mr president i wish to thank the honourable members for this very important debate on a subject that is obviously dear to many of us
again i would like to thank the rapporteur for her important report and also the shadow rapporteurs
as i outlined in my introduction we are planning several measures on this
the victims rights package is of course extremely important and will come next month
we also have the general equality policy for prevention programmes awareness-raising and so on
we are also following very closely the finalisation right now of the council of europe convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence in order when it is ready to propose to the council that the european union adhere to it which would then make it legally binding in the areas where the european union has competence
i would also like to mention two other proposals that you have adopted the directive on combating trafficking for instance contains a lot of preventive measures but also support for victims for women and children who are victims of trafficking for sexual and other purposes
also in the different parts of the asylum package special notice is taken of vulnerable people in asylum procedures such as women who have been victims of sexual violence etc
the problem is as you have all outlined enormous and it is a shame that women and girls in our european union are afraid on a daily basis
they are afraid of violence rape and sexual abuse and often from the people they love the most whom they should be able to trust the most husbands partners etc
we need to act and we need to act where we can see concrete results
this is surely one of the most horrendous violations of human rights
i would like to congratulate those very few but still brave men who have contributed to this debate because violence against women is not a women's issue it is a human rights issue
we can only achieve results here if we work together men and women to combat this horrendous phenomenon
we need to work together we need to achieve a europe where women and girls do not have to fear violence just because they belong to the so-called wrong sex
