Ukrainian woman

Women's rights in Ukraine

The feminist protest group FEMEN was founded in Ukraine in 2008.
Gender Inequality Index
Value	0.326 (2013)
Rank	61st out of 152
Maternal mortality (per 100,000)	32 (2010)
Women in parliament	12.1% (2014)
Females over 25 with secondary education	91.5% (2012)
Women in labour force	53.0% (2012)
Global Gender Gap Index
Value	0.6935 (2013)
Rank	64th out of 144

Women in Ukraine have equal constitutional rights as men in the economic, political, cultural and social fields, as well as in the family. Women receive lower salaries and have limited opportunity for career advancement.

Most of the around 45 percent of Ukraine’s population (45 million) who suffer violence – physical, sexual or mental – are women.

One of the biggest feminist organization in Europe was founded during the 1920s in modern western Ukraine or Galicia. The organization was called the Ukrainian Woman's Union, and was led by Milena Rudnytska. During the Soviet-era feminism was classified as a bourgeois ideology, hence counterrevolutionary and anti-Soviet. Civil society and feminism were virtually nonexistent in the Soviet times. After independence of Ukraine in 1991, a feminist movement began taking root.

Currently there are several women's rights groups active in Ukraine, including Feminist Ofenzyva and Ukrainian Woman's Union.FEMEN, the most active women's rights group in Kiev was closed in 2013. The organization left Ukraine because the leadership feared "for their lives and freedom."

Around 45 percent of Ukraine’s population (45 million) suffer violence – physical, sexual or mental – and most of them are women. Street women are the most vulnerable category; around 40 percent of them suffer from sexual violence, with 25 percent being under 18. In 2001, Ukraine enacted the Domestic Violence (Prevention) Act 2001. Article 173-2 of the Code of Administrative Offences of Ukraine also deals with "violence over family".Nuzhat Ehsan, UN Population Fund representative in Ukraine, stated in February 2013 “Ukraine really has an unacceptable level of violence, mainly by men and mainly due to high level of alcohol consumption”. He also blamed loopholes in the legislation contribute to the problem of domestic violence, “You can violate women and still if you are a high-level official or from a high-level official family, you can get away with it”.