OSCE Gender Equality Champions

Every year the OSCE Secretary General presents Gender Equality Champion awards recognizing exceptional achievements by OSCE leaders, individual women and men, teams or projects to promote gender equality. OSCE Gender Equality Champions are nominated early in the year and the awards are presented on or around International Women’s Day on March 8. Read the stories of how the imagination and perseverance of OSCE Gender Champions are putting the OSCE’s strong commitment to gender equality into action.

OSCE staff recognized for exceptional achievements in advancing gender equality

Today, OSCE Secretary General Helga Maria Schmid acknowledged the remarkable achievements of OSCE staff in advancing gender equality and empowering women in the Organization at the fifth award ceremony held at the OSCE Permanent Council in Vienna.

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Dimitar Dimitrovski, 2023 winner of the Staff Member Award

Dimitar Dimitrovski, recipient of the 2023 Gender Equality Champion Award, has been a part of the OSCE Mission to Skopje for nearly three years. Having worked in the communication and media relations unit, he has seen first-hand the impact online abuse has on women media professionals. Astonished by what he witnessed, Dimitar made gender inclusion and equality a key component of his work.

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Julia Haas, 2023 winner of the Gender Focal Point Award

Julia Haas, an Associate Project Officer with the Office of the Representative on Freedom of the Media, is part of a new generation of OSCE staffers dedicated to ensuring our policy commitment to gender equality transforms into real life action for change.

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Strengthening gender equality the CHANGE way

CHANGE (Capitalising on the Human Dimension Mandate to Advance Gender Equality) - this year’s winner of the OSCE’s Gender Project Award – is an ongoing quest to find new and better ways to promote gender equality.

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Ambassador Alena Kupchyna, 2023 recipient of the Gender Equality Leadership Award

Ambassador Alena Kupchyna, the OSCE Co-ordinator of Activities to Address Transnational Threats and 2023 recipient of the Gender Equality Leadership Award, has been a gender champion for change throughout her distinguished diplomatic career.

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OSCE staff recognized for their dedication to advancing gender equality

OSCE Secretary General Helga Maria Schmid recognized the outstanding achievements of OSCE staff in advancing gender equality and empowering women in the OSCE at the fourth award ceremony that took place at the OSCE Permanent Council in Vienna today.

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Combating Human Trafficking begins in the workplace

It is easy to list reasons why Valiant Richey deserved to win the OSCE Gender Equality Champion award in the leadership category. As the OSCE Special Representative and Co-ordinator for Combating Trafficking in Human Beings, he consistently puts gender issues at the centre of the assistance his Office provides to the 57 OSCE participating States in the development and implementation of anti-trafficking strategies.

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Mainstreaming Gender at the OSCE Mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina

Elmaja Bavcic had to work hard to convince colleagues and partners that gender equality was worth the trouble and not just a “passing fad”. Her results speak for themselves and earned her the OSCE Gender Champion Award for 2022.

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Gender Justice, a Constitutional Right

OSCE Gender Champion Oleksandr Vodyannikov “I always like to tell my trainees that gender justice is not about men versus women. Certainly, it’s about issues like equal pay for equal work. But it’s so much more. It’s about fairness, a society where everyone’s dignity is respected; it’s about what we mean by true democracy.” One day after receiving the award of OSCE Gender Champion on 21 July 2022, Oleksandr Vodyannikov was in the Kyiv office of the OSCE Project Co-ordinator in Ukraine. At work, as usual.

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