Turkey: First Country to Enact Violence against Women Act

The General Assembly of the Turkish Grand National Assembly (TBMM) adopted the "Draft Law on the Approval of the Ratification of the Council of Europe Declaration on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence". Hence, it passed into law on 24 November, one day prior to the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

The "Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence" was signed at the 121^st Meeting of the Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe on 11 May in Istanbul. Turkey is the first country of the undersigned that passed the convention through parliament.

The convention defines the concepts of "violence against women", "domestic violence", "gender, "gender-based violence against women", "victim" and "women". As the first international binding document related to violence against women and domestic violence, the convention includes the following obligations:

* Parties shall undertake to a) collect disaggregated relevant statistical data at regular intervals on cases of all forms of violence covered by the scope of this Convention; b) support research in the field of all forms of violence covered by the scope of this Convention in order to study its root causes and effects, incidences and conviction rates, as well as the efficacy of measures taken to implement this Convention. Parties shall take the necessary legislative and other measures.

* Parties shall take the necessary legislative or other measures to ensure that victims have access to services facilitating their recovery from violence. These measures should include, when necessary, services such as legal and psychological counselling, financial assistance, housing, education, training and assistance in finding employment".

* Parties shall take the necessary legislative or other measures to ensure that the intentional conduct of serious forms of violence such as domestic violence, sexual harassment, rape, forced marriage, crimes committed in the name of so-called "honour" and genital mutilation is criminalized.

* "Parties shall designate or establish one or more official bodies responsible for the co-ordination, implementation, monitoring and evaluation of policies and measures to prevent and combat all forms of violence covered by this Convention".

* "The Group of experts on action against violence against women and domestic violence ("GREVIO") shall monitor the implementation of this Convention by the Parties". (AS/VK)

Click here to read the full text of the Convention.