Julia Mickiewicz - women rights defender, civil society and political activist, gender expert - is a co-founder of the Organization FemGroup Belarus which campaigns for gender equality and women's rights. FemGroup was established in August 2020 from the begging as a working group of the Coordination council (unified body of the Belarusian democratic forces and civil society) and then became an independent NGO. The aim of founding FemGroup was to empower women's political engagement and leadership, not to forget the impressive and valuable achievements of Belarusian women who stranded in front of the most massive political demonstrations and protests against the rigging of the presidential elections and the unprecedented violence that followed. During the 2024 election campaign, Julia Mickiewicz put forward a proposal for a 40 percent women's quota in the third convocation of the Coordination Council, which was adopted despite strong opposition.
Julia was arrested and detained for 15 days in October 2020 for her participation in general Belarusian protests and in particular in women's marches and solidarity actions, as well as for founding the FemGroup, which was seen as a major threat by the Lukashenka regime. After she was released, she forcibly fled from Belarus to Lithuania, where she lives until now in exile.
Julia is the general manager of the organization of civic and non-formal education ABF Belarus, which is based on a human rights-based approach, promoting social justice, gender equality, nondiscrimination and diversity. It was recognized as an «extremist formation» by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Belarus in October 2024. She is also a member of the Council of Europe Contact Group for Belarus (established in 2022), which works to promote gender mainstreaming and women's rights, and a deputy representative of the Office for Social Policy in the United Transitional Cabinet, responsible for gender equality and vulnerable groups. In addition, Julia is chairwoman of the Coordination Committee of the Belarusian National Platform of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum as well as an external expert on equal opportunity and non-discrimination (for Belarus) for the Eastern Partnership Index 2025.
Julia is a graduate of the Faculty of Journalism at the Belarusian State University in Minsk and the Master's program in Gender Studies at the European University for the Humanities in Vilnius. She has been working for more than 15 years as a journalist for several independent mass media. In 2009, she was awarded with P’ero award as the best journalist promoting the human rights of LGBT-persons in Belarus. She also was a chairwoman of the Belarusian youth social democratic organization MSD-MH. In 2011, Julia was awarded by Jim Kemmy social justice award of the Irish Labour Party.