site.btaCouncil of Europe's Human Rights Commissioner, European Commission's First Vice President Urge Bulgaria to Ratify Istanbul Convention

Brussels, January 22 (BTA correspondent Nikolay Jeliazkov) - Nils Muiznieks, the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights, has sent a letter to Parliament Chairperson Tsveta Karayancheva, urging for ratification of the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence (Istanbul Convention). The letter dated January 19 was released to the media by the Council of Europe's press office.

The proposed ratification of the Convention has met with serious opposition from the United Patriots, a coalition which is part of the ruling coalition, from the opposition Bulgarian Socialist Party, the Volya party and the Bulgarian Orthodox Church on the grounds that it threatens traditional family values of Bulgarian society.

Commissioner Muiznieks said he was following with interest the process of ratification by Bulgaria of the Istanbul Convention and welcomed the government's decision earlier this year to submit to the National Assembly a bill to ratify it.

He said: "I am therefore particularly concerned about several misconceptions that have been propagated in the public debate around the Convention in Bulgaria. Some have even argued that Parliament should not ratify the Convention. I would therefore like to debunk myths surrounding the Convention."

The Convention, which was adopted in 2011 and entered into force in 2014, requires states to implement a comprehensive array of practical measures to prevent violence against women (including through awareness-raising and education campaigns), to protect the victims (including through the availability of shelters and psychosocial support) and to prosecute the perpetrators, said Muiznieks.

He explained that "violence against women is considered 'gender-based' when it impacts predominantly women, and/or affects them because of the very fact that they are women. Although men, too, can be victims of domestic violence, in the vast majority of cases the victims are women and girls".

"All states are bound to take appropriate measures to modify the social and cultural patterns of conduct of men and women, with a view to achieving the elimination of prejudices, and customary and other practices which are based on the idea of the inferiority or the superiority of either of the sexes or on stereotyped roles for men and women," the letter says.

The Council of Europe's Commissioner argues with critics who may "acknowledge that violence against women is a problem, but wish to prevent governments from challenging traditional gender roles and stereotypes, due to a cultural affirmation that men and women should play very different roles in public life and within the family. This approach limits women to the stereotypical role of mothers, giving birth and staying at home to rear children".

Muiznieks states that "all the measures provided for by the Istanbul Convention reinforce family foundations and links by preventing and combating the main cause of destruction of families, that is, violence".

"In conclusion, the Istanbul Convention is about preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence and has no other hidden purposes or effect. (...) Therefore, I urge the Bulgarian Parliament to ratify the Convention as soon as possible and promote a more objective debate so as to facilitate public awareness and policies able to foster the implementation of the Convention," Nils Muiznieks said.

During his visit to Bulgaria on Monday, European Commission First Vice President Frans Timmermans expressed a hope that the Bulgarian Parliament would ratify the Istanbul Convention in the interest of all women - mothers, sisters and daughters - and of the European societies, the press office of the Commission Representation to Sofia said.

Timmermans said that Parliament would make a fully sovereign decision whether to ratify the document. He noted that many things had been said about the Convention and many of them were untrue. He stressed that what the Convention does is protect women from violence - neither more nor less.

Timmermans added that one in three women in Europe has been a victim of violence at least once in her life just because she is a woman. Also, one in three women in Europe has encountered psychological and/or sexual harassment. This is unacceptable, it must stop and this has to be done now - together, said the Commission's First Vice President.

The Istanbul Convention helps the prevention of and fight against violence against women and domestic violence. This is the first binding and comprehensive international instrument in Europe dealing with violence against women. It is not about imposing new social standards; what it does is ban violence, said Timmermans.