GREVIO: Domestic violence - countries should improve child custody safety and victim protection.

The Council of Europe’s Group of Experts on Action against Violence against Women and Domestic Violence (GREVIO), which monitors the implementation of the Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence against Women and Domestic Violence (Istanbul Convention), has published an annual report focusing on child custody, visitation and domestic violence drawn from its evaluations thus far. GREVIO finds that many countries lack enough protection for children and domestic violence victims.

Describing strengths and weaknesses in implementing treaty articles 26, 31 and 45 relevant to domestic violence victims and decisions made on child custody and visitation, the report shows that while all states parties to the treaty have taken positive steps, “the road ahead is long” because implementation has been too inconsistent. Women victims of domestic violence who leave their abusers are often confronted with threats of harm to their children, and the report notes an “alarming rate of homicides of both women and child victims, which are reported regularly in the media across Europe”.

GREVIO also highlights that many states recognise the harm done to children who witness domestic violence and provide for the obligation to inform relevant authorities of suspicion or confirmed incidents witnessed by children or where children have been direct victims of violence.

In Italy, for example, GREVIO observed that domestic violence in the presence of children is equated to a form of child abuse and entails aggravated sentences. However, it has also been observed situations which put the safety of the victims of domestic violence at considerable continued risk, including inadequate risk assessments by judges, a lack of coordination between civil and criminal processes, a failure to take incidents of domestic violence into account in court decisions on custody and visitation, insufficient training or expertise to staff from general support services, and inadequate procedures in court such as “parental alienation”.

2021 marked the 10th anniversary of the opening for the signature of the Istanbul Convention. To highlight the impact of the Convention, a documentary was produced, explaining the main aims of the Istanbul Convention through real-life examples of good practice implementation from four states parties: Albania, France, Italy and Sweden.