In a judgment delivered on Thursday 23 January, the European Court of Human Rights condemned France for a divorce “in which blame was attributed solely to the applicant, on the grounds that she had ceased to have sexual relations with her husband” and found there had been a violation of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which concerns the right to respect for private and family life.
“In the Court’s view, consent to marriage could not imply consent to future sexual relations. Such an interpretation would be tantamount to denying that marital rape was reprehensible in nature”, states the judgment.
For the Strasbourg judges, “the very existence of such a matrimonial obligation runs counter to sexual freedom, the right to bodily autonomy and the Contracting States’ positive obligation of prevention in the context of combating domestic and sexual violence”. These obligations are also specified in the Council of Europe’s Convention against violence against women and domestic violence (the ‘Istanbul Convention’), ratified by France (2014) and the European Union (2023).
Finding “no reason capable of justifying this interference by the public authorities in the area of sexuality”, the Court therefore considers that “marital duties”, as set out in French law, is contrary to the right to control one’s own body and to the obligation of States to combat domestic and sexual violence.
Link to the H.W v France judgment (in French): https://aeur.eu/f/f6e (Original version in French by Véronique Leblanc)