A/HRC/44/52/Add.1 Rapporteur, that lack of visibility, combined with the partial implementation of the Committee’s recommendations in four cases related to gender-based violence brought against Bulgaria,4 have contributed to the failure to ratify the Istanbul Convention. IV. State response and measures to address violence against women Constitutional, legislative and policy framework 16. Article 6 of the 1991 Constitution sets out the principle of equality between all persons and affirms that there shall be no privileges or restriction of rights on the grounds of sex and other grounds. 5 Article 14 states that: “The family, motherhood and children shall enjoy the protection of the State and society.” 17. The Special Rapporteur recognizes that over the past 20 years Bulgaria has made significant improvements to its legislative framework on gender equality and domestic violence. Those steps include the 2003 adoption of the Protection against Discrimination Act, and the Combating Trafficking in Human Beings Act, the 2005 Protection against Domestic Violence Act and most recently the adoption in 2016 of the Equality between Women and Men Act. The Protection against Domestic Violence Act 18. The Protection against Domestic Violence Act was promulgated in 2005 and revised in 2009. With the amendments to the Criminal Code adopted in 2015, Bulgaria also criminalized the failure to comply with protection orders. 6 By adopting this law, Bulgaria has recognized the importance of combating domestic violence. The Act remains within the framework of the civil procedure, which allows victims to petition the provincial courts for protection by issuing protection orders (art. 1). It defines domestic violence as “any act of physical, sexual, psychological, emotional or economic violence as well as any attempt of such violence, coercive restriction of personal privacy, personal liberty and personal rights, committed against persons who are in a kinship, who are or were in a family relationship or in a de facto cohabitation” (art. 2). The protection orders can have a duration of 3 to 18 months and may include the removal of the perpetrator from the joint occupied dwelling for a term, the perpetrator prohibited from coming close to the victim, the obligation for the perpetrator to attend specialized counselling to address violent behaviour and provisionally designating the place of residence of the child with the victim parent or the parent who did not perpetrate violence, therefore granting temporary custody of any children to the victim, among other measures (art. 5). According to article 18, in cases of immediate risk to the life and health of the victim, the civil court may issue the orders within 24 hours of the application for protection being submitted. 19. Protection orders are not immediate; in the court of first instance of Sofia, for example, it can take days or even a week before a victim obtains one. In addition, for the protection order to be valid it has to be served on the alleged perpetrator, which could be a problem if the perpetrator cannot be found. This means that after filing a request for a protection order, a woman may have to wait and if there are no crisis centres available, she has to go back to the same household with the same abuser, with the chance that she will be subjected to further acts of violence. 4 5 6 6 The Government informed the Special Rapporteur of measures taken to implement the Committee’s recommendations, including paying compensation related to three complaints, and holding internal discussions regarding possible amendments to the Domestic Violence Protection Act. It also informed her of recent changes in the legislation and the specialized training being provided by law enforcement agencies on domestic violence. The Constitution enlists the following grounds: race, nationality, ethnicity, sex, origin, religion and personal, social and economic status. See article 296 (1) of the Criminal Code.