ANKARA — The
UN rapporteur on violence against women urged
Turkey on Wednesday to reverse its decision to drop out of a European treaty
combating gender-based abuses.
اضافة اعلان
Reem Alsalem expressed “profound regret” at
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s decision last year to leave a treaty that
Turkey took pride in helping draft more than a decade ago.
The treaty — now enacted by dozens of European
countries — requires member states to adopt legislation that strictly punishes
domestic abuse and gender-based violence.
Alsalem said at the end of an exploratory mission to
Turkey that Erdogan’s government has made a number of improvements in its
legislation on violence against women in the past few years.
But she said Turkish rights leaders were worried
that “the withdrawal created confusion on the protection of women”.
“I really urge the government of Turkey to
reconsider this decision,” Alsalem told reporters.
Turkey became the first country to sign the
convention in 2011 and ratified it by a vote in parliament the following year.
Its supporters argued that Erdogan did not have the
right to issue a presidential decree annulling an international agreement that
was approved by lawmakers.
Women’s rights groups tried to contest Erdogan’s
decision in Turkey’s top administrative court, but the court ruled three to two
this month that a president’s decision could not be subject to a legal review.
The two dissenting judges said separately that
Erdogan’s actions overstepped his legal bounds.
Alsalem said the best available data showed more
than 300 women being murdered in Turkey last year.
“This data is not systematically collected. It is
not comprehensive. It does not include some specific forms of violence,” she
said.
“Turkey is very well positioned for creating an
observatory for collecting data on gender-related killings. I invite the
authorities to complement data that they have with data that civil society
groups have.”
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