{"id":39906,"date":"2024-12-06T19:16:29","date_gmt":"2024-12-06T17:16:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/?p=39906"},"modified":"2024-12-11T19:33:12","modified_gmt":"2024-12-11T17:33:12","slug":"femicide-in-serbia-women-least-safe-in-their-own-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/femicide-in-serbia-women-least-safe-in-their-own-home\/","title":{"rendered":"Femicide in Serbia: Women least safe in their own home"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The first recorded femicide in Serbia in 2024 was a double murder.<\/p><p>As reported in the media, a man under the influence of alcohol broke down the door of a house in the village of Rakovac, Vojvodina, and accosted his ex-wife and her mother.<\/p><p>He killed them both, called the police and waited at the scene of the crime.<\/p><p>The murder of women in the family home is not uncommon. Data from the organization <em>Autonomous Women&#8217;s Center<\/em> (AWC) show that this is precisely the least safe place for women victims of violence.<\/p><div class=\"fullwreg\"><div class=\"flourish-embed flourish-pictogram\" data-src=\"visualisation\/20745490\"><script src=\"https:\/\/public.flourish.studio\/resources\/embed.js\"><\/script><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/public.flourish.studio\/visualisation\/20745490\/thumbnail\" width=\"100%\" alt=\"pictogram visualization\" \/><\/noscript><\/div><\/div><p>The figures also show that the majority of victims were aged 35 or older. <strong>Vanja Macanovi\u0107<\/strong> from the AWC says this is to do with the patriarchy: even today, older women are ashamed to report violence or divorce.<\/p><p>\u201cMedia coverage brings to light: \u2018Aha, the woman endured years and years of violence\u2019. Everyone knew but said nothing. (\u2026) These are women who have lived with violence for a long time.\u201d<\/p><div class=\"fullwreg\"><div class=\"flourish-embed flourish-chart\" data-src=\"visualisation\/20745410\"><script src=\"https:\/\/public.flourish.studio\/resources\/embed.js\"><\/script><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/public.flourish.studio\/visualisation\/20745410\/thumbnail\" width=\"100%\" alt=\"chart visualization\" \/><\/noscript><\/div><\/div><p>The <em>Centre for Investigative Journalism of Serbia<\/em> (CINS) previously analysed 117 femicides that were brought to court. Bizarre mitigating circumstances were cited in numerous cases, and sentences reduced.<\/p><p>When a man harassed his wife, threatened to kill her and ultimately beat her to death with a metal bar in the city of Kru\u0161evac, the court adduced the mitigating circumstance that he was \u201ca family man, the father of two adult children with whom he lives in the same household\u201d.<\/p><div class=\"row  irelated\"><div class=\"col-md-12 \"><div class=\"line\"><\/div><\/div><div class=\"col-md-12 \"><div class=\"irelatedhead\">Na istu temu:<\/div><\/div><div class=\"col-md-12 \"><div class=\"irelatedposts\"><div class=\"row irelatedpost\"><div class=\"col-md-4\" >\n            \t\t\t\t<div class=\"irelatedimg\" style=\"background-image:url('https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/05\/Ilustracija-femicid-1-576x288.jpg');\"  >\n            \t\t\t\t\t<div class=\"irelatedimgarrow d-sm-block d-md-none\" ><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"nolightbox\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/wp-content\/plugins\/xo-tinymce\/tinyrelated\/img\/arrow.svg\"><\/div>\n            \t\t\t\t<\/div>\n            \t\t\t<\/div><div class=\"col-md-8  irelatedcont \"><div class=\" irelatedconttitle\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/femicide-in-serbia-crime-and-lesser-punishments\/\" target=\"_blank\" >Femicide in Serbia: Crime and Lesser Punishments<\/a><div class=\"irelatedcontarrow d-none d-md-block\" ><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"nolightbox\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/wp-content\/plugins\/xo-tinymce\/tinyrelated\/img\/arrow.svg\"><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><div class=\"col-md-12 \"><div class=\"line \"><\/div><\/div><\/div><p><strong>Kosana Beker<\/strong> from the organisation <em>FemPlatz<\/em> considers this problematic in the light of courts\u2019 usual practice.<\/p><p>\u201cLet\u2019s say a man is found guilty of aggravated burglary. It\u2019s common for his family and children to be treated as a mitigating circumstance when passing judgement. When it comes to femicide, the courts simply recycle that justification as they\u2019ve done a hundred times before.\u201d<\/p><p>The AWC data shows that women are most often killed by their current or former partners.<\/p><div class=\"fullwreg\"><div class=\"flourish-embed flourish-chart\" data-src=\"visualisation\/20745453\"><script src=\"https:\/\/public.flourish.studio\/resources\/embed.js\"><\/script><noscript><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/public.flourish.studio\/visualisation\/20745453\/thumbnail\" width=\"100%\" alt=\"chart visualization\" \/><\/noscript><\/div><\/div><p>But there may be more such cases because Serbia does not keep statistics on the number of women murdered.<\/p><p>Organisations that deal with the issue arrive at information through media reports and police statements, but some instances remain far from the public eye, so nothing is known about those women.<\/p><p>These organisations have repeatedly demanded that the authorities participate in monitoring the problem so that it can be solved. Similar calls have recently come from institutions.<\/p><p>In July 2024, the Commissioner for the Protection of Equality, <strong>Brankica Jankovi\u0107<\/strong>, demanded that the <em>Ministry of Justice<\/em> establish a mechanism to monitor femicides.<\/p><p>\u201cThis data is a prerequisite for a proper understanding of violence, as well as for the planning of measures and activities aimed at preventing it, and also for the protection of victims \u2013 including potential future ones,\u201d the letter to the Ministry states.<\/p><p>However, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.europeandatajournalism.eu\/femicides-in-europe\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">research<\/a> by the <em>European Data Journalism Network<\/em> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.europeandatajournalism.eu\/cp_data_news\/trapped-in-darkness-women-in-europe-remain-defenseless-against-gender-based-violence\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">demonstrates<\/a> that inadequate official data is a problem in the European Union as well. Nongovernmental organisations are shown to be better at monitoring femicide than public institutions. This was the case in Greece, Italy, France and Spain.<\/p><h6><em>In partnership with the <a href=\"https:\/\/www.europeandatajournalism.eu\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">European Data Journalism Network<\/a><\/em><\/h6><p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-39886 size-full alignleft\" src=\"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/EDJNet-logo-full.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"637\" height=\"229\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/EDJNet-logo-full.jpg 637w, https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/EDJNet-logo-full-576x207.jpg 576w, https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/03\/EDJNet-logo-full-150x54.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 637px) 100vw, 637px\" \/><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>More than 300 femicides have been recorded in Serbia over the last ten years, according to data published by the Autonomous Women\u2019s Centre (AWC) in Belgrade. Most of the women were killed in their own homes, where they lived alone or with their partner.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1120,"featured_media":39907,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1588,1604,1497],"tags":[1659,1815],"class_list":["post-39906","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-gender-equality-and-marginalized-groups","category-hp-slider","category-news","tag-domestic-violence","tag-femicide","ciTrackContent"],"acf":[],"featured_image_url":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/femicid-illustration.jpg","author_additional":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39906","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1120"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39906"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39906\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39912,"href":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39906\/revisions\/39912"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39907"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39906"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39906"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cins.rs\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39906"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}