The statistics are fairly jarring: according to official Turkish government records, the murder rate of women in Turkey jumped by 1400 percent between 2002 and 2009, going from 66 to 953. Some of this rise can probably be attributed to better record keeping and a greater awareness regarding violence against women, but the numbers are still causing concern among women's rights advocates in Turkey. From Bianet:
This development made the headlines in the Turkish Press on Thursday (15 September). The figures are based on data issued by lawyer Aydeniz Alisbah Tuskan, Co-ordinator of the Istanbul Bar Association Centre for Women's Rights. The data revealed an additional startling dimension of the problem: 85 percent of about 2000 annually registered divorce applications in Istanbul are based on violence.
About 300 women applied to the Istanbul Bar Association for protection during the past year. Other applications were concerned with alimony, child custody or family residence for example.
According to lawyer Tuskan, the reason for this explosion in the number of applications based on violence is the fact that women do not endure violence as they used to do in the past.
Full article here. A recent Human Rights Watch report about domestic violence in Turkey can be found here.
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