05 January 2016 - In line with the Department of Foreign Affairs’ Gender and Development (GAD) Program and the Embassy’s continuous effort to equip and train its personnel to enable them to provide prompt and effective service to Filipino migrants especially women, the Philippine Embassy in Lebanon held a “Gender and Development Training on Understanding and Preventing Violence against Women” in the morning session and an echo seminar on the recently held DFA Gender Sensitivity and Human Resources Management Training in Berlin during the afternoon session held at the Roof Function Hall of  Hotel Padova, in Sin El Fil last December 19, 2015.

The Gender and Development Training on Understanding and Preventing Violence against Women was held with the support of the Caritas Lebanon Migrants Center (CLMC). Ms. Noha Roukoss, Head of the Training Unit and Advocacy of the CLMC, facilitated the training with the support of Mr. Tony Antoun, Legal Counselor of the CLMC. Twenty-six (26) officers and staff from the Embassy, POLO and OWWA actively participated in the training.

In her welcome remarks, Philippine Ambassador to Lebanon Leah M. Basinang-Ruiz stressed that the training is part of the Embassy’s continuing efforts to ensure that Embassy, POLO and OWWA personnel deepen their understanding of current GAD issues, develop greater gender sensitivity and improve their capacity to contribute towards a holistic and comprehensive approach to the task of assisting distressed Filipino migrants. She also expressed deep appreciation to the CLMC for sharing their knowledge, experience and expertise in providing psychosocial and gender sensitive support to distressed migrants in Lebanon.

The participants engaged in group activities and discussions on gender sensitive awareness, psychosocial concepts, gender sensitive methods, interventions, as well as exercises on how front-liners and Assistance-To-Nationals (ATN) officers are able to assess the different types of violence being experienced particularly by female migrant workers in vulnerable situations

Capping the day’s session was a briefing by Administrative Officer Gladys Perey on what she was able to learn during the Gender Sensitivity and Human Resources Management Seminar that she attended in Berlin from December 10 to 14, 2015. END