The Istanbul Convention entered into force in 2014. Until 2019 45 countries had signed it, and 35 of these had also ratified it – meaning that these countries had implemented its regulations into their legislation. Countries that have signed but not ratified the convention include Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Liechtenstein, Armenia, the United Kingdom, Slovakia, Ukraine – and Hungary, which first rejected a motion on its ratification a year after it signed the Convention.
“The importance of the Istanbul Convention lies in the fact that it contains a comprehensive strategy to combat abuse both on the level of prevention, intervention and deterring perpetrators”, Rita Antoni explains. It also puts emphasis on prevention, compels prosecution ex officio (that is, whether or not the victim makes a report) and mandates sentences that deter perpetrators. “The Convention also prescribes targeted professional training for people working at the authorities that get in touch with victims, to help them recognize domestic and intimate partner violence, understand its nature and identify the participants (perpetrator and victim)”, Antoni adds.
It is important to add that the Convention does not by itself eradicate gender-based violence.
“The Istanbul Convention is not perfect, not an absolute solution but a set of recommendations on which way to go in services, protocols etcetera, based on what politicians learnt from decades of knowledge and experience of civil society experts”, Vera Mérő told Átlátszó, adding: any government could put together a strategy that works just as well or even better, but that would need cooperation with civil society organizations and a lot of money. “I don’t care whether we call it the Istanbul Convention or a National Victim Protection Strategy, fighting violence against women and children is only a matter of political will.”
Rita Antoni explains that, contrary to the Istanbul Convention, the measures the Hungarian government has taken recently are not comprehensive, only tackle parts of the problem. Moreover, even existing laws are not enforced. For instance, in 2015 there was a mention of using GPS technology to enforce restraining orders – but this was never heard of again, and several murders have happened recently.
“The Christian Democrats claim that Hungarian legislation already includes all those regulations of the Istanbul Convention that are not about migration or gender, but this is not true”, Antoni emphasizes. “There are no widespread prevention campaigns, no trainings for authorities, a criminal procedure only starts if the victim is willing to report, punishments are far too light, there are too few places for victims fleeing from their perpetrators in too few places. Workplace sexual harassment is not an individual criminal category.”
“What will it mean in practice that the Parliament has rejected the Istanbul Convention?”, we asked Vera Mérő.
“Practically it means: ‘don’t bother us with it anymore’. The main reason behind non-ratification was that ratifying countries will be monitored and will have to prepare reports on whether the government has fulfilled its obligations. So this law is a rather rude gesture towards the EU. Especially as the grounds they base it on – the notion of gender and migration – are empty words: the rights of these people are not more protected by the Istanbul Convention than by existing Hungarian laws and Geneva conventions ratified 70 years ago. So this way it just spits in the face of Hungarian women and children.”
True, Minister of Justice Judit Varga contacted the organizers of the charity concert on International Women’s Day, Vera Mérő and Éva Péterfy-Novák. Though she herself did not participate in the event, but sent an open letter offering cooperation and partnership. A few weeks later Mérő received an invitation for cooperation from the Ministry of Justice. She put together a package of recommendations, which – based on the press conference of the Operative Body the next day – they have apparently read. But now the Parliament has voted against the Istanbul Convention and the Chairman of the Parliament speaks about women having to fulfill their ‘female principle’.
“To sum up: if Judit Varga really means she wants to cooperate, I am open to it and so are my human rights defender colleagues. But for this we need two things: entitlement and money. I think Judit Varga is a potent woman, if anyone, she can work something good out of this”, Mérő concludes.
The rejection of the Convention has been in the air for years. “In 2015 (a year after Hungary had signed the Convention) that-time minister Zoltán Balogh filed a proposal on ‘determining national strategy objectives in the area of partnership violence’, which looked at domestic violence as a conflict between partners”, Rita Antoni remembers. “We knew already then that the government does not seriously want to implement the Convention. It is worrying in itself that apparently our government signs international documents without reading and considering them.”
Antoni thinks that the reference to gender ideology is just an excuse. “What this government really fears is the equality of women and men. This is why they are trying to eradicate ‘gender’ in all its real or assumed forms and all phenomena that question even slightly the fundamentalist, conservative, essentialist view of women and men as complementing each other in a hierarchical relationship. This is why they have banned Gender Studies, deprived trans* people of the right to change their legal name and gender, this is why they deny that women MPs are women, Hungarian or even human. I am afraid their next target will be (not for the first time) abortion and contraception. I sometimes wonder: if there are still Parliamentary elections in 2022, will women be allowed to vote?”
Interestingly, while most countries try to combat gender-based violence, Hungary rejects the Convention in the middle of the lockdown. “Having received unlimited authorization from the Parliament, the Hungarian government is not fighting against the coronavirus but against the gender bogus, trying to spread their own ideology instead of protecting citizens”, Antoni claims. “They no longer wish to maintain the façade of democracy: they didn’t even let independent MP Bernadett Szél speak at the debate on rejecting the Convention. Many people think that, as long as this government is in power, it is hopeless to fight for women’s rights.”
Antoni also adds that gender-based violence is often considered secondary in importance to everyday problems of housing and subsistence. The Silent Witnesses march, organized every year to commemorate victims of domestic violence, attract fewer and fewer participants. There are probably many more people affected by the problem, however.
“What the government should understand that it is exactly conservative Hungarian mothers, who ‘fulfill their female principle’, who would profit from the Istanbul Convention. Those who are the most vulnerable in a potentially abusive relationship are not the ‘suspicious’ feminists, career women, singletons and LGBTQ people but women who had conservative (and often Christian) ideas on marrying and having children, but then their husband has turned out to be different than expected”, Antoni warns.
