Brussels, 16/06/2011 (Agence Europe) - The Council of Europe has created a convention to protect the victims of gender-based and domestic violence. It was presented in a press conference at the European Parliament on 15 June with José Manuel Bota, chair of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, Rashida Manjoo, UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women and Eva-Britt Svensson, chair of the EP women's rights and gender equality committee.
Bota explained that it is the most far-reaching international convention to tackle this violation of human rights. It aims to harmonise international laws to ensure equal rights for every woman by demanding that activities such as stalking, sexual harassment or forced marriage be made criminal offences. Svensson added: “We could never build a society if women are scared in many areas of their lives”. Until now, only 13 countries have signed the convention but Bota is sure that others will join soon: “There is no reason to be concerned. The treaty was published in Istanbul 11th May. We rushed things because we wanted to send a strong signal to East-Europe, but most of the countries need more time to sign it because of their own procedures”. On the other hand, at the European Parliament, the S&D Group is not so confident and called on EU governments to speed up adoption of a European Protection Order for victims of gender-based and domestic violence. The Parliament voted for the measure last December, but now, according to the Socialists, the Hungarian Presidency would prefer to move the issue to another committee delaying the decision for up to two years. (G.Ba.)