They said, 'Do not investigate violence against women'...

HEDEP submitted a group motion for a research motion on violence against women to be prioritized on the agenda and discussed today in the TBMM General Assembly, in observance of the November 25 International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women.

Speaking on the motion, HEDEP Diyarbakır Deputy Halide Türkoğlu stated the following:

“WE WILL BE EVERYWHERE”

- Violence against women is a bleeding wound in this country; it is the shame of a government that does not take sufficient measures against this violence and feeds it with policies of impunity. We talk about the importance of the Istanbul Convention in protecting women's lives, and we say that the right to alimony is a hard-won right of women that must be protected.

- We tirelessly and persistently report on how women's gains are being usurped by trustees, from the multilingual 'Hello Violence' hotline to women's shelters and how women's centers are being closed, and the destruction this creates in women's lives.

- Once again, we are faced with the reality of a government that insists on these policies without tiring. We will not give up on reminding this government of its duties and responsibilities toward women, explaining the inadequacies of the policies being implemented, and waging a struggle against this.

- We know very well that until these policies end, violence against women will not end either. As stated in our motion, 350 women were murdered by men in the last 10 months of 2023. In October alone, 19 women were murdered by men, and 18 women lost their lives under suspicious circumstances.

- Femicides are political; there are no suspicious deaths, only femicides left unpunished. We have stated many times everywhere we are that this government has no concern for combating violence against women.

- This government's concern is to torture women who fight against violence against women. It is to intimidate women through pressure, detentions, and torture. Carrying out detention operations against women every March 8 and before every November 25 is also an indicator of this government's fear of women.

- It is not your place to evaluate November 25 events as a crime or a denunciation. You cannot suppress the women's freedom struggle by criminalizing it. We are reporting ourselves; on November 25, we will be everywhere as part of the fight against violence against women.

- We will grow our women's freedom struggle against male dominance. We are right because equality is a right; where there is no equality, there is violence. We will take back what you stole from us through our struggle.

“IS VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN PSYCHOLOGICAL, ECONOMIC, OR SOCIAL?…”

Speaking on behalf of the Saadet Party Group regarding the motion, Sema Silkin Ün stated the following:

- The debate over whether violence against women is psychological, economic, or social is still a luxury for us. Because we are still witnessing femicides every day, and we are talking about why we cannot protect women from murders.

- We lost 350 of our women in 300 days. We have a duty to fight against laws that make sentences on paper almost impossible to execute, against approaches that find violence and murder acceptable and explainable with legitimate reasons, against practices that encourage sexist judicial practices, and against a mentality that does not grasp that protecting a woman's right to life is protecting the dignity of the 'most honorable of creatures'.

İYİ Party Group Deputy for Tekirdağ, Selcan Hamşıoğlu, also expressed the following:

“67 PERCENT OF SOCIETY…”

- According to 2022 data from the Istanbul Economics Research, 67 percent of society thinks that the courts are not sufficient or not at all sufficient in preventing violence against women. 61 percent also find their government and the TBMM insufficient.

- I call on the government in the position of responsibility to think about the reasons why we are entering the 21st century of the Republic—having granted women the right to vote and be elected in the first half of the 20th century—with the label of being the OECD country where women are most exposed to violence; to think about the role of language that makes womanhood almost shameful in this situation; to rehabilitate the perpetrators of violence just as much as the victims; and to demonstrate a will to keep women alive by returning to the Istanbul Convention.

“YOU WILL ALSO BE HELD ACCOUNTABLE”

Speaking on behalf of the CHP Group, Ankara Deputy Semra Dinçer expressed the following:

- We are going through a period where violence against women is practically legitimized by the ruling party, and women are ignored and marginalized.

- The sentences given to perpetrators in trials regarding femicides and violence against women, with 'good conduct' reductions from the lower limit, cause an increase in violence against women. The Istanbul Convention, which protects women, was abolished by AKP Chairman Tayyip Erdoğan himself with a decree that is unconstitutional.

- Thus, with this decision, it was also registered that femicides are political; a mentality that belittles women by saying 'Is it a woman or a girl?' and openly calls women 'sluts' has once again shown its face behind the mask.

- The sin of all women who are subjected to all kinds of violence, harassed, and murdered as a result of your reactionary and misogynistic mentality is on the shoulders of you, the ruling party. No matter how much you try to ignore women and feel uncomfortable with our existence, we will not bow to your pressure.

- You will be buried in history under the screams of women that you do not hear. We are here, women are here. If women are being subjected to violence and killed in a country, that country is also dying. We will not forgive the hands raised against women, who make up half the population in this country.

- Believe me, the day will come when those who commit violence against women, those who protect them, and you will all be held accountable. I reject all forms of discrimination against women in the human rights struggle, as well as violence against their labor, bodies, and identities, and I call on everyone who is sincerely committed to democracy and equal citizenship to fight shoulder to shoulder.

AKP AND MHP REJECTED

HEDEP's motion was rejected by the votes of AKP and MHP deputies.