Weekly Report - 02 February 2012 (WR-12-05)

NICARAGUA | Femicide law. Congress approved a law on gender violence last week, which includes sanctions of up to 30 years imprisonment and, for the first time, includes as a crime, “femicide” – the intentional killing of women for being women. So far Costa Rica, Guatemala and El Salvador have approved legislation making femicide a crime. According to local NGOs 76 women were killed last year in Nicaragua, 13 less than in 2010 although the real figure is likely to be higher. While the new law was hailed by women’s rights organisations, it still falls far short of the main demand of such groups - repeal of the blanket ban on abortion, implemented in 2006, even when continuing pregnancy risks threaten the life or health of the mother, or when the pregnancy is the result of rape. Approval of the law – which was used by President Daniel Ortega’s Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional (FSLN) to win over the support of the Roman Catholic Church in the run-up to the 2006 election, remains a cause célèbre for local and international rights NGOs such as Amnesty International (AI).

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