In
Turkey, Important Stakeholders Discussed Women's Access to Justice
The
second multi-stakeholder meeting for the joint EU-Council of Europe initiative
on "Fostering Women's Access to Justice in Türkiye" took place in Mugla
on June 14, 2022. Participants addressed potential remedies after identifying
the key obstacles women encounter while trying to access the legal system. The
purpose of the meeting was to improve inter-agency communication and
coordination while establishing local, long-lasting support networks to address
the needs of women, particularly those who are vulnerable or underprivileged.
In
his remarks, Attorney "In this move, we are very glad to have been picked
as one of the four pilot bar organisations in Türkiye and to offer a valuable
example to the other provinces with our methods," said Cumhur Uzun,
president of the Mula Bar Association. Non-governmental organisations, bar
associations, local government officials, and public institutions make up the
chain of accountability for women's access to justice, and each should act
responsibly. As the Mugla Bar Association, we'll keep promoting women's access
to the legal system and serving as an example for women everywhere, not just in
Mula. We are excited to take part in this initiative and work together to make
this important aim a reality.
The
joint EU/Council of Europe action "Fostering women's access to justice in
Türkiye" aims to increase the gender sensitivity of legal aid services and
women's access to these services as well as to improve legal awareness and
literacy among women so they can exercise their rights as equal citizens in
Türkiye, according to Pnar Başpnar, Head of Operations at the Council of Europe
Programme Office in Ankara.
One
of the key components of the initiative, according to Başpnar, is the grant
agreement that was struck between the Council of Europe and the Union of
Turkish Bar Associations to enhance women's access to legal representation.
Legal aid lawyers taking part in the training programme will offer legal aid
services to women under the parameters of this grant in at least 360 cases, she
continued.
To
ensure better protection for women's rights, the Union of Turkish Bar
Associations, local bar associations, legal aid centres, legal aid attorneys,
universities, law faculties, women's studies and gender research and
application centres, non-governmental organisations working in the fields of
combating gender-based violence and gender equality, public institutions and
organisations, violence prevention centres, women's shelters, and experts in
the field have teamed up.
In
her talk, Assistant Professor Asuman Aytekin nceolu discussed the
institutional, socioeconomic, legal, and cultural obstacles that women face
when trying to access the justice system in Turkey. She also discussed how the
fundamental principles of access to justice—namely, justiciability,
availability, accessibility, provision of remedies, quality of services, and
accountability—can be operationalized in daily life. She emphasised that, in
relation to the standard of judicial services, "legal professionals should
be aware of and avoid re-producing gender-based stereotypes and biases when
interpreting and applying existing laws, which otherwise amount to
discrimination and set barriers to women's access to justice."
The
first multi-stakeholder meeting took place in Ordu in May 2022, the second one
was in Mula on June 14, and there will be two more sessions before the end of
September in Nevşehir and Diyarbakr. The meetings are organised as a part of
the initiative "Fostering women's access to justice in Turkey," which
is carried out within the framework of the joint programme "Horizontal
Facility for the Western Balkans and Turkey 2019-2022" from the European
Union and Council of Europe.