Daphne Program

SESSION OF TUESDAY I SEPTEMBER 3 2002

Program DAPHNE (2000-2003)

Karamanou (PSE). – Mr. President, without a doubt, the DAPHNE program has been a very successful initiative of the European Commission, but also the result of the pressure from the Committee on Women’s Rights and the campaign launched in 1997 with the slogan “Zero tolerance for violence against women,” a slogan, Commissioner, that remains as relevant today as ever, since violence, or more accurately, the terrorism and war against women, has not only not diminished, but is escalating both in Europe and globally.

Chilling news from the many fronts of this irrational and merciless war arrive daily, particularly from countries with which the European Union has political and economic agreements, from Nigeria and Sudan, where the courts of fanatic Islamists sentence innocent women to death by stoning, from India, where girls as young as ten years old are forced into marriage, from the United Arab Emirates, where women have yet to achieve the obvious, namely, political rights. News of this brutal war against women is published daily in the press, even if in small print.

In the European Union, as other colleagues have mentioned, over 500,000 women and children are bought and sold daily, while Europol has only three staff members dealing with the fight against this internationally organized crime against women and children. A percentage of European women ranging from 20% to 50%, depending on the country, have fallen victim to domestic violence, while rapes and sexual harassment are daily occurrences. In Islamic immigrant communities, in the name of so-called sacred religious rules and traditions, horrific practices such as female genital mutilation continue even within the territory of the European Union. Unfortunately, in 2002, millions of women in numerous regions and communities around the world are not even recognized as human beings, let alone as subjects of rights.

Our committee considers violence against women to be the most serious violation of human rights for half of humanity, a modern barbarity against which there is tolerance from patriarchally structured societies, but also institutional tolerance. The intensity of violence against women coincides with the intensity of the struggle for gender equality and the practical recognition of the rights of half the population of the Earth. From this perspective, violence constitutes a global political problem of the highest magnitude and should be treated as such.

The DAPHNE program, beyond its financial aspect — of course, the money is very limited compared to the scale of the problem — has very significant political value, and for this reason, it should continue beyond 2003, hopefully with an increased budget. We hope the new Treaty will provide a stronger legal basis for addressing violence. Our rapporteur, Ms. Avilés Perea, has drafted a very valuable report and has submitted proposals on behalf of our committee, which I would like to ask you, Commissioner, to take seriously into consideration.