The AKP's war on women: A dossier on the AKP government's (hostile) policy towards women in Turkey
Women’s organizations in Turkey state that violence against women has increased by up to 1400% under the AKP government.
Necati Tığlı, Member of Parliament of the Republican People’s Party (Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi, CHP), and member of the Equality Commission for Women and Men in the Turkish Parliament has published a report on feminicide, sexual violence, and child abuse for the period from 1.01.2016 to 31.12.2019.
The report states: “In Turkey, women continue to be murdered by men. In 2019 alone, 474 women were killed. At least 166 women were subjected to sexual violence and at least 96 children were abused. A steady increase in the number of women being murdered can be seen. In 2016, the number was 329 women, in 2017 it was 409, in 2018, 440. According to the platform ', We will stop the murders of women’, 474 women were killed in 2019. The number of women killed in 2003 was 83.”
Today’s Kurdish women’s movement (TJA - Free Women’s Movement) in Turkey/Northern Kurdistan is building on the foundation of the Kurdish people’s struggle for freedom that has been ongoing for 40 years. With the enormous participation of women in the people’s uprisings in the 1990s, they became a leading force of resistance.
Twenty women’s organizations and associations founded the “Democratic Free Women’s Movement” (DÖKH - Demokratik Özgür Kadın Hareketi) in order to be able to lead their struggle in an even more organized and diverse way. The DÖKH declared gender to be the main contradiction of the 21st century and declared war on racism, nationalism, militarism, sexism, environmental destruction, exploitation of labour and male domination.
In 2015, the DÖKH reorganised at its 8th congress and adopted the name “Congress of Free Woman” (KJA). All women’s associations, organisations, and initiatives were represented in the KJA, in order to develop solutions for the socio-political problems with the help of the democratic, ecological, women-liberating paradigm of the Kurdish freedom movement. Less than two years after its foundation, on 12 November 2016, the women’s association Selis, women’s association Regenbogen (Gökkusagi) as well as the KJA, were banned by decree and many women activists were arrested. Only 10 days after the ban of the KJA, a new organization called “Movement of Free Women” (TJA - Tevgera Jinên Azad) was founded.
