TGEU Countries: Kyrgyzstan ProTrans in Kyrgyzstan S anjar Kurmanov is a trans activist and the executive director of Labrys, an LGBTIQ organisation. Since joining Labrys as a volunteer in 2008, Sanjar has been involved in LGBT activism in Kyrgyzstan and Central Asia. ProTrans has helped Labrys build new partnerships at the international level. The Fifth European Transgender Council has also been extremely fruitful in helping us establish a new group in Kazakhstan, Almat-TQ, which Labrys provides with resources and support. T he ProTrans project in Kyrgyzstan was implemented by Labrys Kyrgyzstan, an LGBTIQ organisation. Labrys was already engaged in monitoring and documenting discrimination against and the violation of the rights of LGBTIQ people, but ProTrans was the first project implemented by Labrys that focused solely on trans people. One of the highlights of the project was the organisation of a trans camp at Issyk-Kul Lake in August 2014, in which activists from Ukraine, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan participated. The training provided at this camp helped unite the trans community, develop solidarity for a variety of identities within the community and deepen the participants’ understanding of the im- An animation about the birth of Labrys portance of monitoring cases of violence. Kyrgyzstan’s trans community understands the importance of documenting the level of discrimination and violence in the region, and members of the community decided to collect this information by informing each other of incidents. It was noted that it was important to focus the government’s attention on cases of human-rights violations and hate crimes against trans people. + 46 + + 47 +