova recorded 1,157,864 border crossings from Ukraine, showing resilience despite being one of Europe’s poorest countries. This crisis has strained Moldova’s resources, as 900,107 return crossings to Ukraine highlight the dynamic migration patterns. Challenges persist, particularly in integrating women and children into the labor market. Ukrainian refugee women face higher unemployment rates, especially outside Chisinau, where job opportunities are limited. They are concentrated in lower-paying sectors and often seek flexible work due to caregiving responsibilities, which clashes with local employers' preferences for full-time roles. Moldova has introduced childcare services and initiatives to aid integration, yet a more gender-sensitive approach is necessary. Priorities include expanding language courses, recognizing qualifications, and improving access to job opportunities, helping to build a more inclusive labor market for refugees and the Moldovan economy.

From September 5-6, 2024, we, 60 women leaders and representatives from women-led organizations across Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, the Republic of Moldova, and Ukraine gathered in Chisinau, Moldova to share views, experiences and best practices related to the implementation of Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) commitments.

Donor: Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Denmark. Geographical Coverage: Europe and Central Asia, with interventions in the Republic of Moldova, Ukraine and Georgia. Implementing period: 2024-2027.

Lessons learned from around the world indicate that supporting women's meaningful leadership and participation through a variety of formal and informal mechanisms has proven to be a catalyst for unlocking stalled processes and securing a longer lasting and more equitable peace. To encourage a reinvigorated peace process in Moldova, and in keeping with its mandate, UN Women's Moldova Country Office has commissioned this analysis to provide actors in Moldova with a set of recommended practices - and those that are not recommended - from across the globe to promote women's meaningful participation in the settlement process.

The Women’s Peace and Humanitarian Fund (WPHF) is a global partnership that empowers local women to be a force for crisis response and lasting peace by stimulating funding for women’s participation, leadership, and empowerment in situations of conflict and humanitarian crisis. As a funding mechanism designed to support women-led and women’s rights organizations in crisis settings and following the invasion of the Ukraine by the Russian government in February 2022, WPHF activated a regional emergency response to the crisis, supporting women’s organizations in both Ukraine and Moldova. Through a series of targeted Calls for Proposals, as part of its emergency track, WPHF launched Phase 1 and Phase 2 of its targeted response in March and April 2022, respectively. This publication presents the key results of WPHF partners in 2023 to document the successful achievements and contribution by CSOs to the Refugee Response Plan.

The Centre for Partnership for Development (CPD) has been monitoring parliamentary and local elections for about 15 years, analysing women's representation in elections, voter perceptions, political party funding, etc. with the aim of highlighting the main inequalities in terms of women's and men's participation in electoral processes; society's perceptions of women's presence in political life, etc. As part of the observation mission for the 2023 general local elections, CPD aimed to analyse trends in relation to previous elections. 

Over two years since the escalation of the conflict in Ukraine, the needs of refugee households displaced from Ukraine to Moldova have evolved, in line with the length of their displacement, dwindling resources and a greater need for reintegration support. In mid-2023, a Multi-Sector Needs Assessment (MSNA) was launched in Moldova to provide up-to-date multi-sectoral data about the needs and coping capacities of these households to inform the 2024 Ukraine Situation Regional Refugee Response Plan (RRP). To further assess how needs, coping capacity, and resilience differs for women, men, people with disabilities, and people of different age groups, UN Women conducted a targeted analysis of needs along gender and inclusion lines based on the REACH 2023 MSNA data.

The Gender Task Force (hereafter referred to as GTF) is a network of actors working to mainstream gender1 across the Moldova refugee response with the aim of ensuring that all persons in the Republic of Moldova (Moldova) affected by the Ukrainian refugee crisis, have equitable access to quality and targeted humanitarian assistance, and can meaningfully participate in an equitable, effective, and efficient response. This Year in Review highlights the accomplishments achieved by the GTF, acknowledges impact and outlines challenges and ways forward.

In the context of International Women’s Day, UN Women launched an essay writing competition with the subject “INVEST IN WOMEN: ACCELERATE PROGRESS”. The competition was organised with financial support from EU and Sweden. The contest called on Gender Equality Advocates and feminist change-makers around the country to identify ways to invest more in women’s rights and gender equality and motivate why increased investments are needed. In this publication, we have gathered the winning essays of the competition.

The Gender Accountability Framework (GAF) is an inter-agency tool that helps humanitarian actors track their performance against global commitments to address gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.

On October 12–13, 2023, UN Women Moldova hosted an international conference titled “Women lead the way: strengthening a localized and gender responsive approach to refugee response and peacebuilding,” in Chisinau. The conference was organized to provide a platform for both international and national representatives of civil society organizations and coalitions, international organizations, government officials, academics, and other stakeholders to deliberate and contemplate the implementation of the Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) Agenda in the Republic of Moldova (Moldova) and its pertinence within the Humanitarian- Development-Peace (HDP) nexus, particularly in the context of the refugee response and Transnistrian region conflict settlement efforts.

Violence against women and girls is the most pervasive human rights violation. The gender-related killings of women and girls represent the lethal end point of a continuum of gender-based violence, and they usually follow prior experiences of physical, sexual, or emotional abuse. With the aim of galvanizing global action against this crime, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime and UN Women are publishing this second joint publication with global estimates of gender-related killings of women and girls by an intimate partner or family member, with data from 2022.

This evaluation brief presents a summary of the key findings, conclusions, and recommendations, as identified by the evaluators. More details can be found in the full evaluation report.

To inform the planning process of the Refugee Response Plan for 2024, the Platform for Gender Equality, Gender Centru and UN Women organized a series of consultations with women-led (WLOs) and women rights organisations (WROs), as well as refugee women. This consultation sought to promote collaboration among local organisations and refugee women leaders in advancing gender equality within the refugee response in Moldova. This publication is a summary of key findings and recommendations from the consultations, which can be used to inform ongoing and future refugee response efforts in Moldova.

The resulting report presents key findings and recommendations based on the results of interviews and focus group discussions with 58 Moldovan CSO representatives and front-line professionals carried out in March and April 2023, as well as the results of a survey conducted with almost two hundred CSOs in Moldova from January to February 2023.

The Gender Task Force (GTF) is a network of actors working to mainstream gender across the Refugee Response in the Republic of Moldova (Moldova) with the aim of ensuring that all persons in Moldova affected by the Ukrainian refugee crisis of ensuring that all persons in Republic of Moldova affected by the Ukrainian refugee crisis, have equitable access to quality and targeted humanitarian assistance, and can meaningfully participate in an equitable, effective, and efficient response. The Annual Report aims to take stock of the results achieved by the GTF, show the impact that individual GTF members and the collective made on the response, acknowledge gaps and identify how to best focus shared efforts moving forward.