Turkey will formally exit Istanbul Convention on July 1

ANKARA

A decree signed by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan saying the Istanbul Convention will expire on July 1, 2021 for Turkey was published in the Official Gazette on April 30.

The European treaty on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence was annulled with a decree on March 20 on grounds that the pact conflicted with local traditions and that Turkish laws provide ample protection to women.

Introduced in 2011 and ratified in the Turkish Parliament in 2012, the convention specifically targets violence against women and obliges ratifying countries to prevent gender-based crime, provide adequate protection and services for victims and assure the prosecution of perpetrators.

The main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) appealed to the Council of State to nix the presidential decree to pull Turkey out of the Istanbul Convention on April 22.

According to the convention, any party state can demand its withdrawal from the treaty through a formal notification to the Strasbourg-based organization. The Council of Europe has three months to process the withdrawal appeal.

Women’s rights groups took to the streets several times to protest the decision to leave the treaty as they believe it safeguards women’s lives if implemented wholeheartedly. Some 118 women have been killed, while hundreds of women have been subjected to violence in Turkey so far in 2021, according to We Will Stop Femicide Platform.