Portuguese

Background and objectives

At the invitation of the Government of Brazil, the UN Special Rapporteur on violence against women and girls, its causes and consequences, Ms. Reem Alsalem, will conduct an official country visit to Brazil, which has been scheduled from 31 July to 10 August 2023.

Country visits are undertaken following an invitation by the Government and are prepared and conducted in close cooperation with the State concerned, in a spirit of cooperation and dialogue. The objective of the country visit is for the Special Rapporteur to gain first-hand understanding of issues related to her mandate, in particular in measures taken to prevent, combat and eliminate violence against women and girls, and to provide redress for victims. Following a country visit, the Special Rapporteur presents a report with her findings, conclusions and recommendations to the State concerned at the Human Rights Council session. The conclusions and recommendations made by the Special Rapporteur are a useful tool for States to improve measures to prevent and eliminate violence against women and girls.

The Special Rapporteur will start her visit in Brasília. She also intends to travel to other states. During her visit, as part of gathering information from all relevant stakeholders, she intends to convene meetings with a number of stakeholders, including State representatives, as well as various non-governmental and civil society organizations and associations, the private sector at the national and local level, including community-based groups and individuals, as well as with relevant international organizations such as UN entities and international NGOs.

At the end of her mission on 10 August 2023, the Special Rapporteur will debrief the Government officials on her preliminary findings. In accordance with established practice, she will also hold a press conference at the end of her visit to share the preliminary findings with the broader public. Additional information on the time and venue of the press conference will be shared in the coming weeks.

In preparation of the mission, the Special Rapporteur seeks relevant information from multiple stakeholders.

Key questions and types of input sought

In preparation of the visit, the Special Rapporteur invites all interested individuals and organizations, including civil society organizations, activists, and academics, to provide inputs for the preparation of her visit. She would welcome information on issues related to violence against women and girls, including its different manifestations; groups of women and girls particularly vulnerable to violence; and policies to prevent and combat violence against women and girls.

While all submissions are welcome and the topics below are not meant to be exhaustive, the Special Rapporteur is particularly interested in receiving information on the following:

• Legal, institutional and policy frameworks to relevant and respond to all forms of violence against all women and girls adopted by central and local authorities, including femicide, domestic violence, trafficking and sexual exploitation;
• Efforts to improve the collection of related disaggregated data and its use to inform legislative and policy reforms;
• Violence against indigenous women and girls;
• Violence against human rights defenders and women human rights organizations;
• Violence against women and girls that are lesbian, bisexual, trans or intersex (LBTI);
• Violence against women and girls who may be nationals of Brazil, stateless, refugees, asylum seekers or migrants, including sexual exploitation and trafficking of women and girls;
• The relationship between climate change, environmental degradation, disaster risk mitigation and response and gender-based violence against women and girls;
• Gender stereotyping and biases in judicial processes, particularly in domestic and sexual violence and child custody cases, including reference to the pseudo-theory of “parental alienation;”
• Violence against women in politics and efforts undertaken to improve the safe and equal participation of women in politics;
• Women’s and girls’ sexual and reproductive health and rights, including abortion;
• Coordination of essential services, including shelters, one-stop service centres, protection orders and other integrated services for women and girls victims of gender-based violence;
• Capacity of the different institutions to prevent, detect, monitor and respond to situations of violence against women and girls, including capacity building initiatives.
• Gender-based violence experienced by women and girls in urban centres.

Treatment of inputs received

All inputs will be treated confidentially by the Special Rapporteur and her team and for the sole purpose of preparing for the county visit. 

The Special Rapporteur greatly appreciates the effort that goes into making such contributions and looks forward to reading the submissions.