KIEV | An activist from the feminist movement Femen demonstrated almost naked Wednesday in front of the presidency in Kiev to demand the ratification by Ukraine of the Istanbul Convention, aimed at preventing and combating violence against women.
“They rape me! Down with violence! », Yelled the young woman, dressed only in black panties despite a temperature close to 0 ° C, a wreath of flowers on her head, while the police arrested her.
Another Femen activist participated in this action, organized on the occasion of the international day for the elimination of violence against women.
Two-thirds of Ukrainian women say they have suffered psychological, physical or sexual violence since the age of 15, according to a 2019 study by the Organization for Security and Cooperation (OSCE).
Ukraine signed the Istanbul Convention in 2011, aimed at better combating domestic violence, but has still not ratified it.
In question, the opposition of religious circles in this predominantly Orthodox country and that of many deputies criticizing the introduction of the notion of “gender” in Ukrainian legislation, seeing it as a threat to “traditional family values”.
Kiev has laws supposed to protect victims of domestic violence, but they have many loopholes and are only rarely enforced, leading to the acquittal of most of the perpetrators of such crimes, according to specialist NGOs.