New Year?s Day killings spark call for action to tackle violence against women in France

Feminist campaigners in France are calling for tougher government action to combat violence against women and girls after three women were allegedly killed by their current or former partner on the first day of 2022.

The body of a 28-year-old military recruit who had been stabbed to death was found near Saumur in western France on Saturday. The local prosecutor, Alexandra Verron, said a 21-year-old man, also a soldier, had been arrested and investigators were looking into a possible femicide - the killing of a woman by her partner or ex-partner.

In eastern France, police discovered the body of a 56-year-old woman with a knife in her chest after neighbours at Meurthe-et-Moselle reported a violent dispute. The victim's husband was questioned by police and was due to appear before a judge on Monday.

On Sunday, a 45-year-old woman was found in the boot of a car at a property in Nice. She had been strangled. Police were interviewing the woman's former partner, a 60-year-old man who reportedly admitted having a violent altercation with his ex-wife, and their 24-year-old son, in whose vehicle the body was allegedly discovered.

The mayor of Nice, Christian Estrosi, said he was devastated by the alleged killing and described it as a "horror".

The collective #NousToutes accused the French government of remaining "scandalously" silent on the grim start to the year for women. It said an estimated 220,000 women reported conjugal violence every year, but judges had ordered the use of electronic bracelets in only 379 cases.

Lena Ben Ahmed, of #NousToutes, told France Info radio: "These femicides are not isolated cases. They're not the occasional news story. They are systematic violence. The whole system colludes in these murders because it banalises and minimises sexist and sexual violence. That's why we are scandalised by the government's silence."

In France, there were at least 113 femicides last year, an increase on the 102 officially recorded in 2020. In 2019, a record 146 women were killed.

"Numerous events that are being looked into and are subject to the omerta of the prosecutors' offices haven't been counted," it said.

"The number of police and gendarmerie interventions for intra-family violences remains very high, with more than 400,000 (in 2020), which is 45 every hour," Darmanin said. "Not a day goes by without [specialist police] freeing a woman or children who are being held hostage," the minister added.

In the UK, the Femicide Census estimates one woman is killed by a man every three days, 62% of them by a current or former partner. A history of abuse was recorded in 59% of killings of women carried out by partners or ex-partners or a male relative.