The violence against women persists through social and institutional permissiveness and impunity.
Every day women and girls of all ages are at constant risk of suffering some type of violence and practically all of them at some point in their lives have been victims of some type of violence or have been threatened simply because they are women. I am talking about the simultaneity and intersection of various forms of violence against women, whether at home, in the street, at work, in institutions, sexual, psychological, labor, obstetric, political or sexual preference, ethnic or religious institutional violence, responds to the multiplicity of violence and social and cultural oppressions that still exist against girls and women in a context in which patriarchal culture has dictated the rules of how society thinks and how they should be treated.
The most brutal and extreme manifestation of gender violence is the femicide, the feminicide most of the time is the result of a set of violence that includes physical, verbal and emotional abuse, sexual abuse, torture and other behaviors that place girls and women in a situation of vulnerability that often culminates in the deprivation of their lives.
The demand for access to justice for all victims of violence involves making visible the failure of the state to comply with its obligations, of course, but also the revision of our behavior as a society and even more so as women. In this way, access to justice must be reflected upon, analyzed and approached as an important subject that intersects in turn with new ways of understanding personal relationships, work relationships and, of course, social relationships; all these elements are indispensable to strengthen life free of violence and oppression, which is what we aspire to, that the observance and full respect of human rights be a reality in Mexico.
On November 27, 2020, the National Human Rights Commission, CNDH, emitted General Recommendation 43 on the violation of access to justice and insufficiency in the application of public policies in the prevention, attention, sanction and integral reparation of damages to direct and indirect victims of femicides and other violence. The objective of this General Recommendation is to provide useful information for all the authorities to whom it is addressed, to work significantly in the recognition of the situation that prevails in the country, regarding gender-based violence against women and to generate public policies that result in the prevention, elimination and eradication of all acts of violence against women, in compliance with the provisions of Articles 14 and 29 of the Political Constitution of the United Mexican States, which provide for the protection of the rights to life, health, personal dignity, equality and the establishment of conditions for personal development in this context of violence against girls and women.
The event that brings us together today, “National Roundtable of Dialogue for the Protection and Defense of Women’s Human Rights”, is a national call for compliance with General Recommendation 43/2020 in favor of respect for the human rights of girls and women for a life free of violence, where we can find as Mexican society the mechanisms of dialogue, enforceability, weighting and progressiveness for its compliance and contribute to transform this country into a safe place for the girls and women who inhabit them. I hope all the reflections emanated from this National Roundtable of Dialogue will strengthen the work ties between the CNDH and the different governmental agencies, international organizations, academia, civil society organizations and, most importantly, with the victims to whom we are indebted.
Thank you very much.