The Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls has published a new report focusing on the role of biological sex in women's experiences of discrimination and violence. The Special Rapporteur, Reem Asalem, writes that the failure to acknowledge the centrality of sex as a driving factor in gender-based violence "has compromised our collective ability to correctly describe and understand violence against women and girls as being violence perpetrated by males against females and to effectively respond to it." The report warns that replacing female and sex-based language with gender-related terms has undermined data quality, service provision for female victims, and protections for women and girls. It notes that this shift also obscures new patterns of sex-based violence, including domestic violence-linked suicides, reproductive violence used in genocide, and online abuse. Asalem takes care to note that a renewed focus on sex-specific violence does not lock women into a form of biological determinism. She recommends that States implement women-sex specific terminology in law, policy, and data, and that States prohibit such procedures as prenatal sex selection.
Compiled from: "UN expert calls for reaffirming importance of sex in description of violence agianst women and girls," United Nations Human Rights Office fo the High Commissioner, June 25, 2025.