The author would  like to thank Ann Foster Monk and Eszter Horvath of the School of Oriental and African Studies of London University, who were interning with the mandate in 2022, for their support with reviewing the data this article and systematizing it.

Femicide, or gender-related killings of women, is the most extreme form of violence against women and the  most violent manifestation of discrimination against women.  lt has been a priority for the mandate of the Special Rapporteur on violence against women since this post was established, and was the focus of thematic reports in 2012 (A/HRC/20/16) and 2016 (4/71/398). In  the  latter,  the  former Special  Rapporteur,  Ms.  Dubravka  Simonovic, called on States to establish a  "femicide watch" and/or observatories, and elaborated on the modalities for establishing such  a mechanism.

In 2016, the Special Rapporteur established a Femicide Watch Prevention Initiative that aimed to foster the creation of such observatories or watch bodies. The mandate has also made yearly calls to States to submit information on the measures it has taken against femicide and provide data on femicide in general and on the number of gender-related killings of women per year, disaggregated  by the age  and sex  of the  perpetrators,  and by the relationship  between the perpetrator  and the  victim.  In  October  2021,  and pursuant  to  General  Assembly resolution 5/161 the Special  Rapporteur presented a  report on the Femicide Watch Prevention  Initiative, to the General Assembly (A/76/132).

In response to the 2021 call by the mandate for information on femicide, 32 Member States, 7 National  Human Rights lnstitutions, and 4 non-state actors responded. The following  article is based in large part on these submissions.

Compared to previous years, there has been only a very modest increase  in the number of femicide observatories. Between 2016 and 2021, there was significant progress towards the creation of different types of bodies to monitor violence against women and femicide. Yet,  in every continent, there are countries that still do not have femicide observatories  such   as  Azerbaijan,2   Cambodia,3   Switzerland,4   Turkey,5   and  Ukraine.6   The list includes developed countries and countries that are not in  a state of conflict, busting the myth that the presence of a femicide observatory or the lack of it is a matter primarily of resources and capacity.

In some countries, femicide observatories have been created or improved  upon by local governments, civil society, and academia, thereby filling  important gaps that exist at the national level. This has been the case in Albania, for example, where a femicide observatory has been set up  by  civil  society.7   For  example,  in  Colombia,  the  Government's  Colombian  Observatory  of Women   has a   strong  relationship  with  the  NGO Feminicidios  Colombia  which   provides  the Observatory with  information that can help identify possible cases of femicide that are  not being investigated.8  Another  example  is the  way data  are  collected  by the  Human  Rights  Commission of the Colombian State of Nuevo  Leon which has developed  a  femicide cartography  based on monitoring  the  news from the  local  and national  press. The data  is systematized  in a  database that contains the date of the event, name of the woman,  age, gender  identity, location, type of aggression,  identity of the  alleged aggressor,  and age and type of relationship  he had with  the woman.9 The creation  of this  cartography  and database  has made it  possible to geographically visualize the violent deaths of women and to look into whether the authorities have failed in their duties  to  prevent,  investigate,  and  punish  gender-based   violence;   it  has also  improved   the analysis of the context  in which these cases occur.10

Conscious of the fact that institutional design of the observatories may differ from  one country to another, the mandate recommended that they all have standard roles and functions which are as follows:  1) data  are collected  according to the  modalities  recommended by the  mandate,  and are therefore comparable at the regional and global levels; 2) data are analyzed and made public; 3)   cases   are    reviewed    to   identify   gaps   in   protection,   services,   and    legislation;   4) recommendations  for  improvement  based on local  trends  can reach legislators,  policy-makers, and   the   general   public;   and   5)   evidence-based   legislation   and   policy   reforms   can   be implemented.

The Special Rapporteur notes that femicide continues not to be criminalized as a separate offence  in several  countries such as Albania,  Cambodia,  Malaysia,  Slovakia,  Switzerland. The list of countries includes affluent countries and ones with developed  legal frameworks and justice systems. The  mandates  position  has been  that  it  is  not  necessary to have a  separate criminal  offence for  femicide as long  as the  legal  system  can adequately  identify  and prosecute these  cases, while also taking  into  account their gendered nature. However,  creating  a  separate criminal  offence  can be a  useful  strategy  in this  regard.

The collection  of disaggregated  data  continues  to  be a   challenge.  For  example,  courts  in Hungary  still  do not  collect  data  disaggregated  by sex,  race,  nationality,  ethnicity,  or religion of victim  or perpetrator;  only by type of crime.16

The mandate  has systematically  recommended that  States  collect  data  under three  broad categories:  1. intimate-partner femicide or 2. family-related femicide,  based on the relationship between the victim and the  perpetrator,  and 3. other femicides, according to the  local  context. The centrality of data  collection  and monitoring in  State efforts to combat violence against women was reaffirmed  by the Committee on the Elimination  of Discrimination against Women, particularly  its  General  Recommendation  No.  35  (2017)  on  gender-based  violence  against women. In  it, the Committee recommended that States parties establish a  system to regularly collect, analyze, and publish statistical data on the number of complaints of violence. This system should include information on the sentences imposed on perpetrators and reparations, including compensation,  provided  to victims. The Committee also recommended  that data  should  be disaggregated  by type of violence,  relationships  between victim and perpetrator, and other relevant socio-demographic characteristics.

Furthermore,  the  mandate  has  reiterated  on  numerous  occasions that the  existence  of criminal  law provisions establishing the crime of femicide  (as a standalone offence or as  an aggravating  circumstance  to  homicide)  is not  a prerequisite for the collection of data. Furthermore, when such legal definitions of femicide as a specific crime are in place,  often only prosecuted cases are counted; in those States, data collection should be broader and encompass all gender-related killings of women.

The mandate considers it problematic that, in some countries, data on femicide or gender-related  killings  of women  and girls  continue  to  be limited  to  intimate-partner violence.  A comprehensive approach should include all types of femicides relevant to a  particular context, including intimate-partner and family-related killings, and others in  which, while  there is  no relationship between victim and perpetrator, there is a gender motive.

The Special Rapporteur notes with satisfaction, however, that since 2020, there have been further moves to gather better data in several countries, even if this has relied on different methodologies and scope. In Argentina, for example, through resolution 48/2021, the lntegrated System for Cases of Violence for Gender Reasons (SICVG) was  created. This system is a tool for recording, processing, and analyzing information on queries and complaints of gender-based violence in order to contribute to the design and monitoring of public policies on gender-based violence. The integrated mechanism would  prevent the duplication of data and improve the gathering and analysis of data arising from diverse sources such as complaints, consultations, and legal cases.17 T

The mandate has recommended that data collected should include three broad categories: 1. intimate-partner femicide or 2. family-related femicide,  based on the relationship between  the victim  and the  perpetrator,  and 3.  other femicides  or gender-related  killings, according to the  local context.  In Bolivia, the Ministry of Justice  and lnstitutional Transparency has established a  national  monitoring  commission  for  femicide  cases  to  monitor the judicial processes on femicide. An electronic form  has been created  that allows the  effective  monitoring of criminal  proceedings and shows the areas of greatest prevalence of these  crimes.

Submissions sent by different governments to the mandate in 2021 show that femicide continues to be monitored predominantly in the framework of domestic violence or family violence in several countries. Similarly, where States have adopted national  plans to address femicide, many have done so through a  heavy focus on ending domestic violence and intimate-partner violence (for example Albania,18   Azerbaijan,19  lraq,20  Malaysia,21  Norway,22  Serbia,23  and Ukraine24  are cases in point).  In  Malaysia for example, while femicide is not defined in any laws including the Penal  Code, the Domestic Violence Act of 1994 has been amended to introduce new elements, such  as immediate protection for victims of violence at harm to supplement the offences under the Penal Code; it also expands the definition of domestic violence to also include emotional, mental, and psychological abuse, the recognition of victims' rights and the right to exclusive occupation of the dwelling and access to a  rehabilitation programme.25  However, and as the mandate has emphasized on numerous occasions, while the categories of domestic violence, family violence, and intimate-partner violence are all relevant categories for understanding the phenomenon of femicide, none of them is sufficient as a standalone proxy for femicide.

Studies and improved data continue to show that women are the primary victims of intimate-partner killings and also the prevalence of a  prior history of violence leading up to the femicide. For example, data collected by the German  Institute for Human Rights Project in Germany from 2018 to 2020 show that more than 79% or more of women that were killed in homicide cases had been killed by intimate partners.26  Similarly, data collected in Argentina show that, in 90% of the cases of femicide in Argentina, victims had a  previous link with their aggressor; 66% of these were committed by partners or former partners.27 Finally, in Colombia, the data gathered shows that there is a strong  correlation between domestic/gender-based violence and femicide. This shows that improving responses to cases of dornestic/gender-based violence can reduce the incidence of femicide.28