"CONVENTION OF BELEM DO PARA"
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
THE STATES PARTIES TO THIS CONVENTION,
RECOGNIZING that full respect for human rights has been
enshrined in the American Declaration of the Rights and Duties of Man and the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights, and reaffirmed in other international and regional
AFFIRMING that violence against women constitutes a
violation of their human rights and fundamental freedoms, and impairs or nullifies the
observance, enjoyment and exercise of such rights and freedoms;
CONCERNED that violence against women is an offense
against human dignity and a manifestation of the historically unequal power relations
between women and men;
RECALLING the Declaration on the Elimination of Violence
against Women, adopted by the Twenty-fifth Assembly of Delegates of the Inter-American
Commission of Women, and affirming that violence against women pervades every sector of
society regardless of class, race or ethnic group, income, culture, level of education,
age or religion and strikes at its very foundations;
CONVINCED that the elimination of violence against women
is essential for their individual and social development and their full and equal
participation in all walks of life; and
CONVINCED that the adoption of a convention on the
prevention, punishment and eradication of all forms of violence against women within the
framework of the Organization of American States is a positive contribution to protecting
the rights of women and eliminating violence against them,
HAVE AGREED to the following:
DEFINITION AND SCOPE OF APPLICATION
For the purposes of this Convention, violence against
women shall be understood as any act or conduct, based on gender, which causes death or
physical, sexual or psychological harm or suffering to women, whether in the public or the
Violence against women shall be understood to include
physical, sexual and psychological violence:
- that occurs within the family or domestic unit or within
any other interpersonal relationship, whether or not the perpetrator shares or has shared
the same residence with the woman, including, among others, rape, battery and sexual
- that occurs in the community and is perpetrated by any
person, including, among others, rape, sexual abuse, torture, trafficking in persons,
forced prostitution, kidnapping and sexual harassment in the workplace, as well as in
educational institutions, health facilities or any other place; and
- that is perpetrated or condoned by the state or its agents
regardless of where it occurs.
Every woman has the right to be free from violence in
both the public and private spheres.
Every woman has the right to the recognition, enjoyment,
exercise and protection of all human rights and freedoms embodied in regional and
international human rights instruments. These rights include, among others:
- The right to have her life respected;
- The right to have her physical, mental and moral integrity
- The right to personal liberty and security;
- The right not to be subjected to torture;
- The right to have the inherent dignity of her person
respected and her family protected;
- The right to equal protection before the law and of the
- The right to simple and prompt recourse to a competent
court for protection against acts that violate her rights;
- The right to associate freely;
- The right of freedom to profess her religion and beliefs
within the law; and
- The right to have equal access to the public service of
her country and to take part in the conduct of public affairs, including decision-making.
Every woman is entitled to the free and full exercise of
her civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights, and may rely on the full
protection of those rights as embodied in regional and international instruments on human
rights. The States Parties recognize that violence against women prevents and nullifies
the exercise of these rights.
The right of every woman to be free from violence
includes, among others:
- The right of women to be free from all forms of
- The right of women to be valued and educated free of
stereotyped patterns of behavior and social and cultural practices based on concepts of
inferiority or subordination.
DUTIES OF THE STATES
The States Parties condemn all forms of violence against
women and agree to pursue, by all appropriate means and without delay, policies to
prevent, punish and eradicate such violence and undertake to:
- refrain from engaging in any act or practice of violence
against women and to ensure that their authorities, officials, personnel, agents, and
institutions act in conformity with this obligation;
- apply due diligence to prevent, investigate and impose
penalties for violence against women;
- include in their domestic legislation penal, civil,
administrative and any other type of provisions that may be needed to prevent, punish and
eradicate violence against women and to adopt appropriate administrative measures where
- adopt legal measures to require the perpetrator to refrain
from harassing, intimidating or threatening the woman or using any method that harms or
endangers her life or integrity, or damages her property;
- take all appropriate measures, including legislative
measures, to amend or repeal existing laws and regulations or to modify legal or customary
practices which sustain the persistence and tolerance of violence against women;
- establish fair and effective legal procedures for women
who have been subjected to violence which include, among others, protective measures, a
timely hearing and effective access to such procedures;
- establish the necessary legal and administrative
mechanisms to ensure that women subjected to violence have effective access to
restitution, reparations or other just and effective remedies; and
- adopt such legislative or other measures as may be
necessary to give effect to this Convention.
The States Parties agree to undertake progressively
specific measures, including programs:
- to promote awareness and observance of the right of women
to be free from violence, and the right of women to have their human rights respected and
- to modify social and cultural patterns of conduct of men
and women, including the development of formal and informal educational programs
appropriate to every level of the educational process, to counteract prejudices, customs
and all other practices which are based on the idea of the inferiority or superiority of
either of the sexes or on the stereotyped roles for men and women which legitimize or
exacerbate violence against women;
- to promote the education and training of all those
involved in the administration of justice, police and other law enforcement officers as
well as other personnel responsible for implementing policies for the prevention,
punishment and eradication of violence against women;
- to provide appropriate specialized services for women who
have been subjected to violence, through public and private sector agencies, including
shelters, counseling services for ail family members where appropriate, and care and
custody of the affected children:
- to promote and support governmental and private sector
education designed to raise the awareness of the public with respect to the problems of
and remedies for violence against women;
- to provide women who are subjected to violence access to
effective readjustment and training programs to enable them to fully participate in
public, private and social life;
- to encourage the communications media to develop
appropriate media guidelines in order to contribute to the eradication of violence against
women in all its forms, and to enhance respect for the dignity of women;
- to ensure research and the gathering of statistics and
other relevant information relating to the causes, consequences and frequency of violence
against women, in order to assess the effectiveness of measures to prevent, punish and
eradicate violence against women and to formulate and implement the necessary changes; and
- to foster international cooperation for the exchange of
ideas and experiences and the execution of programs aimed at protecting women who are
subjected to violence.
With respect to the adoption of the measures in this
Chapter, the States Parties shall take special account of the vulnerability of women to
violence by reason of among others, their race or ethnic background or their status as
migrants, refugees or displaced persons. Similar consideration shall be given to women
subjected to violence while pregnant or who are disabled, of minor age, elderly,
socio-economically disadvantaged, affected by armed conflict or deprived of their freedom.
INTER-AMERICAN MECHANISMS OF PROTECTION
In order to protect the right of every woman to be free
from violence, the States Parties shall include in their national reports to the
Inter-American Commission of Women information on measures adopted to prevent and prohibit
violence against women, and to assist women affected by violence, as well as on any
difficulties they observe in applying those measures, and the factors that contribute to
violence against women.
The States Parties to this Convention and the
Inter-American Commission of Women may request of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights
advisory opinions on the interpretation of this Convention
Any person or group of persons, or any nongovernmental
entity legally recognized in one or more member states of the Organization, may lodge
petitions with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights containing denunciations or
complaints of violations of Article 7 of this Convention by a State Party, and the
Commission shall consider such claims in accordance with the norms and procedures
established by the American Convention on Human Rights and the Statutes and Regulations of
the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights for lodging and considering petitions.
No part of this Convention shall be understood to
restrict or limit the domestic law of any State Party that affords equal or greater
protection and guarantees of the rights of women and appropriate safeguards to prevent and
eradicate violence against women.
No part of this Convention shall be understood to
restrict or limit the American Convention on Human Rights or any other international
convention on the subject that provides for equal or greater protection in this area.
This Convention is open to signature by all the member
States of the Organization of American States.
This Convention is subject to ratification. The
instruments of ratification shall be deposited with the General Secretariat of the
Organization of American States.
This Convention is open to accession by any other state.
Instruments of accession shall be deposited with the General Secretariat of the
Organization of American States.
Any State may, at the time of approval, signature,
ratification, or accession, make reservations to this Convention provided that such
- not incompatible with the object and purpose of the
- not of a general nature and relate to one or more specific
Any State Party may submit to the General Assembly,
through the Inter-American Commission of Women, proposals for the amendment of this
Amendments shall enter into force for the states
ratifying them on the date when two-thirds of the States Parties to this Convention have
deposited their respective instruments of ratification. With respect to the other States
Parties, the amendments shall enter into force on the dates on which they deposit their
respective instruments of ratification.
If a State Party has two or more territorial units in
which the matters dealt with in this Convention are governed by different systems of law,
it may, at the time of signature, ratification or accession, declare that this Convention
shall extend to all its territorial units or to only one or more of them.
Such a declaration may be amended at any time by
subsequent declarations, which shall expressly specify the territorial unit or units to
which this Convention applies. Such subsequent declarations shall be transmitted to the
General Secretariat of the Organization of American States, and shall enter into force
thirty days after the date of their receipt.
This Convention shall enter into force on the thirtieth
day after the date of deposit of the second instrument of ratification. For each State
that ratifies or accedes to the Convention after the second instrument of ratification is
deposited, it shall enter into force thirty days after the date on which that State
deposited its instrument of ratification or accession.
The Secretary General shall inform all member states of
the Organization of American States of the entry into force of this Convention.
The Secretary General of the Organization of American
States shall present an annual report to the member states of the Organization on the
status of this Convention, including the signatures, deposits of instruments of
ratification and accession, and declarations, and any reservations that may have been
presented by the States Parties, accompanied by a report thereon if needed.
This Convention shall remain in force indefinitely, but
any of the States Parties may denounce it by depositing an instrument to that effect with
the General Secretariat of the Organization of American States. One year after the date of
deposit of the instrument of denunciation, this Convention shall cease to be in effect for
the denouncing State but shall remain in force for the remaining States Parties.
The original instrument of this Convention, the English,
French, Portuguese and Spanish texts of which are equally authentic, shall be deposited
with the General Secretariat of the Organization of American States, which shall send a
certified copy to the Secretariat of the United Nations for registration and publication
in accordance with the provisions of Article 102 of the United Nations Charter.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF the undersigned Plenipotentiaries,
being duly authorized thereto by their respective governments, have signed this
Convention, which shall be called the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention,
Punishment and Eradication of Violence against Women ~Convention of Belém do Pará..
DONE IN THE CITY OF BELEN DO PARA, BRAZIL, the ninth of
June in the year one thousand nine hundred ninety-four.