- - - The importance of having plans and policies to ensure implementation of existing antidiscrimination legislation; The need for reforming or repealing de jure or de facto discriminatory laws and regulations, policies and programmes; The importance of translating and disseminating the Declaration and other international human rights documents and ensure that such translations are made easily accessible to minorities; The central role to be played by national human rights institutions and regional bodies in awareness-raising activities including by conducting training programmes on the Declaration with specific focus on minorities; The need for Governments to mainstream minority issues in development plans and policies, using the Declaration as a guide. Mr Martin Chungong, Deputy Secretary-General of the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), presented on “Challenges faced by the IPU in its efforts aimed at implementing the Declaration” stressing that the fundamental problem is the on-going political marginalisation of minorities. The natural approach for IPU to address the status of minorities in political life is to look at parliament, as the institution that makes laws, therefore with a primary role and responsibility in the implementation of the Declaration. The dual approach is to look at descriptive representation in parliament as well as looking at substantive representation of minorities. The IPU investigated both aspects as part of a joint project with UNDP from 2008 to 2011 and the findings were rarely encouraging. Significant obstacles were encountered in collecting empirical data on the number of parliamentarians from minority groups, in some instances because parliaments were either unwilling or unable to provide the data, but also in some situations because some parliaments declined to answer requests for information, considering the issue to be too politically sensitive. He underlined that the overall picture that emerged was one where minorities tended to be marginalised in parliament in terms of their substantive representation. To address the situation he pointed to the following avenues for solutions: as a precondition for minority groups to increase their relative political strength in society which requires participation, leadership and a willingness to engage with other political forces, then international pressure can support the efforts of minority groups and finally, as marginalisation decreases and minority groups gradually become a political force, the question of the establishment of alliances, coalitions and other strategic partnerships with existing political parties arises. Ms. Zola Kondur, vice-president of the International Charitable organization “Roma Women Fund “Chiricli”, presented on “The Challenges faced by the Roma communities in effective participation in cultural, religious, social, economic and public life”. The main challenges that she identified related to the lack of awareness of the Declaration and the ensuing need for all stakeholders to promote the Declaration and advocating for the rights enshrined therein, the need to increase access to education by addressing for instance language barriers, the fact that many Roma communities in Ukraine live in conditions of extreme poverty with little access to basic social or medical services and finally that some print and electronic media contribute to and reinforce antiRomani racist stereotypes. She stressed that the required changes in attitudes to address such challenges can be brought about through formal and informal education. 14