Update official femicide data regularly, NGO calls on gov’t

ISTANBUL

The official data on femicides should be updated regularly in order to help prevent women from being murdered, say activists with an organization that keeps a tally of femicides across the country.

Some 214 women have been murdered in Turkey in 2019, according to Kadın Cinayetlerini Durduracağız Platformu (We Will Stop Femicides Platform).

The non-governmental organization welcomed a Police Academy report released by the Interior Ministry in March, saying it was an important step forward in bringing awareness to the problem.

“It has been an important step in stopping and preventing femicides and violence against women despite the fact that the official figures and our data do not match with each other,” the group said in a statement on July 7.

Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu on March 6 said that 281 women were murdered in 2018 across Turkey, citing the report. The women’s platform, however, put last year’s number at 440.

The interior ministry and the NGO categorize femicides differently, accounting for the disparity in numbers, Soylu said.

He said the women’s platform includes murders in which a woman was not targeted specifically because of her gender.

“The data should be announced regularly with details and concrete preventive policies should be implemented. The Protection Law No. 6284 and the Istanbul Convention should be enforced effectively, good-conduct [penalty] abatements during trials should be limited, and women should be empowered through egalitarian policies,” the women’s platform said.

Forty women were murdered in Turkey in June alone, the NGO stated. That figure brought the total number of murders of women in the first half of 2019 to 214, according to the group’s data.