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“Afghan authorities
need to do much more to build on the gains made so far in protecting women
and girls from violence,” Ms. Pillay added.
Produced by the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan
(UNAMA) and the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
(OHCHR), the annual report – entitled this year: A Way to Go: An Update on Implementation of the Law on
the Elimination of Violence against Women in Afghanistan – found
that police and prosecutors were mediating more cases registered under the
EVAW law and that large numbers of cases were still resolved through
informal dispute resolution mechanisms such as jirgas and shuras.
Mediation whether through formal or informal dispute
resolution bodies often fails to protect women from further violence by not
applying criminal sanctions and legal protections for women, according to
the report, which was released at a news conference in the Afghan capital
of Kabul today.
Enacted in 2009, the EVAW law criminalizes acts of
violence against women and harmful practices including child marriage,
forced marriage, forced self-immolation, baad (giving away a woman or girl
to settle a dispute) and 18 other acts of violence against women including
rape and beating. It also specifies punishment for perpetrators.
“Increases in reporting and registration of incidents of
violence against women by Afghan authorities are encouraging,” the
Secretary-General’s Special Representative and head of UNAMA, Jan Kubis,
said in the news release.
“But it is a real concern that these positive steps have
not been met with increased use of the EVAW law to indict and prosecute
those who commit violence against women and girls,” the UN envoy continued.
“Until the EVAW law is enforced fully, progress in ending violence against
women and advancing women’s rights in Afghanistan will be limited.”
The 49-page report compares and updates findings from
UNAMA’s December 2012 report on EVAW law implementation and is based on
consultations with 203 judicial, police and Government officials, and
monitoring of almost 500 cases of violence against women throughout
Afghanistan. The report analyses statistical data on the law’s application
obtained from police, prosecutors and courts in 18 of Afghanistan’s 34
provinces over the one-year period October 2012 to September 2013.
The UN report found both advances and continuing gaps in
enforcement of the EVAW law by police, prosecutors and courts in 16
provinces and in Herat and Kabul provinces. In the sample of 16 of
Afghanistan’s 34 provinces, police and prosecutors registered 650 incidents
of violence against women with prosecutors using the EVAW law in 109 or 17
per cent of cases and courts applying the law in 60 decisions.
In the previous UN report covering the same 16 provinces
and the time period of October 2011 to September 2012, 470 reported
incidents of violence against women were registered to which the EVAW law
was applied in 72, or 15 per cent, of cases with courts using the law in 52
decisions.
The crime of battery and laceration remained the most
prevalent form of violence against women among the registered cases
documented in the current period.
The current report observes that while registration of
reported incidents increased by 28 per cent in the 16 provinces, use of the
EVAW law as a basis for indictment increased by only two per cent. Courts
this year applied the EVAW law in 60 decisions (55 per cent of 109
indictments filed) compared to 52 decisions (72 per cent of indictments
filed) last year, a 17 per cent decrease in courts’ use of the EVAW law to
decide cases in the current period.
Of concern, the report found that the overall number of
criminal indictments filed by prosecutors in violence against women cases
under all applicable laws decreased this year despite the rise in reported
and registered incidents.
The report highlighted that of an estimated 1,669
incidents of violence against women registered with Departments of Women’s
Affairs and police and prosecutors in the 16 provinces, only 109 cases
(seven per cent) went through a judicial process using the EVAW law. This
indicates that overall use of the EVAW law to indict and prosecute
perpetrators of violence against women still remained low in the 16
provinces over the past year.
“The EVAW law, when it is applied, has provided
protection to Afghan women facing violence,” said UNAMA’s Director of Human
Rights, Georgette Gagnon. “But most women victims still remain largely
unprotected due to a lack of investigation into most incidents and
continued under reporting of pervasive violence against women and girls
resulting from discrimination, existing social norms and cultural
practices, and fear of reprisals and threat to life.”
The practice of wrongful prosecution and imprisonment of
women and girls for ‘running away’ from home, often to escape violence,
continued in spite of directives from the Supreme Court and the Attorney
General to end such practices. The practice is also referred to as ‘attempted
zina (sexual intercourse outside of marriage).'
The Supreme Court recorded the convictions of 283
individuals (mostly women) for ‘attempted zina’ with 71 convictions of
girls and women for both ‘running away’ and ‘attempted zina’ between March
2012 and March 2013 in three provinces. The report urged the Government to
fully implement the Attorney General’s 2012 directive, which requires
prosecutors to ensure that women are not prosecuted for leaving their
houses. It also urged a new review of all cases of women who are imprisoned
for ‘running away’ and ‘attempted zina’ and the release of those wrongly
imprisoned without delay.
The UN report observed that police, prosecutors and
courts need increased resources, and technical and political support and
direction from the highest levels of the Government to deal adequately with
the increase in reporting and registration of cases of violence against
women documented in the report. Such support could enable these authorities
to better meet their obligations under the EVAW law and to do their jobs
better.
Amongst the report’s recommendations, it renewed 71
recommendations made in UNAMA’s two previous reports on the issue related
to enhancing and strengthening the enforcement of the EVAW law and protection
of women from violence.
The report noted that only four of the UN’s previous
recommendations had been acted on by the Government of Afghanistan, while
another 20 had been partially implemented.
The UN report also called on the Government to put in place
a concrete plan, within six months, for the next two-year period for
improving implementation of the EVAW law, including measures recommended to
Afghanistan by the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination
Against Women (CEDAW) in August 2013.
Another recommendation contained in the report is that
major donors establish a joint monitoring framework with specific
indicators to measure progress in EVAW law implementation.
Download the press release in English | Dari | Pashto
Download the full report in English: "A Way to Go: An Update on Implementation of the
Law on Elimination of Violence against Women in Afghanistan"
Download the Executive Summary and Recommendations in Dari
Download the Executive Summary and Recommendations in Pashto
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