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Polish court to examine int'l domestic violence treaty: PM

30.07.2020 12:30
Poland’s constitutional court will consider whether a major international treaty on violence against women is in line with Polish law, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki announced on Thursday.
Polands Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki speaks at a news conference in Warsaw on Thursday, July 30, 2020.
Poland's Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki speaks at a news conference in Warsaw on Thursday, July 30, 2020.Photo: PAP/Radek Pietruszka

“I have decided to ask the Constitutional Tribunal to review the constitutionality of the Istanbul Convention,” Morawiecki said.

He was speaking to reporters after his Justice Minister Zbigniew Ziobro said at the end of last week that Poland was poised to take steps to withdraw from the domestic violence treaty, known as the Istanbul Convention.

Ziobro told a news conference on Saturday that the Istanbul Convention contained "ideological provisions” that Poland’s ruling conservatives “do not accept and consider harmful."

He argued that the treaty undermined parental rights by forcing schools to educate children on gender identity.

Ziobro also said at the time that Poland’s own legal system, reshaped by the country’s ruling conservatives in recent years, provided sufficient protection for women.

Thousands of women in Warsaw and other Polish cities took to the streets last week to protest against proposals for the country to quit the treaty, according to state news agency PAP.

Marija Pejčinović Burić, secretary–general of human rights body the Council of Europe, said in a statement on Sunday that “announcements by government officials that Poland should withdraw from the Istanbul Convention are alarming.”

Poland signed the Council of Europe's Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence Against Women in 2012. It ratified the document in 2015.

(gs)

Source: IAR, PAP, TVP Info