The new Turkey
Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2019 United States Department of State • Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor
Women

Rape and Domestic Violence: The government and independent monitoring groups reported with concern that violence against women, particularly femicides, increased, compared with 2018. The law criminalizes violence against women and sexual assault, including rape and spousal rape, with penalties of two to 10 years' imprisonment for conviction of attempted sexual violation and at least 12 years' imprisonment for conviction of rape or sexual violation. The government did not effectively or fully enforce these laws or protect victims. For example, in May human rights lawyer Muzeyyen Boylu Issi was shot and killed by her husband in front of their children, after having survived two previous attempts on her life and filing for divorce and a protection order. As of November the husband, Mesut Issi, was in prison pending trial. If convicted of murder, he could face additional charges of aggravated life imprisonment.

The law covers all women and requires police and local authorities to grant various levels of protection and support services to survivors of violence or those at risk of violence. It also mandates government services, such as shelter and temporary financial support, for victims and provides for family courts to impose sanctions on perpetrators.

The law provides for the establishment of violence-prevention and monitoring centers to offer economic, psychological, legal, and social assistance. There were 81 violence prevention centers throughout the country, one in each province. There were 144 women's shelters nationwide, providing shelter to approximately 30,000 women. Women's rights advocates asserted there were not enough shelters to meet the demand for assistance and that shelter staff did not provide adequate care and services, particularly in the southeast.

Some NGOs noted shelters in multiple southeastern provinces closed during the state of emergency and that others faced difficulty following the removal of elected mayors and appointment of government trustees, some of whom cut funding and ended partnerships with the local NGOs. Some NGOs noted the lack of services was more acute for elderly women and LGBTI women as well as women with older children. The government operated a nationwide domestic violence hotline and web application called the Women Emergency Assistance Notification System (KADES). NGOs asserted the quality of services provided in calls was inadequate for victims of domestic violence. According to press reports, 13,000 women had used the KADES app to report violence as of September.

Violence against women, including spousal abuse, remained a serious and widespread problem both in rural and urban areas. Spousal rape is a criminal offense, and the law also provides criminal penalties for conviction of crimes such as assault, deprivation of liberty, or threats. Despite these measures, killings and other forms of violence against women continued unabated. According to the We Will Stop Femicide Association, 430 women were murdered in the first 11 months of the year; 53 in September alone.

On August 24, thousands of demonstrators gathered in Istanbul and in other cities around the country to protest gender-based violence following the public killing of Emine Bulut by her former husband in front of their 10-year-old daughter. Social media users shared video of the attack, and the victim's dying words, "olmek istemiyorum" ("I don't want to die"), became a rallying cry for demonstrators and on social media. In October Bulut's former husband was sentenced to life imprisonment.

Following the incident, women's rights groups called for the enforcement of the Council of Europe's Istanbul Convention on Preventing and Combatting Violence against Women and Domestic Violence, and leaders from across the political spectrum denounced that attack. Courts regularly issued restraining orders to protect victims, but human rights organizations reported that police rarely enforced them effectively. Women's associations also charged that government counselors and police sometimes encouraged women to remain in abusive marriages at their own personal risk rather than break up families.

In October Ayse Tuba Arslan's former husband attacked her with a meat cleaver. Arslan had pressed charges against her former husband 23 times; an Eskisehir court dismissed five of the 10 charges filed during the year. Police failed to enforce the court-issued restraining orders effectively. Arslan died of her wounds on November 25.
Courts in some cases gave reduced sentences to some men found guilty of committing violence against women, citing good behavior during the trial or "provocation" by women as an extenuating circumstance of the crime. For example, in August an Adana court reduced the sentence of Mehmet Ciftci from life imprisonment to 18 years' imprisonment for good behavior. Ciftci was convicted of murdering his 19-year-old wife, who was four months pregnant at the time of her murder.

Other Harmful Traditional Practices: Human rights activists and academics reported the problematic practice of "honor killings" of women continued across the country (31 cases reported during the year). The prevalence of killings was most severe in the southeast.
Individuals convicted of honor killings may receive life imprisonment, but NGOs reported that courts often reduced actual sentences due to mitigating factors. The law allows judges, when establishing sentences, to take into account anger or passion caused by the "misbehavior" of the victim.

Sexual Harassment: The law provides for up to five years' imprisonment for sexual harassment. If the victim is a child, the recommended punishments are longer; however, women's rights activists reported that authorities rarely enforced these laws. For example, in February a police officer sexually harassed a university student being detained during a protest in Ankara. According to local media, despite the existence of photographic evidence, police attempted to cover up the incident, accused the victim of having ties to a terror organization, and detained and interrogated the journalist who interviewed the victim and her family.

Gender equality organizations indicated that incidents of verbal harassment and physical intimidation of women in public occurred with regularity and cited as the cause a permissive social environment in which harassers were emboldened. In one case, in September a woman physically attacked in Ankara reported that authorities tried to legitimize the attack by questioning her during her deposition about what she was wearing and whether the attack occurred late at night.

Some women's rights NGOs asserted that weak legal enforcement of laws to protect women and light sentencing of violent perpetrators of crimes against women contributed to a climate of permissiveness for potential offenders. Women's advocates expressed concern that laws passed in 2018 to encourage dispute resolution through mediation rather than the court system would reduce the severity of criminal punishment given perpetrators of violence against women, thereby reducing the deterrent effect of the law, undermining women's safety, and potentially enabling impunity.

Coercion in Population Control: There were no reports of coerced abortion or forced sterilization.

Discrimination: Women enjoy the same rights as men by law, but societal and official discrimination were widespread. Women faced discrimination in employment. The constitution permits measures, including positive discrimination, to advance gender equality. To encourage the hiring of women, the state paid social services insurance premiums on behalf of employers for several months for any female employee older than age 18.

Laws introduced as a gender justice initiative provided for maternity leave, breastfeeding time during work hours, flexibility in work hours, and required child care by large employers. Rights organizations contended, however, that these changes in the legal framework discouraged employers from hiring women and negatively impacted their promotion potential.

Source: https://www.state.gov/wp-content/uploads/
2020/03/TURKEY-2019-HUMAN-RIGHTS-REPORT.pdf

The new Turkey Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2019 United States Department of State • Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor Women

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The new Turkey
Country Reports on Human Rights Practices for 2019 United States Department of State • Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor
Women