BIANET-Expert consultant Isik says Turkey getting results after 20 years of struggle for women rights but calls for stronger stance to advance further. "The definition of violence should be broadened to include all forms of obstacles placed in front of women".
As November 25 marked the United
Nations Day to Prevent Violence Against Women, bianet asked expert
consultant Nazik Isik the state of the struggle in Turkey to end
violence.
Isik said the 20 year
struggle in Turkey to end violence against women had finally started to
produce results in 2006 and that required legislation was put into
force but added that the society needed now to adopt these concepts
while women organizations created pressure groups.
"We are at an important
crossroad", Isik said. "I believe that important steps have been taken
at the point of enforcing the legal amendments made since 1998 and that
the Prime Ministry Decree [calling for nation-wide positive
discrimination for women] is an expression of willpower. We are at the
point where we need to hold strong. We must continue to be a pressure
group".
"The definition of
violence should be broadened"
Noting that when
violence was mentioned in Turkey the first thing that came to mind was
"a slap", Isik said "everything that eliminates the opportunity of
development for women should be accepted as violence" including
economic obstructions and psychological pressure.
"Not sending daughters
to school is also violence" Isik explained, pointing out that limiting
the definition of violence to something that happened only between
couples served to overshadow the overall violence women faced.
Isik warned that on the
issue of violence between couples, the mentality that the issue was
"intimately confidential and cannot be talked about" was on the
foreground.
"It is important for
democratization to intervene in violence between couples, in violence
inside families" Isik said. "Couples are important. We need a broader
definition [to violence]."
"If customs are debated,
it's thanks to women organizations"
Isik said she believed
the women movement in Turkey had achieved important advancements and
led to a debate on various important issues from legislative amendments
to shelter homes, carrying these on the country's agenda.
Yet, she added, these
were not enough.
"There is the need for
more" she said. "There are only 25 women organizations in 81 provinces
of Turkey". Isik said, however, that despite the low number, it was
because of the work of these organizations that the issue of the effect
of customs on women rights was being debated.
Isik also said that
Turkey had made important contributions to the United Nations work on
violence against women and that it played a bridging role as a country.
But legislative arrangements to develop the UN program needed more than
to stay on paper alone she said, adding "we require a world where
November 25s do not exist".
27.11.2006
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