LETTER from WAVE to all the Rapporteurs in the European Parliament of the draft Directive on violence against women
Correlators
MEP Frances Fitzgerald – EPP
Commission on Women's Rights and Gender Equality (FEMM)
MEP Evin Incir – S&D
Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs (LIBE)
Copy:
Shadow rapporteurs
Christine Anderson – ID
Malin Björk – The left
Nathalie Colin-Oesterlé-PPE
Margarita de la Pisa Carrión – Vox
Lucia Ďuriš Nicholsonová – Renewal
Nicolaus Feast -ID
Assita Kanko- Vox
Diana Riba Giner – Greens/EFA
María Soraya Rodriguez Ramos – Renewal
Maria Eugenia Rodríguez Palop – The Left
Sylwia Spurek – Greens/EFA
Pina Picierno – S&D
Vienna, 31 January 2024
Subject: Strengthening the EU directive on violence against women and organized crime: a call for gender-specific measures and the essential inclusion of specialized services for women
Dear MP Fitzgerald and dear MP Incir,
As staunch supporters of women's rights, the WAVE Network, representing over 1.600 Specialized Women's Services in 46 European countries, has been intensively engaged over the last year and a half in providing amendments and expert analysis for the drafting of the amendments to the proposed EU Directive on violence against women and domestic violence (2022/0066 (COD)). We greatly appreciate your commitment and efforts as shadow rapporteurs in trying to create a directive that truly elevates and protects women's rights in Europe, especially during the trialogue process.
The WAVE Network is united in Condemn unreservedly Member States' failure to include a consent-based definition of rape, as well as the adoption of a gender-neutral approach to addressing violence against women and domestic violence in the Directive. Over decades of advocacy work, we have observed a worrying trend towardsincrease in gender-neutral policies throughout Europe. These policies, often disguised as inclusive, in reality they hide the specific challenges women face in the field of violence against women and domestic violence, as has been highlighted during the COVID-19 pandemic and the high rates of femicide that continue to occur across Europe. This highlights the urgent need for a directive that explicitly takes a gender-specific approach, in line with the standards of the Istanbul Convention for the Protection of Women's Rights.
The Council's resistance to including Article 5 on rape is alarming. We urge continued advocacy to ensure this essential protection is not missed. At the same time, we understand that if we fail to finalize the directive with the mandate of the current Parliament we risk losing the crucial protections already guaranteed. Nonetheless, We encourage the retention of Article 5 alongside other vital provisions and urge you to ask for the inclusion of other key demands in exchange for any concessions. We would like to recall the key points that we, as the largest network of specialized services for women in Europe, consider crucial, thus reiterating our commitment to work closely with you to strengthen this directive as much as possible.
First, we must reiterate the critical need for explicitly include women's specialist services (WSS) in articles and recitals of directive. The unfounded criticism against the inclusion of WSS is rooted in the same logic used by Member States opposing Article 5: a deliberate effort to dilute and reformulate women's rights and render invisible the unique needs of women victims of violence type. This approach, which downplays the specific and structural nature of violence against women, is detrimental to the provision of adequate protection, support and access to justice, as is increasingly occurring in some Member States.
The recognition and inclusion of specialized services for women of sectoral legislation does not in any way affect the existence or importance of general support services. However, unlike general support services, WSSs offer targeted, gender-sensitive assistance that is critical for preventing revictimization and vulnerability of female victims by addressing women's diverse and intersecting needs. Ensuring direct access to these services is not only an ethical imperative for all women, but is also essential to protect the rights of victims with particular protection and support needs that are not adequately met by mainstream services, particularly those who suffer intersectional discrimination, such as migrant women, minority women, Black women, women with disabilities, and LBTIQ women, among others.
Based on the above, WAVE strongly requests theintegration of specialized services for women into the Directive, ensuring that they complement general victim support services. This approach is in line with the our dedication to a collaborative, multi-agency way of working and reflects the minimum standards established by the Istanbul Convention. In particular, we draw your attention to the Chapter 4 – Support for victims, in particular on articles 27, 28, 31 and 32, which highlight the crucial role of specialist services in providing essential support and protection to victims of violence against women and domestic violence. These articles also highlight the need for adequate geographical distribution of specialized services for women and to ensure their availability in sufficient numbers.
We also draw your attention to the WAVE Country Report 2023, published recently, which highlights the critical importance of women's specialist services (WSS) in Europe. The report exposes the negative repercussions resulting from the inadequate availability of WSS, a consequence of gender-neutral policies that have led to decreased funding and investment in feminist organizations and services. This deeply worrying situation is further exacerbated by growing opposition to feminist organizations and the women's rights agenda, which ends up undermining and limiting women's access to protection and support in cases of violence against women and domestic violence .
The EU's commitment to the Istanbul Convention, while laudable, is not sufficiently comprehensive in terms of scope and impact, requiring a more comprehensive embrace in the Directive. We urge the European Parliament to fully adopt the holistic 4P approach of the Convention, which includes effective prevention, protection, prosecution and integration policies. We caution against adopting gender-neutral articles in the Directive is weaken or circumvent these essential parameters, in particular regarding specialized services for women, as they may reduce attention to women's specific problems.
Excluding or undermining the role of the WSS in the Directive, guided by a gender-neutral agenda and perspective, would not only undermine the fundamental rights of women in Europe, but would also put at risk the survival of women's organizations that provide this type of support. Experience, particularly during the COVID-19 pandemic, has shown how gender neutrality policies can limit the operational capacity of these organizations, while violence against women and domestic violence increase exponentially, including rates of femicide and infanticide.
We firmly call for the recognition and inclusion of WSS in the Directivea non-negotiable condition for continued support of the proposed directive by WAVE and its 1.600 members. If the proposed directive does not adopt a cross-sectoral and gender-specific approach and does not include specialized services for women, we will have no choice but to openly withdraw support for the directive for failing to achieve its main aim of preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence in the European Union.
For further details on our specific requests and proposed amendments, please refer to previous letters , promising e , promising
Originally posted on the website of WAVE – Women Against Violence Europe.