New Report: Domestic Violence May Violate Women’s Right to Life as an “Arbitrary Execution”

The UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions has called on governments to recognize the role gender plays in a person’s right to life because women are disproportionately at risk of experiencing lethal violence. For example, with homicides, “almost half of female victims are killed by family members or intimate partners, compared with just over five percent of male victims.” The Special Rapporteur advised that the violence to which women are subjected, whether it is domestic and intimate partner violence, honor killings, or sexual orientation-based killings, amounts to a serious human rights violation and is a form of arbitrary execution. However, intentional actions such as murder are not the only cause of gender-based right to life violations; violations also result from women’s lack of access to basic needs like food, water, shelter, and health services.

Compiled fromDomestic violence a form of "arbitrary execution", says UN rights expert, UN OHCHR News (June 7, 2017).