Russia's 'family values': raping, beating women & girls to death

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Russia's most senior lawmaker on family policy said on 23 June 2026 that a domestic violence law would frighten men away from marriage, nine years after the state decriminalised first-offence battery.<br>"Will young people get married if this law is passed? Or will men be afraid, because any touch at home directed at a wife, given the sometimes impulsive statements of our women, could be considered an assault."<br>Nina Ostanina, chair of the State Duma's committee on Family Protection, Fatherhood, Motherhood and Childhood, said that "any touch at home directed at a wife, given the sometimes impulsive statements of our women, could be considered an assault on physical and psychological wellbeing." If the bill passed, she predicted, "ten out of ten" Russian families would end in divorce.<br>The statement was the latest iteration of a political argument that has successfully blocked dedicated domestic violence legislation in Russia for more than three decades, while the Russian state continues to treat family battery as a lesser offence than hitting a stranger.<br>In 2024, UN data showed, 963 women in Russia were killed as a result of domestic violence. Of those, 530 were murdered by intimate partners and 433 by other family members. That figure, 47 per cent of all intentional female homicides, was the highest ratio recorded in 15 years, according to analysis by the independent Russian outlet Important Stories.<br>The law that governs this violence fines perpetrators the equivalent of a restaurant bill.<br>The fine that replaced a sentence<br>From July 2016 to February 2017, domestic battery in Russia was briefly treated as a criminal matter. The State Duma had voted to include family violence in the criminal code, and for six months a first offence of battery against a family member carried the same criminal penalties as a racially motivated assault.<br>Then Senator Yelena Mizulina, the architect of Russia's 2013 law banning "gay propaganda," led the campaign to reverse the change. The Russian Orthodox Church had called the 2016 criminalisation a measure lacking "moral justification and legal grounds." Conservative lawmakers argued that it was wrong for a parent who hit their child to face harsher penalties than a neighbour who struck a stranger. On 7 February 2017, President Putin signed the amendment into law.<br>The effect was specific and deliberate. Under Article 6.1.1 of the Code of Administrative Offences, a first offence of domestic battery that does not result in lasting harm became an administrative infraction, punishable by a fine of 5,000 to 30,000 roubles (approximately 80 to 480 US dollars at 2017 rates), administrative arrest of up to 15 days, or compulsory community service of up to 120 hours. Criminal penalties apply only on a second offence within one year: a fine of up to 40,000 roubles, arrest of up to three months, or community service of up to 180 hours. After one year has elapsed, the clock resets. A second beating committed 13 months after the first is treated, again, as a first offence.<br>The practical consequence is a system that demands victims survive and document repeat violence before the state will treat their abuser as a criminal. It also returned domestic battery to the realm of private prosecution, meaning that victims, not police, are responsible for collecting evidence and initiating a complaint.<br>Amnesty International called the 2017 amendment "a sickening attempt to further trivialise domestic violence." The Secretary General of the Council of Europe wrote that reducing family battery from a criminal to an administrative offence "would be a clear sign of regression within the Russian Federation and would strike a blow to global efforts to eradicate domestic violence." Russia signed neither the Istanbul Convention on preventing and combating violence against women nor any equivalent legislation or treaty.<br>"Family values"<br>Russia has no dedicated domestic violence law. Proposals have been submitted to the Duma more than 40 times since 1993. None has passed a first reading. The most recent serious attempt came from the New...