May, 04 2011, 11:31am EDT
Turkey: Women Left Unprotected From Violence
Gaps in Law, Police Response, Put Urgently Needed Help Out of Reach
ISTANBUL
Turkey's flawed family violence protection system leaves women and girls across the country unprotected against domestic abuse, Human Rights Watch said in a report released today. Life-saving protections, including court-issued protection orders and emergency shelters, are not available for many abuse victims because of gaps in the law and enforcement failures.
The 58-page report, "'He Loves You, He Beats You': Family Violence in Turkey and Access to Protection," documents brutal and long-lasting violence against women and girls by husbands, partners, and family members and the survivors' struggle to seek protection. Turkey has strong protection laws, setting out requirements for shelters for abused women and protection orders. However, gaps in the law and implementation failures by police, prosecutors, judges, and other officials make the protection system unpredictable at best, and at times downright dangerous.
"With strong laws in place, it is inexcusable that Turkish authorities are depriving family violence victims of basic protections," said Gauri van Gulik, women's rights advocate and researcher at Human Rights Watch and author of the report. "Turkey has gone through exemplary reform on women's human rights, but police, prosecutors, judges, and social workers need to make the system exemplary in practice, not just on paper."
Human Rights Watch interviewed women and girls as young as 14 and as old as 65 who described being raped; stabbed; kicked in the abdomen when pregnant; beaten with hammers, sticks, branches, and hoses to the point of broken bones and fractured skulls; locked up with dogs or other animals; starved; shot with a stun gun; injected with poison; pushed off a roof; and subjected to severe psychological violence. The violence occurred in all areas where researchers conducted interviews, and across income and education levels.
This report comes as the Council of Europe is about to adopt a regional convention on violence against women and domestic violence. Turkey played an important role in drafting the convention as the current Chair of the Committee of Ministers, and the convention is scheduled to be signed at a summit in Istanbul on May 11, 2011.
Some 42 percent of women over age 15 in Turkey and 47 percent of rural women have experienced physical or sexual violence at the hands of a husband or partner at some point in their lives, according to a 2009 survey conducted by a leading Turkish university.
The report is based on interviews with, and the case files of, 40 women in Van, Istanbul, Trabzon, Ankara, Izmir, and Diyarbakir, and dozens of interviews with lawyers, women's organizations, social workers, government officials, and other experts.
"That first time, he hit me,he kicked the baby in my belly, and he threw me off the roof.,"said Selvi T., not her real name, forced to marry at age 12, whose husband has abused her for years.
Turkey entered the vanguard of countries offering civil mechanisms to protect against domestic violence with its 1998 adoption of Law 4320 on the Protection of the Family. This law, as amended in 2007, established a protection order system under which a person abused by a family member under the same roof, male or female, can apply directly or through a prosecutor for an order from a family court.
The orders can, among other things, require the offender to vacate the home, stay away from the victim and their children, surrender weapons, and refrain from violence, threats, damaging property, or contacting the victim. The system is designed to bring about quick action, within days at most, since people who apply for them are often in extremely dangerous situations.
The report documents serious shortcomings with Law 4320, though. The law excludes certain groups of women altogether, such as divorced and unmarried women. Police, prosecutors, and judges in many cases neglect their duties. Many women said that police officers mocked them and sent them home to their abusers, rather than helping them get protection orders, and that prosecutors and judges were slow to act on protection order requests or improperly demanded evidence not required by the law.
"The extreme brutality that family members inflict on women and girls is bad enough, but it is even worse to know that a woman who finds the courage to escape and ask for protection might be insulted and sent right back to her abuser," van Gulik said.
Shelters for women and children are another important element of Turkey's response to domestic abuse. The Law on Municipalities requires every municipality with 50,000 or more residents to provide a shelter, but the government has fallen far short of meeting this requirement. Moreover, women reported to Human Rights Watch that some existing shelters have dismal conditions and inadequate security procedures. In fact, staff in some shelters have allowed abusers to enter and have urged women to reconcile with their batterers.
Selvi T.'s experience reflects many of these problems.Her husband has beaten and raped her repeatedly for years, inflicting grave injuries, yet police sent her home multiple times when she sought protection. When she finally fled to a shelter, police told her husband the location, and shelter staff let him in and encouraged her to reconcile with him.
On March 7, Fatma Sahin, a Justice and Development Party member of parliament for Gaziantep, in southeastern Turkey, announced a proposal to revise the Law on the Protection of the Family, following consultations with women's groups. The proposed amendments are before parliament.
The amendments would widen the scope of protection to include women who are in a relationship but not married. They would direct the Interior Ministry to provide financial support to protection order recipients. The draft law would require improved measures to protect information about victims, including their addresses if they have moved. It provides for dedicated police and prosecutor units staffed by officers with training and expertise in family violence.It also would allow prosecutors to grant protection orders outside court hours, to be presented later for a judge's approval.
Turkey should close the gaps in its family protection law by explicitly providing that protection orders may be issued to unmarried and divorced women, including women in unregistered religious marriages, Human Rights Watch said.
The Justice and Interior Ministries should create dedicated units at police stations and family courts with specialized staff who can refer women to social services and deal with their protection claims, Human Rights Watch said. The Interior Ministry should also develop a complaint mechanism to identify police officers, prosecutors, and judges who do not uphold the law or who mistreat domestic violence survivors.
Overall monitoring of the protection order system is also needed, with more specific, publicly available data on the use of the system.More shelters are needed, and both the Interior and Justice Ministries should continue and improve training for police officers, and to trainprosecutors and judges aboutthe practical requirements of Law 4320, and each official's role in the process.
"At a time when Turkey is about to host governments from all over Europe to make a binding commitment to end violence against women, Turkey's government should take an honest look at its own shortcomings," van Gulik said. "Turkey needs to make changes so that its family violence protection system will live up to the new treaty both in design and implementation."
Accounts From Victims:
Selvi T.
In southeast Turkey (exact location withheld), Selvi T., a 22-year-old pregnant with her fifth child, represents everything that can go wrong when domestic violence is not taken seriously. She was married at age 12, and her husbandstarted his attacks when she was pregnant with their first child.
"That first time, he hit me,he kicked the baby in my belly, and he threw me off the roof," she told Human Rights Watch. Since then, the violence has increased in frequency and severity, and now even includes their children. Selvi's husband controls every aspect of her life and is extremely jealous. She told us: "He rapes me all the time, and he checks my fluids 'down there' to check I didn't have sex [with another man]." Selvi managed to escape four times to go to the police for help, but was sent back to abuse every time. She made it to a shelter once, but the police told her husband where the shelter was and he forced her to leave.Selvi receives assistance from a local women's group, but has given up on escaping the violence.
"I just cannot go to the police anymore," she said.
Zelal K.
In Istanbul, Zelal K. was denied a protection order because she was divorced. Zelal lives in Istanbul with her three children, and divorced eight years ago. Her former husband lives across the street, and one day in January 2008, he grabbed her when she walked out of her house. She told Human Rights Watch:
He held me, I screamed, "Let me go," and he started beating me. There were a lot of people around us, but nobody did anything. He pulled my hair and covered my mouth, and he dragged me to my house. There he kicked me and I fell to the ground [...]. He broke every possession I have in the house, every chair, every picture, everything. Then he took off my clothes and he raped me.
Zelal managed to escape, almost naked, and went to several police stations, where she was turned away for different reasons ranging from "wrong police office" to "Why are you bothering us with this?"She eventually managed to speak with a prosecutor. He refused to accept her application for a protection order because she was divorced.
Asli I.
Asli I. is a 21-year-old Kurdish woman from a village close to Van. Asli confronted violence from the moment she married and moved in with her in-laws in 2009. All 10 people in the household abused her in some way. When she had severe stomach pains, the family kept her captive and her father-in-law injected something into her arm that severely damaged her health. The family also forced her to carry stones and wood all day for a house they were building. Asli's father-in-law hit her "all the time" with a water pipe, a hose, and a hammer.He broke Asli's nose and arm, and barred her from going to a nearby hospital. He regularly locked her up in the animal house and finally told her, "I didn't just get you here for my son, but also for my pleasure." He then raped her.
She cannot read or write and speaks little Turkish, but she got help from a women's group once she was finally out of the house. The police told the father-in-law to stay away from her, but did not arrest him. They advised Asli to seek a protection order from the prosecutor, which she did in May 2010. However, as Asli told us: "I went to the prosecutor, but never heard back from them, and he [the father-in-law] keeps coming to our house. Will he kill me or one of my brothers before I can get help?"
Zeynep B.
In Izmir, Zeynep B. had a protection order against her husband, who regularly beat and psychologically abused her. At the end of 2009, while the order was in force, her husband barged into her house, cut off her electricity, and threatened her with a knife. She fled and he chased her, but she managed to get to the police. They told her, "Go home, we will deal with it." On her way home she was stabbed six times by her husband. She barely survived.
Human Rights Watch is one of the world's leading independent organizations dedicated to defending and protecting human rights. By focusing international attention where human rights are violated, we give voice to the oppressed and hold oppressors accountable for their crimes. Our rigorous, objective investigations and strategic, targeted advocacy build intense pressure for action and raise the cost of human rights abuse. For 30 years, Human Rights Watch has worked tenaciously to lay the legal and moral groundwork for deep-rooted change and has fought to bring greater justice and security to people around the world.
LATEST NEWS
​State of Emergency Declared After Cargo Ship Destroys Baltimore Bridge
Maryland Congressman Jamie Raskin said he was "deeply concerned for the safety and well-being of everyone affected by the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore."
Mar 26, 2024
This is a developing story... Please check back for possible updates...
A state of emergency was declared in Maryland early Tuesday morning after a large cargo ship slammed into the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore leading to its total collapse and sending a still unverified number of vehicles and people into the Patapsco River.
As the Baltimore Sunreports:
In a Tuesday morning news conference, just a few hours after the incident, Baltimore Fire Department Chief James Wallace said authorities are "still very much in an active search and rescue posture" noting they are searching for "upwards of seven individuals" and that sonar has detected the presence of vehicles in the water. There is no indication that the event was intentional, Wallace said.
"This is a tragedy that you could never imagine … It looked like something out of an action movie," Mayor Brandon Scott said.
The terrifying footage of the bridge's collapse—which CNN correspondent Omar Jimenez commented was "almost unbelievable" to watch—is circulating widely on news channels and social media:
This video is almost unbelievable. The Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore literally collapsed this morning after it was struck by this large ship. pic.twitter.com/rYuy4U2r7H
— Omar Jimenez (@OmarJimenez) March 26, 2024
U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg said Tuesday that he had spoken with Mayor Scott and well as Maryland Governor Wes Moore and was helping to coordinate federal assistance.
"Rescue efforts remain underway and drivers in the Baltimore area should follow local responder guidance on detours and response," said Buttigieg.
Moore said in a statement he had declared a state of emergency and that work was underway to "quickly deploy federal resources" to the area.
"We are thankful for the brave men and women who are carrying out efforts to rescue those involved and pray for everyone's safety," said Moore. "We will remain in close contact with federal, state, and local entities that are carrying out rescue efforts as we continue to assess and respond to this tragedy."
Kevin Cartwright of the Baltimore Fire Department told CNN that the number of missing people may be higher than reported in other outlets. "Unfortunately," said Cartwright, "we understand that there were up to 20 individuals who may be in the Patapsco River right now as well as multiple vehicles."
Early reporting indicated that no crew members aboard the container ship, which sails under a Singapore flag, were injured or missing. A local harbor pilot was also said to be on board at the time of the crash.
"Deeply concerned for the safety and well-being of everyone affected by the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge in Baltimore," said Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) following the accident. "I'm profoundly thankful to first responders on the scene and will track rescue efforts by local, state, and federal authorities."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Grave 'Threat to Journalists' Remains as UK Court Delays Assange Extradition Ruling
"The Biden administration should take the opportunity to drop this dangerous case once and for all," said the executive director of the Freedom of the Press Foundation.
Mar 26, 2024
The United Kingdom's High Court ruled Tuesday that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange cannot immediately be extradited to the United States and gave the Biden administration three weeks to provide "assurances" that the publisher's First Amendment rights will be protected and that he won't face the death penalty.
If the U.S. does not provide the requested assurances, Assange will be allowed to pursue a limited appeal of his extradition. Should the U.S. submit assurances by the April 16 deadline, a hearing will be held on May 20 to determine whether they are "satisfactory."
Assange, whose health has deteriorated badly during his five years in a high-security London jail, faces 17 counts of violating the Espionage Act and a possible 175-year prison sentence in the U.S. for publishing classified information—a common journalistic practice. WikiLeaks disclosures exposed grave U.S. and U.K. war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Press freedom and human rights groups say the extradition of Assange to the U.S. would set a dangerous precedent and pose a dire threat to journalism everywhere.
Trevor Timm, executive director of the Freedom of the Press Foundation, said in a statement Tuesday that "we are glad Julian Assange is not getting extradited today."
"But this legal battle is far from over, and the threat to journalists and the news media from the Espionage Act charges against Assange remains," said Timm. "Assange's conviction in American courts would create a dangerous precedent that the U.S. government can and will use against reporters of all stripes who expose its wrongdoing or embarrass it. The Biden administration should take the opportunity to drop this dangerous case once and for all."
"It's long past time for the U.S. Justice Department to abandon the Espionage Act charges and resolve this case."
The U.S., which has been aggressively pursuing Assange's extradition for years, previously provided the U.K. government with assurances that Assange would not be held at a supermax prison that's notorious for its inhumane treatment of inmates.
Human rights groups have said such assurances from the U.S. government are "inherently unreliable" and should not be taken seriously by British authorities.
"While the U.S. has allegedly assured the U.K. that it will not violate Assange's rights, we know from past cases that such 'guarantees' are deeply flawed—and the diplomatic assurances so far in the Assange case are riddled with loopholes," noted Simon Crowther, legal adviser at Amnesty International.
"The U.S. must stop its politically motivated prosecution of Assange, which puts Assange and media freedom at risk worldwide," Crowther said Tuesday. "In trying to imprison him, the U.S. is sending an unambiguous warning to publishers and journalists everywhere that they too could be targeted and that it is not safe for them to receive and publish classified material—even if doing so is in the public interest."
Jameel Jaffer, executive director of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, echoed that message, saying in a statement that "prosecuting Assange for the publication of classified information would have profound implications for press freedom, because publishing classified information is what journalists and news organizations often need to do in order to expose wrongdoing by government."
"It's long past time for the U.S. Justice Department to abandon the Espionage Act charges and resolve this case," said Jaffer.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Sanders Rips 'Absurd' US Claim That Israel Is Not Violating International Law
"The State Department's position makes a mockery of U.S. law and assurances provided to Congress," said Sen. Bernie Sanders.
Mar 26, 2024
Sen. Bernie Sanders on Monday said the U.S. State Department's determination that Israel is not violating international law with its assault on the Gaza Strip is "absurd on its face," pointing to the mass death, destruction, and starvation that Israeli forces have inflicted on the territory's population over the past six months.
"Thirty-two thousand Palestinians in Gaza have been killed and almost 75,000 injured, two-thirds of whom are women and children," Sanders (I-Vt.) said in a statement. "Some 60% of the housing units have been damaged or destroyed, and almost all medical facilities have been made inoperable. Today, hundreds of thousands of Palestinian children are facing starvation because [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu won't let in sufficient humanitarian aid, while thousands of trucks are waiting to get into Gaza."
"The State Department's position," said Sanders, "makes a mockery of U.S. law and assurances provided to Congress."
The senator's statement came after State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller told reporters during a press briefing earlier Monday that the Biden administration has not found Israel "to be in violation of international humanitarian law, either when it comes to the conduct of the war or when it comes to the provision of humanitarian assistance."
Miller was responding to a question about assurances the administration has received from the Israeli government that its use of American weaponry has complied with international law and that it has permitted U.S. humanitarian aid to enter Gaza, where the entire population is facing acute hunger.
Under a new Biden administration policy known as NSM-20, recipients of American military aid are required to provide the U.S. government with "credible and reliable" written assurances that they are using such assistance "in a manner consistent with all applicable international and domestic law and policy."
Late last week, a group of U.S. senators—including Sanders—warned the Biden administration that deeming Israeli assurances credible would "be inconsistent with the letter and spirit of NSM-20" and "establish an unacceptable precedent" for the application of the policy "in other situations around the world."
"Until Biden is ready to impose real policy consequences on Netanyahu's government, the famine will continue."
It is a violation of U.S. law to continue sending military assistance to a country that is obstructing the delivery of American humanitarian aid. Last month, far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich blocked a U.S.-funded flour shipment from entering the Gaza Strip, and Israeli forces have repeatedly fired on convoys attempting to deliver aid to desperate Gazans.
Prominent human rights groups have been calling on the U.S. to impose an arms embargo on Israel for months, pointing to documented examples of the Israeli military using American weaponry to commit atrocities in Gaza.
But the Biden administration has refused to even apply concrete restrictions on American military aid. Over the weekend, U.S. President Joe Biden signed into law a measure that approves $3.8 billion in unconditional military assistance for the Israeli government and imposes a one-year ban on funding for the primary humanitarian aid organization in Gaza.
Jeremy Konyndyk, the president of Refugees International and a former USAID official, said Monday that Israel's assurances to the U.S. are "not remotely credible" and argued the Biden administration is undermining efforts to combat the worsening humanitarian crisis in Gaza by accepting the Israeli government's claims.
The U.S., he said, is "talking a big game about fighting the famine that its bombs and diplomatic cover have helped create." Resorting to "gimmicky" efforts such as airdrops and temporary ports while a U.S. ally obstructs humanitarian aid "is not how you fight a famine," Konyndyk argued.
"Fundamentally Biden must choose: between continuing to enable Netanyahu, or ending the famine. There's no way to split the difference," said Konyndyk. "Until Biden is ready to impose real policy consequences on Netanyahu's government, the famine will continue."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular