GNV News, November 29, 2024

Every ten minutes, one woman or girl is killed worldwide at the hands of a partner or family member, UN Women and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) revealed in a report on November 25, 2024. Killing a woman or girl because of her gender is called femicide.

According to the report, of the approximately 85,000 intentional killings of women worldwide in 2023, 60% were perpetrated by intimate partners or family members. The region with the highest per capita share was Africa, followed by the Americas and Oceania. The largest numbers of victims were in Africa (21,700) and Asia (18,500). In Europe and the Americas, women are more likely to be killed by intimate partners, while in Africa and Asia they are more likely to be killed by family members. It is noted that this situation is driven by the false belief that women and girls are inferior to men and must be controlled in every aspect of life—for example, being killed after escaping an abusive partner or being killed by family members for refusing a forced marriage.

However, data on femicide are often difficult to obtain. Because accurate and transparent data collection enables monitoring trends in femicide, tracking progress of policy outcomes, strengthening government accountability through international comparisons, and effective prevention based on an understanding of root causes, the need to improve data collection has been emphasized.

Learn more about femicide around the world → “The expansion of the feminist movement in Latin America”

Women participating in a demonstration held on International Women’s Day, Chile (Photo: abriendomundo / Shutterstock.com)