Aim of the Centre and its Activities

The Equality Watch Centre (EWC) is an international platform that brings together national and international civil society organisations (CSOs), professional chambers, academic institutions, human rights defenders, and researchers to strengthen access to justice for people and groups facing discrimination in Turkey.

The Centre creates a common working ground as well as undertaking lobbying and advocacy activities to strengthen equality policies and National Human Rights Institutions in Turkey. In order to support people and groups who face discrimination, the Centre designs activities to strengthen and develop capacities of civil society organisations (CSOs) and other stakeholders working in this area as well as providing research and project-based grants. The Centre works to create an open-access database for individuals and institutions that will work on equality policies and anti-discrimination mechanisms. Also, it carries out monitoring and reporting on discrimination based on different grounds.

Equality Watch Centre Coordination

The coordination of the Equality Watch Centre is managed by the Netherlands Helsinki Committee (NHC) and the Association for Monitoring Equal Rights (AMER). The Centre carries out its activities under the project “Together against discrimination: building a civil society coalition to improve access to justice for victims of discrimination” supported by the European Instrument for Democracy and Human Rights (EIDHR).

Consisting of five people, the secretariat is responsible with running the general activities of the Centre.

Centre’s Executive Board

The Executive Board of the Equality Watch Centre (EWC) consists of one full member and a reserve member each from the Netherlands Helsinki Committee (NHC) and the Association for Monitoring Equal Rights (AMER); Atılım University Faculty of Law and Union of Turkish Bar Associations and an expert member.

  • Prof. Dr. Dilşad Çiğdem (Atılım University Faculty of Law)
  • Hester van Ommeren (Netherlands Helsinki Committee)
  • Kasım Akbaş (Union of Turkish Bar Associations)
  • Nejat Taştan (Association for Monitoring Equal Rights)
  • Revşan Çobanoğlu (Union of Turkish Bar Associations)
  • Prof. Dr. Timuçin Köprülü (Atılım University Faculty of Law)
  • Prof. Dr. Ulaş Karan (Bilgi University, Human Rights Centre)

Duties and Responsibilities

The main function of the Executive Board is to direct the secretariat of the Centre in determining the need in the field and in the activities to be designed accordingly. In this respect it;

  • Makes recommendations for annual activities and execution plan,
  • Provides feedback and advice during the execution of activities, participates as an observer and/or participant when possible,
  • It especially supports the creation of the contents of activities such as conferences, seminars and capacity building activities as well as supporting the dissemination of their outputs.