Conference Report

The weekend started on Thursday evening 26 September in a picturesque bar on the beach in Filad resort about an hour away from Tirana, where friends renewed their connections and met new members.

The next day our conference started on the theme of overcoming gender bias in artificial intelligence development and implementation, with the morning session held at the Tirana International Hotel.

The moderator was Ms Denada Seferi, Deputy Minister of Health and Social Protection, who informed us that now in Albania more women had recently taken up higher positions in  the government of health and justice. She shared with us her concerns about the limitation of women’s access to digital information, this was reflected in data collection and consequently influenced legislation.

Next we heard from the Minister of Justice Etilda Gjonaj who welcomed all delegates to Albania; she emphasised the importance of measures to be taken to protect women from digital violence ranging from young girls to politicians. The Albanian forum of women and peace alliance is taking initiatives to protect women against this sort of violence.

The President of UWE gave a warm welcome and her thanks and gratitude to the Albanian Federation for organising such high-level speakers, and reminded delegates of the difficult challenges that are facing women in Europe, including the wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.

Our keynote speaker was Mrs Zamira Gjini, Director General in the Ministry of Education and Sports, who talked to us about programmes designed to reduce cyber violence, and including ethnic minorities in educational programmes; the work is very timely in relation to AI and gender equality.

We then had an informal discussion with a lecturer at law and head of a consumer protection association, as well as a tech entrepreneur. Through our Q&A session we learnt about positive and negative impacts of AI in current life.

The afternoon was spent at the Albanian parliament where we had the opportunity to meet up with the speaker Elisa Spiropali, who gave us an overview of steady progress in gender equality and economic progress; currently 36% of members of parliament are women supported by a positive discrimination policy. The country also benefits from support from the Albanian diaspora.

The talk was followed by interesting questions and answers from attendees on topics ranging from legal representation to mitigating violence against women. Elisa gave feedback on how women navigate and balance roles in politics with the media scrutiny and family life.

We then went to the Parliament building to sit in the seats of politicians and listen to a Member of Parliament from the socialist party with a background in taxation and economics policy, who described challenges to women in the start-up economy and in relation to migration from neighbouring countries.

The group had a few hours to explore Tirana and then make their way back to our resort in Golem to enjoy dinner with much to reflect on from a most interesting day.

The UWE Annual General Meeting took place the following day, with voting delegates attending, the main morning session was dedicated to reports from the President, Treasurer and Vice Presidents. The location on the top of the hotel was stunning with views over the coastal areas. This however did not distract us from the work at hand!

Anne Nègre presented an extensive report highlighting her actions over the year at the Council of Europe, including the collective complaint on violence against women, full version available with all relevant references on request. She also outlined last year’s activities in UWE which all the Board contributed to, including the webinar on AI, biography contest and gender scan survey, and the meet and greet event in Marbella which members supported.

Pina Foti and I had finished our mandates and were standing down as Vice Presidents, which both our reports reflected. It was a very productive, enjoyable and learning time for me personally; the contacts and friendship will always cement BFWG’s role at UWE.

The financial report was shared between the previous and current Treasurers, reflecting the last year’s budget and 2025 forecast.

The reports were accepted by the voting delegates (all reports available on request).

We were very fortunate to have four Vice Presidential candidates from Italy (FILDS), Germany, Netherlands and Ireland standing for election, each gave a five-minute presentation, three in person and one via video to share their expertise and give their vision on how they will build on what we have already achieved in UWE.  After lunch the results were declared and we now have two new Vice Presidents,

Ines Dannehl, from German NFA (DAB), and Grainne Keane, from Ireland’s NFA (IrFUW).

Each year we get to hear about what other members of UWE get up to, which is very interesting and wide ranging: those of us from the English-speaking Federations noticed a theme of commemorating past presidents. Some reports came with presentations, all are available from the UWE secretary general for further details.