Violence against women and children a daily reality in every country, women’s shelters not

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The european Network WAVE (Women Against Violence) has published its third annual Country Report 2010 on the situation of women’s services in Europe. The results are shocking:

Only six countries in Europe – Luxembourg, Norway, the Netherlands, Spain, Malta and Slovenia – fulfill the standard of providing at least one women’s shelter place per 10,000 inhabitants. The 27 EU Member States lack around 25,500 women's shelter places. Altogether, the 44 analyzed European countries lack more than 54,800 women’s shelter places. Surprisingly, even Switzerland, one of the richest countries in the world, does not fulfill the minimum standard.

Eight countries – Austria, Liechtenstein, Germany, Iceland, UK, Sweden, Denmark and Portugal – fulfill at least half of the standard. The service provision is extremely poor in countries including Italy, Bulgaria, Azerbaijan, Czech Republic, Ukraine, Russia and Poland – in Poland, there is only one women’s shelter place for almost 1,5 million people.  Four countries – Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Belarus – do not seem to have any service qualifying as a women specific shelter.  

Drastic differences still exist between EU and non-EU countries as well as between new and old EU countries: Out of the existing 1,992 women’s shelters in 44 European countries, only 202 women shelters (10 %) are located in non-EU countries - for a population of over 325 million people. 96.5 per cent of the existing 1,790 women’s shelters in 27 EU Member States are located in the old EU countries and only 3.5 per cent in the new ones. The lack of shelter places can result in lack of protection and places victims of domestic violence at risk of death. The situation is most concerning in Russia: In 2009 alone, 14,000 women have been killed by their (ex-) partners.  

WAVE urgently calls upon the council of Europe, the European Union and each Member State to undertake effective measures to increase the number of safe women’s shelters. Europe must not accept that the economic crisis puts lives, health and freedom of hundreds of thousands of women and their children at risk – all too often deadly risk.

No women’s shelter shall be closed! New women’s shelters shall be opened daily in Europe, until we meet the minimum standard of providing one women’s shelter place per 10,000 inhabitants.

In Europe alone, approximately every fourth to every fifth woman has suffered male violence during adult life. If all forms of violence against women are taken into account, around 45 per cent of all women experience violence. This means that in the 27 EU Member States, about 100 million women are estimated to become victims of gender-based violence in their lifetime – and one to two million women are victimised daily.

Migrant women, lacking financial and social resources, are the most at risk: In Spain, out of 26 women killed by their partners in 2008, 56 per cent were migrants. While most of the victims of domestic violence are migrants, the perpetrators are not: The statistics of the Austrian women’s shelters show that in 60 per cent of cases of domestic violence, the perpetrator was born in Austria.   

The Country Report 2010 has a special focus on the situation of migrant and minority women. Data was gathered by 94WAVE Member Organisations in 44 European countries as well as from women’s NGOs specialised in the support of migrant and minority ethnic women. WAVE’s objective is to raise awareness, to roll-out good practice models as well as to highlight missing or inadequate measures. Women against Violence Europe (WAVE) connects 27 countries of the European Union, the applicant countries Croatia and Turkey and 18 non-EU countries, including the Balkan countries.

The new Council of Europe Convention to Prevent and Combat Violence against Women and Domestic  Violence, signed in May 2011 in Istanbul, contains (among others) a clear obligation to criminalize rape, defines the need for specialist women’s support services (Article 22) and aims for shelters in sufficient numbers (Article 23) referring to the Council of Europe Task Force recommendation of one family place per 10,000 inhabitants.

Violence against women is not random. It is violence „directed against a woman because she is a woman or violence that affects women disproportionately“[1]. The Beijing Platform for Action points out that violence against women is „one of the crucial social mechanisms by which women are forced into a subordinate position compared with men“[2]. 

Women against Violence Europe (WAVE): http://www.wave-network.org

WAVE Country Report 2010: http://www.wave-network.org/start.asp?ID=23519

For further information, please contact:

Maria Rösslhumer, tel.: +43 (0) 664 7930 789, maria.roesslhumer@aoef.at

Sonja Plessl, tel.: +43 (0) 1 548 2720-20, sonja.plessl@wave-network.org