A/HRC/41/33/Add.2 about the concept of gender and about the fact that women were regarded as the main victims of domestic violence. Opponents labelled the content of the Convention as the “gender ideology”, and there were attempts to withdraw from the Convention, including institutional preparatory initiatives for the renouncement. The Working Group was pleased to be reassured by the Ministry of Justice during the visit that there was no plan for withdrawal. 66. The Working Group was pleased to learn of the various measures taken since the adoption of the Convention and its application to asylum procedure cases. Indeed, the Working Group recognizes the continuous efforts to establish and improve the legal and programmatic framework for combating violence against women, noting that the Government has so far prioritized family violence. Violence against women in other spheres of life, including sexual harassment in schools, institutions of higher education and other public spaces, as well as cyberviolence, are mostly left out of the current framework. 67. The Working Group was informed of the positive changes in attitudes among law enforcement personnel and judicial actors and of various training courses. Notwithstanding these commendable efforts, more remains to be done to overcome gender stereotypes in the justice system. Furthermore, there is a need to review the content of the training programmes to ensure greater understanding of women’s barriers to accessing justice at the legal, institutional, structural, socioeconomic and cultural levels, including discriminatory or insensitive legal provisions, the persistence of gender stereotypes, women’s economic dependence and responsibility for children, and gender bias in the system. 68. It is also important to systematically collect disaggregated statistical data at regular intervals in order to study the root causes and effects, incidences and conviction rates, and the efficacy of measures taken to combat violence against women. This should include data on women in vulnerable situations, such as older women, women with disabilities, migrant women and minority women (particularly Roma). Such data would serve as the basis for adopting and implementing targeted policies for addressing the problems these women face, including securing effective access to justice and access to specialized support centres and places of safe refuge. A. Domestic violence 69. The Working Group observed that the Istanbul Convention’s recognition of women as the main victims of domestic violence is also supported by the Government’s statistics disaggregated by gender, which indicate that the overwhelming majority of the victims of domestic violence in Poland are women and children, 67 per cent and 22 per cent respectively, while men predominate among the perpetrators (92 per cent of all perpetrators).39 70. The 2005 Act on the Prevention of Violence in the Family, with further amendments made in 2010, and the Programme to Combat Family Violence 2014–2020, provide a comprehensive framework for the prevention of family violence and protection of and assistance to the victims/survivors, including legal, medical and psychological support, crisis intervention, provision of shelters and assistance in finding accommodation, as well as the possibility of isolating the perpetrator from the common dwelling. They also provide for correctional and educational measures for the perpetrator and professional training for those involved in dealing with domestic violence. Local authorities are also required to assume certain responsibilities to counteract domestic violence and protect victims. 71. The Act, however, does not fully reflect the gendered nature of family violence and is not yet fully compliant with the Istanbul Convention in terms of the scope of the protected persons and the types of violence covered. The Act defines the protected person as a family member, understood as the nearest relative within the understanding of article 39 Data from 2017 collected by the Ministry of Family, Labour and Social Policy. 15

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