International Conference on Violence Against Women Gets Under Way
09/09/2009
The International Conference on Violence Against Women, an Italian G8 Presidency initiative promoted by the Presidency of the Council of Ministers' Equal Opportunities Department in conjunction with the Foreign Ministry, opened with a welcoming address from Foreign Minister Franco Frattini and from Equal Opportunities Minister Mara Carfagna, and with a speech from President of the Republic Giorgio Napolitano.
The aim of the conference, which will be focusing on every aspect of violence against women, is to identify the most effective tools for achieving the global recognition of women's basic rights. But "we aren't here just to complain about women's circumstances, or merely to deplore and to whine; we're here to fight, and to come out on top", Equal Opportunities Mara Carfagna explained in her introductory address. The figures that Minister Carfagna quoted are quite simply shocking. Women between the ages of 15 and 44 run a greater risk worldwide of being the victims of rape or of violence in the home than they do of contracting cancer or malaria, or of having an accident. Fully 93% of sexual violence caused by partners is never reported, and there are over 60 million child brides aged between eight and 14 in the world today. "One woman in five in the world is the victim of physical or sexual abuse at one time or another in the course of her life," the equal opportunities minister stressed, "while 50,000 women are killed or commit suicide every year, and over 140 million women are the victims of harassment, violence, rape, the slave trade, selective abortion, acid violence or genital mutilation".
In this connection, Foreign Minister Franco Frattini called, in the course of his address, for a "total and definitive UN ban" on female genital mutilation. He also announced that an initiative will be promoted on the sidelines of the upcoming UN General Assembly on 25 September in an effort to draft a common strategy against this form of violence.
President of the Republic Giorgio Napolitano, on the other hand, pointed in his opening speech to the role and the importance of rights and of their full implementation. He explained: "In any context, full recognition and the concrete implementation of human rights is an undisputed yardstick for judging both the real circumstances of peoples and individuals, and a country's degree of material and spiritual progress". He added that even "in developed and wealthy countries such as Italy, with a Constitution and a legal system that are extremely attentive to women's basic rights, horrifying events still occur, and we have recently seen an upswing in the amount of group violence against women of all ages and ethnic groups". The Head of State went on to highlight the fact that "the struggle against every kind of harassment of women, against xenophobia and against homophobia is part and parcel of the cause that rejects intolerance and violence, both of which are largely fueled today by ignorance, by the loss of ideal and moral values, and by an often unwitting marking of distance from the principles on which our Constitution bases civil coexistence in a democratic nation".
The conference is being attended by Nobel Prizewinner and Life Senator Rita Levi Montalcini, UN Deputy Secretary General Asha Rose Migiro, Chantal Compaoré, the wife of the President of Burkina Faso, and Manda Zand Ervin, Founder and Chair of the Alliance of Iranian Women. Also in attendance are Ministers Bibiana Aido Almagro (Spain), Maria Eagle (United Kingdom), Helena Guergis (Canada) and Aliye Kavaf (Turkey), together with acting Council of Europe Secretary General Mrs. Maud de Boer-Buquicchio and ministers from numerous African countries, as well as a delegation of Afghan women from the world of politics, culture and civil society.
