Mor Çatı Women’s Shelter Foundation held a workshop with the members of the Supreme Court in accordance with “Women’s Collaboration For Gender Justice Project” which Mor Çatı has conducted with Human Rights Law Research Center of İstanbul Bilgi University. The meeting which was held on 29th of March, 2013 in Ankara was entitled “National and International Legal Practices for the Struggle with Violence and Discrimination Against Women”. The members of the Supreme Court and a women’s organization gathered around the same table (probably the first time in history) and shared the experiences about cases of violence against women.
Mor Çatı Women’s Shelter Foundation held a workshop with the members of the Supreme Court in accordance with “Women’s Collaboration For Gender Justice Project” which Mor Çatı has conducted with Human Rights Law Research Center of İstanbul Bilgi University. The meeting which was held on 29th of March, 2013 in Ankara was entitled “National and International Legal Practices for the Struggle with Violence and Discrimination Against Women”. The members of the Supreme Court and a women’s organization gathered around the same table (probably the first time in history) and shared the experiences about cases of violence against women.
The participants were the volunteers of Mor Çatı Women’s Shelter Foundation, the members of Human Rights Law Research Center of İstanbul Bilgi University, Delegation of the European Union to Turkey, the President of Penal Department No:1 of the Supreme Court, members and Judge-Inspectors of the Supreme Court, members and Judge-Inspectors of Penal Department No:1, 3 and 14 of the Supreme Court, and Judge-Inspectors of Penal Department No:2of the Supreme Court.
At the opening speech, Mehmet Yalçın, the President of Penal Department No:1 of the Supreme Court, stated that they were in charge of applying the laws to everyone equally. Underlining the fact that violence against women has increased, Mr. Yalçın said that they were dealing with such cases very delicately and they didn’t want women to be killed; therefore they strived to prevent them. Mr. Yalçın pointed out the fact that mitigation for unjust provocation shouldn’t be granted for crimes against women and the cases of femicide. He specified that they are trying to reconstitute the legal opinion concerning this issue. Mehmet Yalçın also said that if women commit homicide due to sexual violance, they consider such cases as self defense.
Prof. Dr. Yakın Ertürk who was previously a UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women and is still a member of European Committee for the Prevention of Torture, made a presentation named “The Framework of United Nations (UN) for The Struggle with Violence Against Women.” Prof. Dr. Feride Acar, a member of UN CEDAW (Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women), referred to international regulations for violence against women, ranging from CEDAW to İstanbul Convention. She stated that CEDAW was ratified by Turkey in 1986 and the convention was the first and a significant text that elaborated on the scope of discrimination against women.
Feride Güneri who is a clinical psychologist and volunteer of Mor Çatı Women’s Shelter Foundation discussed “the types of violence and what violence does to women” in her speech entitled “The Conceptualization of Violence and Discrimination Against Women”. She said that the applications of women who were exposed to violence must be taken into consideration in the criminal and civil trials, and also emphasized that particularly in cases of sexual crimes, women’s testimonies should be relied upon, and the fact that they had given incoherent testimonies before shouldn’t be used against them.
The members of Supreme Court and judge-inspectors also shared their experiences and observations. Stating that they had difficulty in implementing regulations since women withdrew their complaints, the members of Supreme Court highlighted that women were actually victimized because of having made the complaints, as the public prosecution continues in case of deliberate injury (assault) and the women end up even paying the penalties as the verdicts are against them. The members of Supreme Court asserted that the jurisdiction gained ground thanks to recent regulations and fulfilled its duties; even so the jurisdiction was under the pressure. They pointed out the fact that the problems occured due to lack of inter institutional communication (court- police station- shelter) and the issue was mostly misrepresented in the media.
Assistant Prof. Dr. Dolunay Özbek, a member of Law Faculty in İstanbul Bilgi University, focused on positive liability and necessary attention which are dominative principles for the implemention of international law into municipal law on her presentation. She especially underlined the significance of the state’s liability to fulfill its duty which means positive liability and paid adequate attention to its duty (Did the state fulfill its duty?) She also emphasized the importance of the effective protection of women, the prevention of violation of the right to life and taking precautions for the cases of violence against women. Özbek said that these lawsuits determined the contents of law which was particularly constituted after European Court of Human Rights’ decision on Nahide Opuz.
In the section entitled “The Experiences of Jurisdiction and Women About The Cases of Violence Against Women” in the meeting that lasted for a day, Muzaffer Özdemir, a member of Penal Department No:1 of the Supreme Court, talked about his experiences in the Supreme Court. He said that they were in process of publishing a book, and added that they adjudicated over 10.000 cases in 2012 and there were more than 500 cases about violence against women amongst them, underlining that they were dealing with women and women’s rights. Focusing attention to the fact that harsh punishments were granted to honour killings, Muzaffer Özdemir declared that they no longer recognize the decisions of family members and accepted mitigation for unjust provocation for the murder of women (the fact that a women who is adult and single is in a relationship with a man cannot be considered as unjust provocation), underlining that they also didn’t implement mitigation for unjust provocation by any insult. However, Özdemir said that they assessed a married woman’s violation of her liability for fidelity as the unjust provocation and cited 185/3rd article of Turkish Civil Code in their decision. Özdemir remarked that they didn’t act in accordance with the public perception of chastity, and make subjective judgements, emphasizing that they are completely depended on the legislations and it was their judicial opinion which is open to discussion.
Özlem Özkan and Deniz Bayram who are lawyers from Mor Çatı Women’s Shelter Foundation conveyed their experiences in Mor Çatı. Özkan and Bayram mentioned the reflections of judgements of Supreme Court on women. As far as they stated, women don’t particularly believe that they could get results when they apply to the justice and they request for the elimination of their subjection when applying to judicial authority, nevertheless; they get disappointed mostly. The volunteer lawyers from Mor Çatı remarked that women’s movement drew attention to the judge’s decisions, underlining that they raised an issue of mitigation for unjust provocation through a campaign entitled “we are rising against the murder of women” and they succeeded on the issue. They referred to the recent judicial opinion of Penal Department No:1 of the Supreme Court that the violation of the liability for fidelity is a reason of unjust provocation and emphasized that they would meet once again in the following period.
Thanks to the meeting that Mor Çatı Women’s Shelter Foundation held in accordance with “Women’s Collaboration For Gender Justice”, it
was probably the first time there was a chance to Exchange experiences with the members of Supreme Court.