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Secretary General of the Council of Europe Thorbjørn Jagland has called on nine member states to sign and ratify the ‘Istanbul Convention’ to strengthen women’s safety across Europe.

“The Council of Europe’s Convention on Preventing and Combatting Violence Against Women and Domestic Violence – better known as the Istanbul Convention - came into force on 1 August 2014.

The convention is ground-breaking because it criminalises violence against women in all its forms, from sexual violence and rape to stalking, sexual harassment and psychological abuse at the hands of intimate partners.

It challenges the social taboos which have for too long allowed grave mistreatment of countless women and girls, not least by obliging governments to outlaw forced marriage.

Crucially, under the Istanbul Convention, states are not only obliged to prosecute perpetrators, but also to provide support and protection to their victims and to implement measures that will help prevent the violence occurring in the first place.

I would therefore like to take this opportunity to praise the 18 member states who have incorporated the treaty into their domestic law and the 20 who have signed it with the intention of ratifying. Only 9 member states have not yet signed this important treaty: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Ireland, Latvia, Lichtenstein, Republic of Moldova and the Russian Federation. I urge them to do so without delay, “ T. Jagland said in a statement posted on the website of the Council of Europe.