Council Decision (EU) 2023/1075 of 1 June 2023 on the conclusion, on behalf of the European Union, of the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence with regard to institutions and public administration of the Union

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The Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs, together with the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality, adopted the interim report by Anna Maria CORAZZA BILDT (EPP, SE) and Christine REVAULT D'ALLONNES BONNEFOY (S&D, FR) on the proposal for a Council decision on the conclusion, by the European Union, of the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence. The committee asked the Estonian Presidency to speed up the ratification by the Union of the Istanbul Convention , stressing that the accession of the Union to the Convention will ensure the establishment of a coherent European legal framework to prevent and combat violence against women and gender-based violence While welcoming the signing of EU’s accession to the Istanbul Convention on 13 June 2017, Members regretted the fact that the limitation to two areas, namely matters relating to judicial cooperation in criminal matters and those related to asylum and non-refoulement, raised legal uncertainties as to the scope of the EU’s accession. The report invited the Council, the Commission and the Member States to take account of a series of recommendations , including: The European Parliament adopted by 489 votes to 114, with 69 abstentions, a resolution on the proposal for a Council decision on the conclusion, by the European Union, of the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence. Members recalled that gender-based violence should be treated as a serious and urgent issue as it concerns more than 250 million women and girls in the EU alone. Some groups of women and girls, such as migrant women, women refugees and asylum seekers, women and girls with disabilities, LBTI women and Roma women, are at risk of multiple discrimination and are therefore even more vulnerable to violence. Condemning all forms of violence against women, Parliament welcomed the signing of the EU’s accession to the Istanbul Convention on 13 June 2017. It urged the Estonian Presidency to speed up the EU’s ratification of the Convention , the first comprehensive legally binding international instrument on preventing and combating violence against women and gender-based violence, including domestic violence. Members stressed that the EU’s accession to the Convention will ensure a coherent European legal framework to prevent and combat violence against women and gender-based violence and to protect and support victims in the EU’s internal and external policies. Parliament invited the Council, the Commission and the Member States to take account of a series of recommendations, including: present a legal act to support Member States in their efforts to prevent and eliminate all forms of violence against women; revise the EU framework decision currently in force on combating certain forms and expressions of racism and xenophobia by means of criminal law, in order to include sexism, bias crime and incitement to hatred on grounds of sexual orientation, gender identity and sex characteristics. Lastly, Parliament called for the creation of a European Monitoring Observatory on gender-based…

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