Parliament adopts bill protecting women, health workers
Parliament took a landmark step to deter violence targeting women and health care workers and cleared a package of reforms for laws in force, including harsher prison terms and fully criminalizing stalking
TURKISH Parliament’s ratification of a bill regarding violence against women and health care workers on Thursday aims to reduce casualties by addressing pressing issues the two groups currently face.
After lengthy deliberations, Parliament approved the bill introduced and approved by a subcommittee in March. The bill is expected to help the government, which has been struggling to keep domestic violence in check while trying to reduce the number of “health care violence” crimes committed by patients or their relatives and friends.
The new bill introduces the sentence of aggravated life imprisonment for perpetrators convicted of deliberate manslaughter if the crime is committed against a woman. Though most such cases end up with this severe punishment, which rules out the possibility of parole, perpetrators have been getting away with lesser sentences in some trials. Along with loosely interpreted extenuating circumstances, a defendant’s conduct during the hearings is sometimes enough to be granted a lenient sentence.
Indeed, women’s rights activists have been criticizing some verdicts in cases of violence against women, which even often took into consideration that the perpetrator “wore a tie to the hearing” before issuing the ruling. The bill scraps this practice too. The perpetrator’s attitudes and behaviors during the trial will not be taken into account as grounds for a discretionary discount.
Overall, the bill increases prison terms for deliberate injury, threat and torture if the victim is a woman, regardless of their relationship with the perpetrator. For instance, the minimum sentence for a minor injury that does not require surgery will be six months in prison. Similarly, the crime of torturing women will have a minimum sentence of five years in prison.
The bill also clarifies the definition of “persistent pursuit” or stalking for the first time, recognizing it as a separate crime. Stalking others physically, through tools of communication (via phone, online messages, etc.), or using third parties, will be subject to prison terms from six months to two years. Prison terms for stalking will be increased if it is committed against children or divorced/divorcing spouse, if it caused the victim to relocate and if the perpetrator had a restraining order when he/she committed the crime.
Domestic violence and violence toward women remain dire issues in Turkey, with stories of murders and beatings of women in the hands of their spouses and others dominating headlines almost every day. Though authorities say the number of “femicides” has decreased, more than 300 murders were “murders of women” according to nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). The government has given the official number of “femicides” as 307.
In most cases, women are killed by their spouses who have had a history of domestic violence, and NGOs often call for a better implementation of protective measures for victims of domestic violence.
Violence against women is a product of a warped patriarchal mindset that still exists in some sections of society. According to an Interior Ministry report from 2020, the majority of perpetrators in domestic violence cases that end in murder are husbands, while most victims are housewives. In some nonfatal cases, women shy away from filing a criminal complaint, either out of fear of their violent husbands or due to economic dependence on their spouses. The report says some women avoid seeking restraining orders against their spouses due to “social pressure, shame and giving another chance for redemption to violent spouses,” according to the report.
The “social pressure” here refers to a warped mindset that is biased toward men in marriages where men are viewed as being entitled to beat their wives. Although this mindset, a legacy of a patriarchal worldview degrading women, is fading away, so-called “honor killings,” where husbands kill cheating spouses or those they claim to suspect of cheating, still exist.
Murders are mostly premeditated, a common theme that perpetrators invariably deny, claiming they killed their spouses during “heated arguments.” Domestic disputes of various kinds make up the majority of motives for murders, ahead of “jealousy” and “rejection of divorce.”
For health care workers, the bill ends the practice of release pending trial for perpetrators of attacks targeting health care workers if the victim or victims are injured. Perpetrators will also not be granted a lenient sentence based on their behavior during the trial.
Health care workers will also be exempt from paying out of their own pockets in malpractice cases if they did not deliberately mistreat the patients under the new bill. The state will cover expenses, compensation, etc., in malpractice cases.