News

IWP held a videoconference with Special correspondent of CNN at State Department Jill Dougherty.Jill Dougherty focused on possible changes in the relations of Ukraine and the USA after the most recent appointment of John Kerry to the post of United States Secretary of State. She also presented her opinion on perspectives of gender equality dissemination in Ukraine and throughout the world. {1}

According to Ms. Dougherty, a key problem consists in a woman’s eagerness to influence society without doing more than pretend that she has power: “I call the phenomenon, when a woman pretends to have power but in fact she is no one and will never have influence on anything, the mentality of a milkmaiden.” Ms. Dougherty explained that the Soviet period of time, when women were deprived of real rights in comparison with men, was characterized by such a mentality.
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Dougherty also emphasized that work in politics is “ very difficult work,” “so if women really want take part in politics, they should cooperate with each other.” The American journalist underscored that “it is very difficult to reach success without political parties and organizations.”
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During the digital videoconference Ms. Dougherty also mentioned that “fence-mending with the USA depends on Ukraine.” Ms. Dougherty appealed to Ukraine to take the initiative on fence-mending with the United States, which is impossible without “clean-up” in internal policy. “Today, the United States is focused on solving more important and high-priority problems in Iran, Syria, and North Korea.”
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This assertion was affirmed by United States Ambassador to Russia James Collins (1996-2001), who also took part in the videoconference at the Institute of World Policy. He explained that United States is also trying to solve its internal problems, establishing its foreign policy: “Ukraine can not give anything to the USA and that is why it has lost the attention of White House.” Ambassador Collins said: “Of course, Ukraine is far from implementation of the democracy principles, but it is not a priority for Department of State.”
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The videoconference was held within the framework of the project “Global virtual forum of women leaders,” which is supported by Internews, the U.S. Agency for International Development, and the Carnegie Centre (Washington).

The goal of “Global virtual forum of women leaders” is to discuss questions of gender equality and foster more active participation of Ukrainian women in political and social life. Ukrainian politicians, representatives of NGO’s, experts, and journalists take part in the project.
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