The Campaign #alljobs4allwomen: protection of the labor rights of women

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ADC Memorial has led the fight against legal bans on the labor of women in hundreds of professions, including prestigious and high-paying ones. The campaign #alljobs4allwomen, which was launched on March 8, 2017, and the joint efforts of activists, human rights defenders, and attorneys have led Ukraine to revoke its list of banned profession, Uzbekistan to announce that its list will be cancelled in May 2019, Kazakhstan to reduce the number of banned professions, and Russia to announce that it will start curtailing its list in 2021.

Strategic cases

Case of Svetlana Medvedeva

ADC Memorial began working on the problem of the list of banned professions in 2012, when it received an appeal from Svetlana Medvedeva, a resident of Samara, Russia. Even though she received an education in “Ship navigation on internal waterways and in coastal waters,” she was not able to find work in her specialization of navigation officer because this work is considered harmful for women and is banned for them in Russia. With support from ADC Memorial, Medvedeva appealed this decision in Russian courts, and after exhausting all national means of judicial protection, filed an individual communication with UN CEDAW in 2013. On February 26, 2016, the Committee found the ban discriminatory and issued recommendations for her specific case and for improving the overall situation. Building on CEDAW’s recommendation, Medvedeva appealed for a reconsideration of her case at the national level, but faced resistance from both the Samara District Court (August 2016) and the appeals bench of the Samara District Court (October 2016). The Supreme Court, however, overturned the unfavorable decisions of both courts and sent the case back to the first instance court for reconsideration. The court could not obligate the employer to hire Medvedeva, but it did find that Russian labor law is discriminatory.

Svetlana Medvedeva

Relevant publications

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