The second module of the training on Health and Budgets aimed for civil organizations in Republic of Macedonia will be held in the period from 11 to 13 December 2014 at the hotel Sirius in Strumica. The training will be attended by 25 representatives from  14 citizen associations in R.Macedonia. The training will be dedicated to several topics, such as: tools for budget analysis, techniques for reading and monitoring budgets, other methodologies for social accountability, etc. The training will be conducted by the following trainers: Darko Antik, coordinator of the program for monitoring and budget analysis from the Association ESE, Borjan Pavlovski, coordinator of the program for public health and women’s health from the Association ESE and Vanco Velinov, economist at the Public Health Institute of RM.

In October 2014, the Association ESE started the realization of the USAID Women’s Legal Protection Program. This is a three-year project that ESE implements in partnership with the organizations LA STRADA and the Coalition for sexual and health rights of marginalized communities, and the main goal is to raise the level of legal protection of women victims of violence (domestic violence, trafficking in women, sexual violence, sexual workers) and discrimination. The project also includes the monitoring of court cases related to violence and discrimination against women, in order to prepare the analysis with recommendations about the improvement of the level of court protection.

On 09 December 2014, the Association ESE organized the first working meeting for preparation of templates (questionnaires) about monitoring the court cases related to gender based violence and discrimination. The working meeting was attended by representatives of vulnerable groups (women victims of discrimination and violence), civil and criminal judges, prosecutors, lawyers, representatives from relevant international organizations, as well as representatives of partner organizations included in the project.  The templates shall serve as base for data collection about the work of judges on cases related to violence and discrimination against women.

In the period from 2-3 December 2014, an expert meeting was organized by the Foundation Open Society New York in New York, which was attended by many civil organizations from the whole world that work in the area of social accountability and legal empowerment, as well as uniting the two approaches for promotion of health rights. The purpose of the meeting was to make a situational overview regarding the application of the two approaches; possibilities for documentation and learning; as well as possibilities for cooperation among civil organizations that use the respective approaches. The meeting was attended by Jasminka Friscik, executive director of ESE and Borjan Pavlovski, coordinator of the program for public health and women’s health.

The seventh European conference on public health was held in the period from 19 – 22 November 2014 in Glasgow, United Kingdom. The topic of the conference was “Minding the gap: reducing inequalities in health and health care“. The coordinator of the program for public health and women’s health from the Association ESE participated in the conference. The representative from ESE made a presentation at the workshop organized by ASPHER, entitled “Human rights in health care“, whereby he presented the activities of ESE in the field of promotion of human rights in health care with special focus on the trainings provided by ESE for professionals.  Also, the representative from ESE had a poster presentation as part of the poster session on the section about migrants and ethnic minorities’ health. The poster presentation included part of the findings from the research “We are all humans: health care for everyone regardless of the ethnicity – Situation with regard to health, health care and right to health among Roma people in Republic of Macedonia“.

In the period from 10-15 November 2014, ESE team went on a study visit to the civil organization CEGSS, Guatemala. The purpose of the visit was to exchange experiences regarding the application of social accountability and legal empowerment approaches or more specifically, the activities of CEGSS to merge these two concepts in order to promote the health status and rights of marginalized communities in Guatemala. During the study visit, ESE team participated at the advocacy activities organized by the citizens of San Bartolo and Quiche in Guatemala, and also visited two communities where events were organized on the occasion of the “Day of the right to health”. As result of the visit, further cooperation of ESE and CEGSS team was agreed regarding the merging of the two concepts/approaches for social accountability and legal empowerment of Roma in our country. The study visit was part of the activities in the area of merging the two approaches of ESE which is supported by the Foundations Open Society New York and the Foundation Open Society Macedonia.