SA: Violence Against Women

From IOL:

Women in South Africa are six times more likely to be killed by their "male partners" than elsewhere in the world, says the senior researcher at the Tshwaranang Legal Advocacy Centre, Lisa Vetton.

She said the rate of such killings by intimate partners in South Africa was six times higher than the global average.

"It translates into four women killed every day by their intimate partners."

This was one of the chilling statistics given by Vetton when she took part in SAfm Radio's discussion programme, the After Eight Debate, on violence against women and children.

The debate marked the 16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence campaign.

Vetton said last year's statistics showed 52 000 rapes had been reported in South Africa. "But research from 1997 found that only one in nine women in the study was reporting. This suggests we are looking at closer to 450 000 rapes a year. If you compare our reported rapes with those in the United States, it is three times higher."