Italy’s parliament has unanimously voted to classify femicide—gender-motivated killing of women—as a separate criminal offense. As a result, any murder committed due to a woman’s gender will now be treated directly as a life-imprisonment-eligible crime. Femicide refers to the deliberate killing of a woman because she is a woman. The bill was passed on Tuesday (25 November), coinciding with the International Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, the BBC reported.
The issue of femicide has long been debated in Italy. But the murder of Giulia Cecchettin, a young woman killed by her ex-boyfriend, shocked the nation and accelerated legal reforms.
In late November 2023, 22-year-old Giulia was stabbed to death by her former partner, Filippo Turetta, who then placed her body in a bag and dumped it near a lake. Until Turetta’s arrest, the murder dominated Italian media headlines. However, it was a statement by Giulia’s sister Elena that left the deepest impact.
She said the killer was “not a monster, but the healthy son of a deeply patriarchal society.” Her words triggered nationwide protests demanding change.
After two years of intense debate and discussions, Italian lawmakers finally passed the femicide bill. With this, Italy joins a small group of countries that legally classify the gender-motivated killing of women as a distinct criminal category.
Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni introduced the bill. Despite Meloni’s far-right government supporting it, opposition MPs also backed the legislation. Many lawmakers wore red ribbons or red clothing during the vote in memory of women killed.
From now on, every gender-motivated killing of a woman in Italy will be officially recorded as “femicide.”
Judge Paola Di Nicola, one of the architects of the new law, said that femicide will now be categorized, examined within its real context, and formally recognized.
She was part of a specialist commission that studied 211 recent femicide cases before drafting the law.
According to her, describing such murders as acts driven by “overwhelming love” or “extreme jealousy” is a distortion—romantic or culturally acceptable language that obscures the underlying reality.
Before Italy, countries such as Cyprus, Malta, and Croatia had included a legal definition of femicide in their penal codes.
The lack of a global uniform definition of femicide makes international comparisons and statistics difficult.
According to Italy’s new law, femicide includes the killing of a woman driven by hatred, discrimination, dominance, or control; murder committed due to rejection after ending a relationship; and killing to restrict a woman’s personal freedom.
Official statistics show that last year, 116 women were murdered in Italy, of which 106 were gender-motivated. These killings will now be documented separately, and life imprisonment will automatically apply—an approach authorities believe will act as a deterrent.
Giulia was murdered by her ex-boyfriend after she refused to resume their relationship.
Giulia’s father blamed societal attitudes toward women, entrenched patriarchal norms, and young men’s inability to manage emotions as key factors behind such killings.
