Implementation period: 13.11.2017– 31.12.2019.
Bosnia and Herzegovina has ratified the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and the Council of Europe Convention on the Prevention and Suppression of Violence against Women and Domestic Violence - the Istanbul Convention. The aforementioned conventions are the most important sources of binding norms for establishing standards of an effective system of protection against violence in BiH. The convention standards require the state to acknowledge the importance and support of specialized women's CSOs, especially in financial terms, recognizing their role and past performance as major stakeholders in the provision of specialized services (legal, psychological, SOS telephone, shelter) and as important partners in the prevention and action in the fight against violence against women.
Following the ratification of the Istanbul Convention, there is a need to establish and develop new standards for the protection of women against all forms of violence in accordance with international standards. In this regard, although the country has significantly improved the legislation, still a large number of legislative reforms are unclear and are not being implemented.
The existing system of protection for victims of domestic violence is unsystematic, fragmented and uncorrected. The CSO, OSCE, CEDAW and Shadow Reports clearly state that victims of domestic violence in BiH do not receive adequate services and protection.
The members of the Safe Network, as a network of CSOs dealing with the protection, prevention and improvement of the system of protection against domestic violence, will, through this project, undertake a comprehensive analysis of the existing legislative framework in relation to the recommendations of the Istanbul Convention, in cooperation with the the relevant Entity Ministries and gender mechanisms, in order to draft appropriate documents, and submit to the Federation of BiH and Republika Srpska Governments concrete proposals for legislative solutions in line with international human rights standards, including the CEDAW and the Istanbul Convention. In this way, the Safe Network wishes to influence the competent institutions in adopting the necessary changes to the legislative framework to comply with the Istanbul Convention.
