Heartland Alliance is working to improve the way in which gender-based violence is identified, documented and addressed in the criminal justice system and the family court system in the northern Iraqi governorates of Erbil, Sulaimaniya and Duhok, with the aim of improving the legal response to victims of gender-based violence in both court systems. In partnership with the Chicago-Kent College of Law, Heartland Alliance is working to develop monitoring instruments that will identify how victims of gender-based violence are impacted by the legal system, and is developing an incident-tracking software and database to store data collected by Heartland Alliance's local non-governmental organization (LNGO) partners in the targeted governorates. This data is necessary to develop a tangible resource of information in order to advocate for changes in laws, policies and practices in the Iraqi criminal justice and family court systems in the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG). After collecting this information, Heartland Alliance will prepare a report to demonstrate how the legal system discriminates against and is harmful towards women, and will use the report to raise awareness among judicial and legal personnel on the patterns and prevalence of gender-based violence in the region.

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