A new United Nations report has warned that a woman or girl is killed by someone close to her every 10 minutes, showing no real progress in the fight against femicide.
The report, released on Monday by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and UN Women, said an estimated 50,000 women and girls were murdered in 2024 by intimate partners or family members. The figures were gathered from 117 countries.
According to the UN, 60 percent of female homicide victims were killed by partners or relatives, including husbands, fathers, uncles, brothers and even mothers. In contrast, only 11 percent of male homicide victims were killed by someone close.
The agencies said the figure amounts to about 137 women per day. Although slightly lower than the number recorded in the previous year, the UN stressed that the change does not mean the situation is improving. Instead, it reflects gaps in data from different countries.
The report said, “Femicide continues to claim tens of thousands of lives of women and girls each year, with no sign of improvement.” It added that the home remains “the most dangerous place for women and girls in terms of the risk of homicide.”
Africa recorded the highest number of cases in 2024 with about 22,000 femicides.
Sarah Hendricks, Director of UN Women’s Policy Division, said femicide often starts with smaller signs of abuse.
She stated, “Femicides don’t happen in isolation. They often sit on a continuum of violence that can start with controlling behavior, threats, and harassment, including online.”
The report also warned that new technology has created more avenues for abuse, including doxxing, non-consensual image-sharing, and deepfake videos.
Hendricks said, “We need the implementation of laws that recognize how violence manifests across the lives of women and girls, both online and offline, and hold perpetrators to account well before it turns deadly.”
The UN called for stronger laws, better data collection, and early intervention systems to help prevent the killings.
