Common definition of rape based on consent, EU to test historic agreement

Brussels – Finding a common definition of the offence of rape based on the absence of consent: The proposal for a directive on fighting gender-based violence enters the final stage of negotiations, with a meeting tomorrow (Feb. 6) in Strasbourg between EU Parliament and Council negotiators that could lead to a historic political agreement for the Union.

“We call for member states to say yes to the inclusion of the crime of sex without consent as rape,” urges in a post on X (formerly Twitter) Swedish MEP Evin Incir (S&D), who is co-signer of the European Parliament position along with Irish MEP Frances Fitzgerald (EPP). He accuses “two liberal men and an illiberal one, President Macron in France, Justice Minister Buschmann in Germany and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán” of holding back the agreement.

The proposed directive was put forward by the European Commission on March 8, 2022, with the idea of criminalizing several offences, including female genital mutilation, online violence, and rape, which is defined in Article 5 as “any compulsion to a non-consensual sexual act.” Member states do not have a common definition of the crime of rape based on non-consent, so this, according to the European Institute for Gender Equality, is an obstacle to community-wide data collection.

July, November, and December: To date, three meetings have already been held between parliament and council negotiators. Tomorrow’s will be the fourth negotiating meeting and according to various sources, it could be the decisive one. As also pointed out by the rapporteur, France and Germany are among the countries slowing down the negotiations, opposing such a specific European definition of rape, complaining that there is no legal basis for these new rules. The member states in their negotiating position adopted in June (and to Italy’s regret as well) removed any reference to the principle of consent to define rape precisely because of the opposition also of Berlin and Paris, along with Austria and the Netherlands.

Italy has always been for the inclusion of the crime of rape in the new directive. Reportedly, during the negotiations that led member states to agree on a common position in June, Italy pushed for this inclusion but it was not possible. In its mandate, the European Parliament instead broadened the definition of nonconsensual acts, emphasizing that consent can be withdrawn at any time and adding situations where a victim is unable to secure his or her freedom to decide due to fear, intimidation, disability, and other vulnerable circumstances.