The grant application for the project entitled “Combating Discrimination in Turkey through Documenting and Reporting” has been selected by the Delegation of the European Commission to Turkey for financing under the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR). The project expected to commence on the 1 February 2009 aims at contributing to reveal ongoing discrimination practices and strengthening the mechanisms that work towards combating discrimination in Turkey.

In order to reach this objective the project aims to enhance the role of civil society in addressing the issue of discrimination based on race or ethnic origin, religion or belief, disability, and sexual orientation. Taking the representatives of non-governmental organisations and community based organisations, trade union representatives and lawyers as the target group of the project, following activities will be undertaken: 

• Mapping exercise on NGOs and trade unions that conduct work to fight discrimination 
• Networking seminar with the purpose of encouraging and enhancing networks and establishing partnerships among NGOs and trade unions 
• Training needs assessment of the target group 
• Training curriculum, toolkit and hand-book on anti-discrimination 
• Seminars for NGO/trade union representatives and lawyers 
• Preparation of guidelines and standards for monitoring reports 
• Preparation of monitoring reports for a period of six months 

The project that will last for 18 months is co-financed by the Global Dialogue. For more information on the project please get in touch with Burcu Yeşiladalı (burcuy@bilgi.edu.tr).