The Association for the Prevention and Handling of Violence in the Family (SPAVO) is the project promoter. Women and their children will be able to stay for shorter or longer periods at the shelter. In addition, one floor is to be dedicated to SPAVO’s outreach and prevention activities, including a hotline service for victims of violence.
Under the Norway Grants 2009-2014, about €700 000 has been earmarked to prevent and tackle domestic and gender-based violence in Cyprus.
Support for victims
The building is expected to offer shelter and psychological support, counselling, therapy groups, education and other services to victims. It will benefit women and children who experience domestic violence and are in direct physical or psychological danger, regardless of their ethnicity and beliefs.
The new shelter is expected to open at the beginning of 2015, according to SPAVO.
“Very useful” cooperation
Kiki Boyiadji, president of SPAVO, described the cooperation with the Norwegian Secretariat of the Shelter Movement, which is the donor programme partner, as “very useful”.
“What is most important is that some members of our association will visit Norway and they we will see how the shelters work there and what programmes they offer, especially to children housed in the shelters with their mothers, which is something we don’t have here,” said Ms. Boyiadji.
“We’ll exchange a lot of ideas together, and we can also cooperate on common goals and also [transfer] experience from [our] shelter work in Norway,” said Ms. Lone Alice Johansen from the Secretariat of the Shelter Movement.
You can watch a video about the new shelter here.
Video credit: Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs