The EU and the Council of Europe on Sunday voiced regret and alarm over the Polish right-wing government’s move to withdraw from a landmark international treaty combating violence against women.
The Council of Europe said it was “alarmed” that the Polish government was moving to withdraw from a landmark international treaty combating violence against women.
Polish Minister of Justice Zbigniew Ziobro over the weekend said that he would yesterday begin preparing the formal process to withdraw from the Istanbul Convention.
Photo: AFP
The treaty is the world’s first binding instrument to prevent and combat violence against women, from marital rape to female genital mutilation.
Ziobro has in the past dismissed it as “an invention, a feminist creation aimed at justifying gay ideology.”
The European Commission, the EU’s executive arm, told reporters in Brussels that it “regrets that such an important matter has been distorted by misleading arguments in some member states.”
The Commission added that it would “continue its efforts to finalize the EU’s accession” of the convention, which was signed in 2017, but has not yet been ratified.
A previous centrist Polish government signed the treaty in 2012 and it was ratified in 2015.
The treaty was spearheaded by the Council of Europe, the continent’s oldest human rights organization, and its Secretary-General Marija Pejcinovic Buric condemned the Law and Justice (PiS) government’s plan to withdraw.
“Leaving the Istanbul Convention would be highly regrettable and a major step backwards in the protection of women against violence in Europe,” she said in a statement on Sunday. “If there are any misconceptions or misunderstandings about the convention, we are ready to clarify them in a constructive dialogue.”
About 2,000 people on Friday marched in the Polish capital, Warsaw, to protest the government’s withdrawal plan, some shouting “Stop violence against women.”
There was also outrage from several members of the European Parliament, with Iratxe Garcia Perez, the Spanish leader of the Socialist group, calling the decision “disgraceful.”
“I stand with Polish citizens taking [to] the streets to demand respect for women’s rights,” he tweeted.
The leader of the EU parliament’s Renew Europe group, former Romanian prime minister Dacian Ciolos tweeted: “Using the fight against the Istanbul Convention as an instrument to display its conservatism is a new pitiful and pathetic move by some within the PiS government.”
Irish center-right Member of the European Parliament Frances Fitzgerald said it was now essential for the whole of the EU to ratify the convention “so that no woman is left unprotected and vulnerable to violence.”
The Council of Europe said that the Istanbul Convention’s “sole objective” was to combat violence against women and domestic violence.
Although the treaty does not explicitly mention gay marriage, that has not stopped the backlash to it in Poland, Hungary and Slovakia.
In Slovakia, the parliament rejected the treaty, saying — without proof — that it was at odds with the country’s constitutional definition of marriage as a heterosexual union.
The Strasbourg-based Council of Europe, which is separate from the EU, has no binding powers, but brings together 47 member states to make recommendations on rights and democracy.
Warsaw has already clashed with the EU Commission over reforms to its judicial system, championed by recently re-elected Polish President Andrzej Duda.
Turkey is also mulling a possible withdrawal from the treaty, and on Sunday, women marched in several cities there to express support for the treaty.
The demonstrations also reflect rising anger in Turkey at the growing number of women killed, including the murder of university student Pinar Gultekin this month.
A fire caused by a burst gas pipe yesterday spread to several homes and sent a fireball soaring into the sky outside Malaysia’s largest city, injuring more than 100 people. The towering inferno near a gas station in Putra Heights outside Kuala Lumpur was visible for kilometers and lasted for several hours. It happened during a public holiday as Muslims, who are the majority in Malaysia, celebrate the second day of Eid al-Fitr. National oil company Petronas said the fire started at one of its gas pipelines at 8:10am and the affected pipeline was later isolated. Disaster management officials said shutting the
DITCH TACTICS: Kenyan officers were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch suspected to have been deliberately dug by Haitian gang members A Kenyan policeman deployed in Haiti has gone missing after violent gangs attacked a group of officers on a rescue mission, a UN-backed multinational security mission said in a statement yesterday. The Kenyan officers on Tuesday were on their way to rescue Haitian police stuck in a ditch “suspected to have been deliberately dug by gangs,” the statement said, adding that “specialized teams have been deployed” to search for the missing officer. Local media outlets in Haiti reported that the officer had been killed and videos of a lifeless man clothed in Kenyan uniform were shared on social media. Gang violence has left
US Vice President J.D. Vance on Friday accused Denmark of not having done enough to protect Greenland, when he visited the strategically placed and resource-rich Danish territory coveted by US President Donald Trump. Vance made his comment during a trip to the Pituffik Space Base in northwestern Greenland, a visit viewed by Copenhagen and Nuuk as a provocation. “Our message to Denmark is very simple: You have not done a good job by the people of Greenland,” Vance told a news conference. “You have under-invested in the people of Greenland, and you have under-invested in the security architecture of this
Japan unveiled a plan on Thursday to evacuate around 120,000 residents and tourists from its southern islets near Taiwan within six days in the event of an “emergency”. The plan was put together as “the security situation surrounding our nation grows severe” and with an “emergency” in mind, the government’s crisis management office said. Exactly what that emergency might be was left unspecified in the plan but it envisages the evacuation of around 120,000 people in five Japanese islets close to Taiwan. China claims Taiwan as part of its territory and has stepped up military pressure in recent years, including
RSS