Commissioner for the Protection of Equality Brankica Jankovic warns that in the last three days only, two women were murdered, while several were physically injured.

Appealing to all authorities to fully implement Law on the Prohibition of Domestic Violence, as well as all other available protection measures, in order to stop the increasing trend of violence against women, Commissioner stresses that partner and domestic violence is not someone’s personal matter, but important social and state issue. Still, it does not include misuse of information from the victim’s private life in media, deterioration of human dignity and violation of the Journalists Code of Ethics. During the past several days, we have witnessed intolerable and sensationalistic reporting about singer Natasa Bekvalac, backed up by numerous comments in some media and social networks, relativizing the crime by exposing the information that are not of public interest and are harmful both for the victim and her family.

Commissioner Jankovic particularly stresses that the discriminatory relation and patriarchal attitude, considering woman as men’s property and causing various types of violence, must be changed.  In order to make this change happen, we all need to fight together and shatter the gender stereotypes, while media have very important role in this matter. Commissioner appeals once again to media to respect professional and ethical standards when reporting about family and partner violence, which includes the respect for privacy and dignity of victims, their children and family, whether they are celebrity, public figure or any other citizen of this country.