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"Access to Specialised Victim Support Service for Women with Disabilities who have Experienced Violence" is a project about disabled women who have experienced violence and need access to support services carried out in four European Countries (Austria, Germany, United Kingdom and Iceland). Lead of the Project is the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute of Human Rights in Vienna, Austria, and the project is funded by the Daphne programme of the European Commission, started in 2013 for two years. The European partners are the Universities from Leeds (GB), Gießen (Germany) and Iceland.

WHY IS THIS WORK RELEVANT?

This work is very important because there have been many reports that suggest disabled women are significantly more likely to experience violence than non-disabled women. Also they are more likely to encounter barriers to accessing mainstream victim support services which prevent them from reporting the acts and getting the protection they need.

The issue has been recognized as a priority by the monitoring committees of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD) and the Convention on the Elimination of all forms of Violence against Women (CEDAW). So it is important to listen to the personal stories of disabled women to understand how they have been affected by violence over the course of their lives, and the barriers they face in help-seeking from mainstream victim support services and by disability organizations. In particular we seek to learn about:

• Whether the four countries fulfill their national obligations as stated in the UNCRPD, CEDAW and other legal instruments and measures aimed at the protection of non-disabled women and especially of women with disabilities who have experienced violence.
• Which specialized victim support services (shelters, helplines, counseling services, etc.) offer services for disabled women who have experienced violence.

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