The Constitutional has today renewed its commitment to the protection of women’s rights, and especially with the right of equality, in an act in which it has celebrated. The president of the Guarantees Body, Cándido Conde-Pumpido, highlighted the work of the court in this field in its 45 years of existence and mentioned the “relevant social impact” of the sentences of this last exercise on the expansion of maternity permits in single-parent families. The event was attended by the President of the Inter -American Court of Human Rights – equivalent in its area to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) -, Nancy Hernández, presented by the vice president of the Guarantee Body, Immaculate Montalbán.
In his speech Montalbán highlighted the importance of applying the “gender perspective” to the work of interpretation and application of the proclaimed rights in the Constitution, with the objective of “fulfilling the mandate of eliminating obstacles that prevent equality reality.” This perspective – he added – constitutes “a category of analysis of unequal reality between men and women”, and stressed that the formation in this matter in the Judiciary is mandatory since the legal reform carried out in 2018, as the development of the State Pact against Gender Violence. Montalbán also recalled that until 1966 the woman’s access was not allowed to the positions of judge and prosecutor, and celebrated that she is now a magistrate, Isabel Perelló,
The Vice President of the Constitutional affirmed that the situation of exclusion of women in the judicial and fiscal careers was “the result of prejudices and biases transmitted throughout history, such as that of an alleged innate inclination to the care and affection tasks typical of a being biologically determined for procreation; or the eventual incompatibility with a rational work, such as the application and interpretation of law. ” He also mentioned that the history of the Constitutional itself “is no stranger to this story of absence of women or invisible women”, since the court has had a total of 63 components, of which 10 were women, 5 of them today, and only one, only one,
In turn, Nancy Hernández, president of the Inter -American Court of Human Rights – which is based in Costa Rica -, explained that “violence against women is increasing in many countries of the region”, as a reflection of “the persistence of discriminatory cultural patterns for gender reasons.” He added that this factor, added to “impunity prevailing in most judicial systems” perpetuates the status quo, normalizes violence in particular against populations of especially vulnerable women, such as “indigenous people, poor women, girls, human rights defenders, journalists, trans -descendant women, among others.” He also said that through sentences of the Inter -American Court “sexual violence has been recognized as torture.” The act concluded with a performance by singer Conchita, who got the jurists auditorium “who urged” doing things well “because” we depend on you ” – accompanied her in one of her pieces.
