“PREVENTION OF DOMESTIC VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN” PROJECT

Minister for EU Affairs and Chief Negotiator Egemen Bagis, Family and Social Policies Minister Fatma Şahin and Minister of Interior Muammer Güler attended the opening ceremony of the project titled “Prevention of Domestic Violence against Women” organized in Ankara by Gendarmerie General Command.

Speaking at the opening ceremony, Minister Bagis pointed out Gendarmerie’s leading role for combatting violence against women, through the EU funding with the inter-ministerial cooperation and said “With this project, our Gendarmerie will be a shelter and our ministries and EU will be a shield to the violence against women”.

Stating that March 30th, when the local elections were to be held, would be a historical milestone in terms of women having a voice in governance; Minister Bagis said “I believe that it is time for women to have a hand on our cities. I hope we will all see, by March 30th, that women will be quite more active on local administrations and show a far more different performance in many parts of Turkey”

Minister Bagis also commented on Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s visit to Diyarbakır and said “We all saw last weekend in Diyarbakır, where once fear and horror had reigned, how ambitious and how passionate our women were for the social peace. Once, while former Prime Ministers were visiting the region, shutters were used to be taken down and nothing could be seen other than trash mountains but there were tens, even hundreds of thousands on the streets of Diyarbakır. I and my colleagues personally witnessed that. These people want to live in peace with their government any more. These people, with men and women, want to rise up above the EU standards. They want to see the dreams of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of the Republic to come true and their country to rise above the level of contemporary civilizations. We will do it all together, we will always be together.”