Turkey unveils new action plan for violence against women

ANKARA

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan unveiled a new action plan to enhance legal, administrative and political means in combatting violence against women on the day Turkey formally withdrew from the Istanbul Convention.

“Our fight against violence against women did not begin with this convention, and it will not end by withdrawing from this convention,” Erdoğan said at an introductory meeting of the fourth National Action Plan for Combating Violence Against Women on July 1 in Ankara.

The action plan, which covers all the actions to be taken between 2021 and 2025, was announced as Turkey accomplished all the necessary procedures for its withdrawal from the Council of Europe’s Istanbul Convention. Turkey said it pulled back from the convention on the ground that it was undermining family values.

Erdoğan denied the comments that Turkey’s withdrawal would complicate the country’s efforts against the violence against women, recalling that the first national action plan was announced in 2007 before the Istanbul Convention was even born.

Just like in the fight against the pandemic, we need to deal with violence against women sincerely and objectively, without making it material for political discussions,” Erdoğan said.

“We will continue today and tomorrow our struggle against violence against women and for the women’s use of human rights just as we did yesterday,” he stated. Turkey is among the countries with broad and comprehensive legal and administrative infrastructure on this issue, he recalled.

The new action plan will further strengthen the government’s efforts to end violence against women, Erdoğan said, informing that the four-year plan covers five top objectives and 28 strategies in a holistic way.

The first objective of the plan is to revise the entire legislation on the violence against women and ensure their effective implementation, the president stated. “We will continue to take all necessary legal and administrative measures within the framework of changing conditions and emerging needs,” he said.

Victims’ access to justice, all-out struggle against the violence against women and children, enhancing preventive and protective mechanisms and a new campaign to increase social awareness and sensitivity over the matter are listed as other objectives of the action plan, Erdoğan stressed.

Training on how to control the anger of perpetrators of violence and individuals who are likely to commit violence will be given, the president said, informing that guest houses for women would be opened in seven more provinces.

“Completion of the risk map of violence against women in 81 provinces is among our strategic goals. We will eliminate approaches that make violence against women ordinary,” he said.

“The main purpose of our action plan is to raise awareness about influencing and changing society’s perspective on violence against women and raising sensitivity. Combating violence against women can only be successful with the participation and genuine contribution of the whole society,” he said.