In Turkey, with its already high rate of femicide, more than 400 women are killed every year. The release of violent men from prisons during lockdown may have further aggravated the situation. Hundreds of domestic violence incidents were reported.
But Turkish women have recently shown great strength and enthusiasm when contributing to change in their country and speaking up against abuses and violations to their rights. They have learned how to reject repression and violence.
Yesterday, Women's Assemblies protested in Kadıköy, İstanbul ahead of International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women on November 25. Gathering in front of the ferry port to Beşiktaş, women opened a banner that read, "We will have İstanbul Convention implemented to stop violence, impunity, suspicious deaths and feminicides."
Speaking first in the protest, Gülsüm Kav, the General Representative of the We Will Stop Femicides Platform, emphasized the importance of struggling against male violence and gender inequality: "Everyone must be the subjects of the struggle against feminicides and violence, we must walk together to win our rights of equality. We must foster the struggle together in the face of all this inequality."
Despite Turkey being one of the first countries to ratify the Council of Europe’s 2011 Istanbul Convention on preventing domestic violence, the government is debating withdrawing from the agreement meant to protect women from gender-based violence.
Following the announcement of the government’s possible withdrawal, protests have sprung up in defense of the agreement, with female activists calling for the convention to be fully implemented, rather than torn up. Some argue that a withdrawal would signal Ankara’s complicity in violence against women.
To best protect women, Turkey need to remain a part of the Istanbul Convention and to fully implement it. In addition to that, there needs to be widespread condemnation of violence against women by Turkish politicians.
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