Ukraine published a second National Action Plan (NAP) for the period 2020-2025 after its first NAP, for the period 2016-2020, came to an end. At the end of 2022, however, amidst the ongoing full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Government of Ukraine launched an initiative to revise their NAP to reflect on the WPS agenda in practice, and learn from prior government initiatives and civil society in how to best update and implement the plan within the changing conflict context.
The new NAP, in writing, is a copy of the original 2020-2025 NAP but includes changes noted by: {As amended by the Order of the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine No.1150-r dated 16.12.2022}. This NAP therefore still has the name end date as the NAP published in 2020, meaning the implementation period is now 2022-2025. The NAP was developed through joint efforts between different national institutions reporting to the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine. The NAP approaches the implementation of the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda primarily domestically, with an expected focus on the ongoing war. However, it does apply an international lens to issues such as ensuring the training and selection of women for participation in international peacekeeping, as well as peace negotiations.
The NAP includes five strategic goals: participation of women in decision-making; resilience to security challenges; post-conflict recovery and transitional justice; combatting gender-based violence and conflict-related sexual violence; and institutional capacity of the national plan actors. Within these strategic goals, operational goals are also identified, which include a ‘task title’, ‘activity title’, the actor(s) responsible for implementation, the time frame for implementation, the source of financing, and the estimated financial resources required for task implementation. The monitoring and evaluation framework for the NAP involved analyzing the key achievement of key indicators and their deviation from target values, determining the reason for their deviation, and conducting an analysis of the implementation status of the tasks and activities in the NAP (p. 13). The collection of information of the indicators’ achievement is stated to be the responsibility of central executive bodies, other state bodies involved in the implementation of the NAP, the Council of Ministers of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, regional state administrations, and the Kyiv and Sevastopol City State Administrations (p.13).
The updated NAP includes a slight change in the problem analysis, as well as updated objectives, main target groups and principles of the NAP. The key difference in the problem analysis is outlining issues that have arisen since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation. It highlights how since then, almost one third of Ukrainians have been forced to leave their homes, and details how this mass displacement disproportionately impacts the lives of women due to the burden of caring for children and other family members requiring care (p.4). An increase in gender-based violence, including conflict-related sexual violence, has also been added to the problem analysis, noting that multiple cases have been perpetrated by military personnel of the Russian Federation in all territories of Ukraine that have been liberated (p.5). The NAP then states that Ukraine does not currently have effective mechanisms to identify security challenges that consider gender aspects, nor is there capacity to inform the wider population about any such issues that arise (p.5).
As a result of the change in context, the main target groups and principles were also adjusted. This included referencing the importance of addressing issues relating to: internally displaced persons; persons with limited mobility that live close to the contact line; persons living in combat areas; persons released from captivity; persons staying in temporarily occupied territories; close relatives of combatants or prisoners of war; victims of human trafficking; persons who became disabled due to combat related actions; and persons who suffered material losses due to combat. Essentially, the NAP created a more expansive list of whom it would focus on in recognition of the changed context and the shifting needs of different populations.
There is no mention of Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW) in the NAP, nor is there reference to any wider weapons or armament policies. Given the global concern around arms-control and disarmament relating the war, as well as the general consensuses that increased arms availability makes adhering to international law more difficult and also facilitates and aggravates violence against women and girls, the omission of policies that mention this means that these issues remain unaddressed in the NAP.