Belém do Pará Convention


The Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment, and Eradication of Violence against Women, better known as the Belém do Pará Convention, is an international human rights instrument adopted by the Inter-American Commission of Women of the Organization of American States at a conference held in Belém do Pará, Brazil on 9 June 1994. It is the first legally binding international treaty that criminalises all forms of violence against women, especially sexual violence. On 26 October 2004, the Follow-Up Mechanism agency was established to ensure the State parties' compliance with the Convention.

Background

In the late 1980s use of rape as a tool in war by official regimes in El Salvador, Haiti, Peru, and other places across Latin America was exposed, while the traditional taboo on domestic violence was gradually eroded at the same time, forcing violence against women into the forefront of public discourse. As most military dictatorships fell across Latin America during the Third Wave of Democratisation, women began to pressure their civilian governments to address the systemic violence against women from Brazil to Chile to Mexico.
In 1988, CIM strategy followed its model of creating international norms to press for national governmental change. To that end, the women determined to draft an Inter-American Convention focusing on violence against women and scheduled a special consultative meeting in 1990. The 1990 Inter-American Consultation on Women and Violence was the first diplomatic meeting of its kind. At the convention, the women thoroughly evaluated the issue of gender-based violence and then organised two inter-governmental meetings of experts to assist with clarification of issues to draft a proposal. The final instrument, which would become known as the 1994 Belém do Pará Convention, was the first treaty to ever address violence against women. It was presented at a Special Assembly of CIM delegates in April 1994, who approved it and endorsed its submission to the General Assembly of the OAS. It was adopted at Belém do Pará, Brazil, on 9 June 1994, and has been endorsed by 32 of the 34 member States of the OAS.
The delegates of the CIM continued to press for international agreements throughout the Americas that effect change and protect women. In 1998, they adopted the Declaration of Santo Domingo, which recognised that women's inalienable rights exist throughout their lifetime and are an "integral, and indivisible part of universal human rights".

Contents

The treaty is written in the four official languages of the Organization of American States; 'each is equally authentic' :
The text defines what violence against women is, establishes that women have the right to live a life free of violence, and that violence against women constitutes a violation of human rights and fundamental freedoms. It calls for the first time for the establishment of binding mechanisms for protecting and defending women's rights as essential to combating the phenomenon of violence against women's physical, sexual, and psychological integrity, whether in the public or the private sphere, and for asserting those rights within society.
Chapter I: Definition and scope of application

Chapter II: Rights protected

Chapter III: Duties of the States

Chapter IV: Inter-American mechanisms of protection

Chapter V: General provisions

As of March 2020, 32 of the 34 or 35 member states of the Organization of American States have either signed and ratified or acceded to the Belém do Pará Convention; only Canada, Cuba and the United States have not.

Follow-Up Mechanism (MESECVI)

In order to effectively monitor the State parties' compliance with the Conventions' obligations, the State parties created an agency on 26 October 2004 called the Follow-Up Mechanism to the Belém do Pará Convention, abbreviated MESECVI. MESECVI consists of two bodies: the Conference of State Parties and the Committee of Experts.
MESECVI is headquartered at the Executive Secretariat of the CIM in Washington, D.C.

Impact

According to Professor Rashida Manjoo and Professor Jackie Jones, the Belém do Pará Convention has significantly contributed to making the 'Inter-American human rights system, while far from perfect, arguably the world's most well-developed and effective human rights system in the violence against women context.' The Convention had been cited in over 20 cases before the Inter-American Commission and Court, and 'helped to further define and give specificity to the norms of the American Convention on Human Rights and other Inter-American human rights instruments in the VAW context.'
For example, the Belém do Pará Convention was used alongside the American Convention on Human Rights when the Inter-American Court of Human Rights intervened in the Cotton Field femicides case, on requests from victims' relatives, who, motivated by the Mexican authorities' lack of response, filed a complaint against the Mexican state. In its 2009 judgement, the Court found Mexico to be responsible for multiple rights violations, including the State obligations under the Belém do Pará Convention 'to use due diligence to respond to violence against women' according to Article 7, paragraphs b and c. The verdict caused Mexico to undertake some positive steps to comply with the Court's order. However, the case revealed that the justiciability of the Convention was mostly limited to Article 7, which stipulates the immediate obligations of state parties; Article 8 and 9 are mostly useful for interpreting these obligations, and the obligations of state parties to other conventions such as the American Convention on Human Rights.
Moreover, Manjoo and Jones criticised the fact that the United States and Canada had still not ratified the two Conventions, ' millions of women and girls without the protections afforded by these treaties.' In conclusion, they argue that an improved version of the Belém do Pará Convention, with a better emphasis on state parties' immediate obligations, would be the best model for a worldwide treaty on violence against women, replacing the United Nations' non-binding 1993 Declaration on the Elimination of Violence Against Women, as long as there is a sustained campaign – preferably led by VAW survivors and their advocates – towards universal ratification by all states in the world.