“Yuzhnyi Kazakhstan”, #23 (17.938), 25/02/2005
N. Kazorina

   During three months, 218 people appealed to the Legal Center for Women's Initiatives “Sana Sezim” about the violence committed against them. After an analysis of the treatment, 86 percent of offenders and aggressors were close relatives: spouses, parents, sisters, brothers, and children. 12 percent suffered from people they were familiar with and only two from strangers. It was also established that domestic violence can last from several months to 40 years...
   “This is a very serious problem,” said the director of the Center, Hadicha Abysheva, “Not only because there are certain stereotypes in society – a husband does a beating because of jealousy and no one is willing to accept this as criminal. Women themselves believe that they are “condemned” to such treatment. A wife is afraid to throw out her husband because then the children are left without a father. Although, it is their first need to protect the home from the tyrant. There is no guarantee that when they grow up, that they will not repeat what they saw in childhood and repeat their family “values”: girls, future wives, might tolerate abuse, and the boys, the future husbands might beat and humiliate their spouses. Professionals consider violence against women as a complex problem, and led to the decision to adopt the law “About Domestic Violence”, tightening up on rapists. This applies not only sexual but also physical, verbal, physical violence. But above all there is the need to educate the women themselves. Therefore, employees of the Center spread information on the institutions and organizations associated with the issues on posters and booklets “Domestic violence” and “Sexual Violence”. They have already distributed over 2000 copies. Annually the Center participates in the international campaign “16 days without violence” and every year around the world the first Women's Global Leadership Institute. We provide free legal and psychological assistance to victims of violence in our office. A “hotline” was opened on these issues, which takes calls from 9:00 to 20:00. In general, we are doing everything that contributes to changing the situation and protecting the right of women to live without violence.
   Since last year the center has been registered from a private to public organization, which is the result of one of the six activities in this direction.