Isik said the 20 year struggle in Turkey to end violence against women had finally started to produce results in 2006 and that required legislation was put into force but added that the society needed now to adopt these concepts while women organizations created pressure groups.
"We are at an important crossroad", Isik said. "I believe that important steps have been taken at the point of enforcing the legal amendments made since 1998 and that the Prime Ministry Decree [calling for nation-wide positive discrimination for women] is an expression of willpower. We are at the point where we need to hold strong. We must continue to be a pressure group".
"The definition of violence should be broadened"
Noting that when violence was mentioned in Turkey the first thing that came to mind was "a slap", Isik said "everything that eliminates the opportunity of development for women should be accepted as violence" including economic obstructions and psychological pressure.
"Not sending daughters to school is also violence" Isik explained, pointing out that limiting the definition of violence to something that happened only between couples served to overshadow the overall violence women faced.
Isik warned that on the issue of violence between couples, the mentality that the issue was "intimately confidential and cannot be talked about" was on the foreground.
"It is important for democratization to intervene in violence between couples, in violence inside families" Isik said. "Couples are important. We need a broader definition [to violence]."
"If customs are debated, it's thanks to women organizations"
Isik said she believed the women movement in Turkey had achieved important advancements and led to a debate on various important issues from legislative amendments to shelter homes, carrying these on the country's agenda.
Yet, she added, these were not enough.
"There is the need for more" she said. "There are only 25 women organizations in 81 provinces of Turkey". Isik said, however, that despite the low number, it was because of the work of these organizations that the issue of the effect of customs on women rights was being debated.
Isik also said that Turkey had made important contributions to the United Nations work on violence against women and that it played a bridging role as a country. But legislative arrangements to develop the UN program needed more than to stay on paper alone she said, adding "we require a world where November 25s do not exist". (AO/TK/II/EU)
