The 6th Assembly of Women’s Shelters and Solidarity Centres was held by Women’s Solidarity Centre on 14-16 November 2023 in Ankara with financial support from Heinrich Böll Foundation. The Assembly convened for the first time in 1998 as an initiative of Mor Çatı Women’s Shelter Foundation to mark 25 November declared by the United Nations as the “International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women. State Minister Güldal Akşit, CHP Deputies Oya Araslı and Gaye Erbatur were in attendance as guests in the 6th Council meeting. The participants of the Assembly included 44 organizations working to combat violence against women, 14 civil society organizations that support the efforts to combat violence against women as well as representatives from the public sector including SHÇEK, KSSGM and AAK, and academicians from Hacettepe University Graduate School of Social Work and other universities. 3 political parties and 11 press organizations followed the Assembly.
The first day of the 6th Council saw presentations and considerations on the developments and the agenda of the last year. We assert that what has marked this year has been the murders of women and girls in the name of “honour”.
Women are killed by a number of reasons including poverty, war, honour-killings, traditional practices applied on women’s bodies such as female genital mutilation, customs and traditions, extra-judicial executions and state violence. This is a universal fact, still, in the case of our country these killings turn into a massacre of women at the regional/local level. We, the women, are horrified to be executed every other day on various excuses. Our concerns grow deeper because femicides are ignored or played down with attempts to mitigate the severity of sentences; and the murders are distortedly reported in the media as a trivial page three news story. The lack of adequate number of women’s shelters remains a primary problem in terms of providing the safety of women whose lives are in danger.
Turkey, with a 70 million population, 51 percent of whom are women, has only 8 state-owned Women Guesthouses with a maximum occupancy capacity of 16 persons and a total of 13 women’s shelters, 5 of which are owned by municipalities. In addition, the women’s shelter of the Women’s Solidarity Foundation supported by Yenimahalle Municipality is the only independent women’s shelter. Turkey, in its EU accession bid, should take heed of the EU requirement to open a women’s shelter for every 7,500 women and girls in line with the EU standards and introduce regulations in accordance with harmonization laws.
The participants of the Assembly again heavily discussed the financial problems faced in opening and running women’s shelters and counselling centres, reiterating that it was the state’s responsibility to open, expand and keep open women’s shelters, essential for the life safety of women and children. Expenditures of women’s shelters should be covered by the public budget.
The participants called on the state to develop and conduct central policies to empower women economically. Universal practices show that the state, political powers and local governments have the primary responsibility to establish and operate mechanisms for combatting violence against women and also have the obligation to eliminate violence.
Below are our decisions on the priority items on our agenda:
A commission, whose secretariat will be provided by Ka-Mer, will investigate the femicides and turn this work into a campaign in the upcoming term. In addition, we will publish a quarterly newsletter to make femicides visible and provoke a rapid and effective backlash against the execution of women.
We once more emphasize that it is the state’s responsibility to open, expand and keep open women’s shelters, whose expenditures should be covered by the public budget. Women’s shelters are essential for the life safety of women and children. A funding should be earmarked from the state budget for women’s organizations that plan to open women’s shelters in Turkey and work in this field.
We, first and foremost, want the state to support us in opening firstly currently closed women’s shelters as well as new shelters which we have failed to open so far due to financial reasons.
It is necessary to open women’s shelters, expand Women’s Counselling Centres so that every province has at least one such centre, increase the number and capacity of SHÇEK Women’s Counselling Centres as well as the budget allocated for women’s guesthouses.
Every municipality should open Women’s Counselling Centres that would be overseen and run by women’s organizations. Similarly, the Offices of Governors, via their Women’s Status units, should open Women’s Counselling Centres that would be run by women’s organizations. Municipalities and the Offices of Governors should provide every support to women’s organizations for opening these centres and cover their operational costs.
SHÇEK provincial directorates should adopt a shift work system and provide 24 hours of service so that the police can make a referral in the case of complaints received by police stations out of office hours. The Directorates of Security (Turkish National Police) should have temporary shelters that provide short term accommodation facilities, similar to the ones provided by child services, primarily in locations without any women’s shelters.
A common oversight system should be adopted in all public services including women’s shelters, women’s counselling centres and health service stations. The relevant legislation should be revised accordingly. To this end, we will make an effort to develop partnerships with civil society organizations that have a social oversight role similar to ours but in various fields.
It is necessary to make specific architectural arrangements in all spaces including women’s shelters and counselling centres to accommodate women with mental and physical disabilities. It is also important to contribute to the efforts for making their problems visible.
When we experience violence, we would like to receive proper attention and care at institutions that we contact to seek assistance such as hospitals, law enforcement agencies, the judiciary etc. It hurts us to see that judges and prosecutors are unwilling to implement the Law no. 4320 on the Protection of the Family. We do not want to experience further violence while we are receiving public services. We want to benefit from the implementation of the Code of Criminal Procedure and get the support we need. We do not want to suffer any more because of the lack of communication and coordination among public agencies and institutions.
We recommend all institutions working in the field of combatting violence against women to adopt the operating principles which were identified at the 6th Council meeting by independent women’s shelters working group and counselling centres groups and accepted by the participants of the Assembly. As a standard operating principle, i) all institutions should adopt a woman’s perspective as a basis; ii) having a woman’s perspective should be a requirement in recruitment processes; iii) the locations of women’s shelters and guesthouses should be kept classified in the first degree and due measures should be taken accordingly; iv) women should not be discriminated against on grounds of religion, language, ethnic origin etc. during admission to women’s guesthouses in particular; v) bureaucratic procedures during the application process should be expedited and facilitated.
The State should develop central policies to economically empower women against violence and provide employment and vocational training programmes, financial assistance and social security support on the basis of positive discrimination, which is implemented at the international level.
Women’s rights implementation centres established under bar associations should become widespread. Izmir Bar Association Women’s Rights Counselling and Implementation Centre (KAHDUM) which was closed in recent months based on an anti-democratic decision, should immediately be reopened.
Political parties and candidates, in their statements for local elections in March 2004, should respond to our demands for opening women’s counselling centres and women’s shelters. To this end, a nation-wide campaign will be carried out until the elections, targeting all parties and candidates running for the position of mayor.
Legal regulations made intensely in the EU accession bid carry a lot of weight vis-à-vis the efforts to combat violence against women. Consequently, it is essential to develop and revise laws in favour of women and in line with the universal law, including in particular the Constitution, recently adopted laws (the new Civil Code) and upcoming laws (Turkish Penal Code, the laws on Public Administration, Local Governments, Public Financial and Personnel).
The State is bound by international conventions, to which it is a party, to ensure that all opportunities and practices in our country are egalitarian and eliminate violence against women. To this end, it is imperative to pass, without delay, the Law on the Organization of the Directorate General for Women’s Status and Problems, the lack of which is a major setback in achieving this obligation as the Directorate is the national mechanism that coordinates the efforts for eliminating sexist inequalities.
In order for the Fundamental Law on Public Administration to become a reform, it is mandatory to have a Ministry for Women’s Affairs as a part of the state structure and set up field offices of this Ministry in every province.
This Ministry for Women’s Affairs, which is to be established, should employ women educated and specialized in the field of violence against women. The cadres of experts on violence against women working at the Directorate General for Women’s Status and Problems (KSSGM) and the Social Services and Child Protection Agency (SHÇEK) should be transferred to the Ministry for Women’s Affairs.
Any regulation that will be made as part of the reform on public administration, which is high on the agenda, should not only preclude the state from fulfilling its obligations towards women, but it should also enable, at least facilitate, the state to satisfy these obligations.
Public administration reform should not eliminate social state; it should reinforce services for women, including primarily women’s shelters and counselling centres, by providing adequate budget for these services.
Certain practices, including setting quotas, should be adopted to facilitate women’s participation in decision making mechanisms. “Gender equality units” should be established in central and local governments.
Public oversight should be based on a system that allows civil society engagement and that does not solely act on the basis of a market rationale but also considers the common good.
Analyses of gender responsive budgeting should be made, and the conclusions of the analyses should be publicly announced together with the budget; thereby making the state expenditures for women affairs visible.
A public administration reform that strengthens local services would be in women’s interest. However, recently announced Draft Fundamental Law on Public Administration does not guarantee that local services would be strengthened. Our demands should be taken into account while revising the draft law.
While the Fundamental Law on Public Administration and other relevant draft laws are enacted, funding should be earmarked from all budgets to increase the quality and the rate of services for women. These fundings should be excluded from austerity measures and privatization measures.
Economic violence pushes women into poverty and leaves them out of decision making and oversight mechanisms. Besides, it becomes more difficult for women to distance themselves from abusive relations when they do not have economic and social security. On account of these reasons and also specifically to rectify the loss of rights arising from article 10 of the Civil Code regulating the date of enactment of the law, we will continue our campaign “No to Economic Violence” launched in 2003 by more than 50 women’s groups in line with the decision of the 6th Council.
We ask the private sector, trade unions and municipalities at the local level to provide in-kind support to help with the funding challenges of our campaign.
During the 6th Council, our delegation comprising representatives from various provinces submitted 4 thousand petitions to the Turkish Grand National Assembly (TGNA), raising the total number of petitions so far to 30 thousand. However, since there has not been any response yet to even one petition, we want and expect that women members of parliament follow up on our petitions and bring them to the agenda of the TGNA. We commend and thank persons and institutions that have contributed from a woman’s perspective to the work on the draft Turkish Penal Code.
Participants of the Assembly discussed the currently debated “Turkish Penal Code from a Woman’s Perspective: Requests for Amendments to Draft TPC” drafted by TPC Women Working Group and agreed on all of the requests for amendment in the draft.
The Assembly decided to provide support to the TPC Women Working Group and follow up on the matter at the local level.
The 6th Assembly considered the Draft Turkish Penal Code, which is prepared to amend TPC and currently discussed at TGNA Justice Committee, and the “Turkish Penal Code from a Woman’s Perspective: Requests for Amendments to Draft TPC” drafted by TPC Women Working Group. All of the requests for amendment to TPC are also the demands of the Assembly. We will send a letter to 550 members of parliament to let them know of our decision.
During the enactment process of the draft law, we also need a campaign in addition to the work carried out by the TGNA to influence the public opinion and the members of parliament. With significant contributions from jurist and non-jurist women, this campaign will make it apparent that the Penal Code is not just technical work but concerns us all, emphasizing the political responsibility of the Government about the Draft law.
We, the participants of the Assembly, will make use of the local media in our respective local areas and continue to inform women and the public through meetings. We will call on the respective member of parliaments of our provinces to support our demands and send thank you messages to members of parliaments who support our demands. We, as women’s organizations, will jointly organise street demonstrations and make press statements.
TOP PRIORITY DEMAND OF ALL WOMEN’S ORGANIZATIONS IS THE DISMISSAL FROM OFFICE OF DOĞAN SOYASLAN, CONSULTANT TO THE MINISTER OF JUSTICE, WHO SAID “MARRY YOUR RAPISTS”.
PARTICIPANTS OF THE ASSEMBLY
Adana Bar Association Women’s Rights Commission (Adana)
AKDAM (Adana)
Adana Union of Women’s Organizations (Adana)
Aliağa Local Agenda 21 Women and Family Counselling Unit (İzmir)
Amargi Women’s Academy (İstanbul)
Amargi Women’s Cooperative (Adana)
Antakya Municipality Women’s Counselling Centre (Hatay)
Antalya Women’s Solidarity and Counselling Centre (Antalya)
Antalya Local Agenda 21 Women’s Assembly (Antalya)
Independent Women’s Association (Mersin)
Permanent Women’s Platform for Peace (Ankara)
Batman Women’s Solidarity Centre (Batman)
Bingöl Ka-Mer (Bingöl)
Women of the Republic Association (Ankara)
DİKASUM (Diyarbakır)
Aegean Women’s Solidarity Foundation (İzmir)
No to Economic Violence Platform (İstanbul)
EPİ – DEM – Women’s Education and Psychological Counselling Center (Diyarbakır)
Housewives Solidarity and Development Centre (Adana)
İstanbul Bar Association Women’s Rights Implementation Centre (İstanbul)
Women’s Solidarity Foundation (Ankara)
Women’s Solidarity Group (İzmir)
Association for Utilizing Women’s Work (Çanakkale)
Association for Protecting Women’s Rights, İzmir Branch (İzmir)
Women for Women’s Human Rights (WWHR) – New Ways (İstanbul)
Foundation for Solidarity with Women (İstanbul)
KADMER (Kızıltepe / Mardin)
Women Exist Group (Kadınlar Vardır Grubu) (Ankara)
Ka-Mer (Diyarbakır)
Karşıyaka City Council Women’s Solidarity Centre (İzmir)
Kütahya Municipality Women’s Shelter (Kütahya)
Morçatı Women’s Shelter Foundation (İstanbul)
Selis Women’s Counselling Centre (Diyarbakır)
Social Services and Child Protection Agency, Department of Women Services (Ankara)
Social Services and Child Protection Agency, Directorate of Provincial Social Work (Ankara)
Social Services and Child Protection Agency, Directorate of Provincial Social Work Ankara Guesthouse (Ankara)
Şahmaran Women’s Solidarity and Research Centre (İstanbul)
TPC Women Working Group
Reshaping Health and Education Association, Psychosocial Trauma Support Unit, Women Project (İstanbul)
Local Agenda 21 Women’s Council (Kütahya)
Local Agenda 21 Women’s Shelter Working Group (İzmir)
Local Agenda 21 City Council Women’s Assembly (Adana)