Ahead of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, on 25 November, Executive Vice-President Mînzatu and Commissioner Lahbib, on behalf of the European Commission, and High Representative/Vice-President, Kaja Kallas, issued the following statement:
"Gender-based violence is unacceptable. On this International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, the European Union renews its determination to end all forms of violence against women and girls and to ensure that every person can live free from fear and harm.
Across the EU, one in three women has experienced gender-based violence. Behind each number is a person whose life, health, and dignity have been violated. Violence against women can take many forms, can happen anywhere and to anyone.
Ending this requires action. The EU is taking concrete steps, from prevention and protection to enforcement and accountability. With the EU's accession to the Istanbul Convention and the adoption of the first-ever EU law to combat violence against women and domestic violence, the EU is establishing a comprehensive framework to fight gender-based violence.
Gender-based violence online harms women, silences their voices, and threatens our democratic values. Our Directive combatting violence against women explicitly criminalises the most widespread forms of gender-based online violence such as sharing intimate images without consent, deepfakes, cyberstalking, online harassment, and online incitement to violence and hatred based on gender. It also ensures that publicly accessible illegal content online is promptly removed. For survivors of any form of violence against women and domestic violence, the law provides stronger protection and support. We call on all EU Member States to transpose this Directive into national law swiftly, so that women and girls everywhere in our Union can be safer, both online and offline.
Eradicating gender-based violence is essential. In our Roadmap for Women's Rights, we placed 'Freedom from gender-based violence' as the first principle, and we will carry this priority into the upcoming Gender Equality Strategy 2026–2030.
Through the EU Strategy for a more effective fight against child sexual abuse and our legislative proposals to criminalise all forms of child sexual abuse and to ensure that online platforms better shield children from sexual abuse, we are stepping up efforts to protect every child, especially girls, who are disproportionately affected.
Our efforts do not stop at Europe's borders. The EU works globally to end sexual and gender-based violence, partnering with governments, UN agencies, civil society, women's rights organisations, peacebuilders and human rights defenders. Through actions like the Spotlight Initiative and the EU–UN Women ACT Programme , we are investing in real change.
We will continue to implement the Women, Peace and Security Agenda fully as to build a world where women can live safely and girls can grow up without fear in every community, and in every digital space.
Ending violence against women and girls is everyone's responsibility. Together, we can and must make it happen."
Background
Eradicating gender-based violence is a longstanding and key priority of the Commission. The International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, on 25 November, is the annual starting point of the global ' 16 Days of Activism to End Gender-based Violence' campaign, led by UN Women. The 2025 campaign titled 'UNiTE to End Digital Violence against All Women and Girls' focuses on promoting safety and justice online. Executive Vice-President Virkkunen and Commissioner Lahbib will be in Strasbourg for the occasion of the High-level Event on technology-facilitated gender-based violence marking the start of the '16 Days of Activism', and the event can be followed online.
Building on the EU Gender Equality Strategy 2020-2025 , the upcoming Gender Equality Strategy 2026-2030 will outline the new initiatives and legislation to continue this progress towards a gender-equal Europe. The Directive on combating violence against women and domestic violence was adopted in May 2024 and constitutes the first EU law to address gender-based violence. It provides a comprehensive framework to prevent and combat violence against women and domestic violence across the EU. For example, it introduces definitions of certain criminal offences both offline and online, facilitates victim's access to justice, and enhances prevention, data collection, coordination and cooperation. Member States are required to transpose it into national law by June 2027 and the EU is supporting countries with their implementation. Moreover, the European Union acceded to the Council of Europe's Istanbul convention in October 2023, which is the most far-reaching international legal instrument to set out binding obligations to prevent and combat violence against women and girls.
The Commission, through the Citizens, Equality, Rights and Values Programme, under its 'Daphne strand', made €23 million available in 2025 to support transnational actions that tackle and prevent violence against children and gender-based violence in the domestic sphere and in intimate relationships. Preventing future abuses goes hand in hand with supporting the existing victims and ensuring accountability for perpetrators. To ensure victims of violence fully benefit from their rights under EU law, the Commission proposed the EU Strategy on victims' rights (2020-2025) and has successfully implemented all its actions and the Commission's proposal on amending the 2012 Victims' Rights Directive is now being discussed by the co-legislators. Furthermore, the recast of the Child Sexual Abuse Directive is also underway to strengthen the criminalisation of child sexual abuse, improve the rules on prosecution and reinforce prevention and assistance to victims.
The EU Action Plan on Human Rights and Democracy (2020-2024) and the Action Plan on Gender Equality and Women's Empowerment in External Action 2021 – 2025 (GAP III) are ambitious frameworks for achieving progress on gender equality and women's empowerment through external action, and have been extended up to 2027. The EU will continue its efforts to curb gender-based violence internationally in its role as co-leader of the Generation Equality Forum's Action Coalition on Gender-Based Violence and through programmes such as the Spotlight Initiative and the ACT Programme to End Violence Against Women. The ACT Programme supports women's rights organisations to strengthen prevention, protection, and accountability systems to end violence against women and girls. The EU also supports the Digital for Democracy Initiative (DDI), implemented with Denmark and Norway. Among its flagship actions is a €6.5 million regional project in Latin America, implemented by the Latin American Alliance of Women's and Feminist Funds, with Fondo de Mujeres del Sur (FMS) as lead partner, to counter technology-facilitated gender-based violence by improving legal frameworks, supporting women human rights defenders, and building capacity among local organisations.
As in previous years, the headquarters of the European Commission and the European External Action Service (EEAS) will join the UN Women's Orange the World campaign. On the evening of 24 November, the European Commission's Berlaymont building will be lit in orange — the UN's global symbol of commitment to eliminate violence against women. The EEAS headquarters will also employ dedicated orange visuals on its building to reinforce this commitment. The pictures will be available on EBS .
