Country Profile The Republic of Cyprus

General Country Information

Summary

In the Republic of Cyprus, the national women’s helpline is free of charge, operates 24/7 and provides multilingual support. Four women-only shelters offer 79 beds, and there is one women’s centre which provides several support services, including specialist services for survivors of sexualised violence. The National Action Plan for 2023–2028 includes provisions for primary prevention activities, as well as a dedicated budget. The state collects data on women’s specialist support services and on some primary prevention activities, and this data is available upon request.

In the northern part of Cyprus, there is one women’s helpline, which is free of charge and available 24/7. Additionally, there is only one women-only shelter with 48 beds available and two women’s centres. There are no specialised services for women and girls who have experienced sexualised violence in Northern Cyprus, and there are no specific provisions on primary prevention. In Northern Cyprus, the state does not collect data on women’s specialist services.

The Republic of Cyprus does not exercise control over the northern territory of the country, which is administered by Turkish Cypriot authorities. For this reason, the services of the Republic of Cyprus and those of Northern Cyprus are presented in separate sections under this profile.

Women’s Specialist Services

In the Republic of Cyprus, there is one national women’s helpline called National Helpline 1440 (Εθνική Γραμμή Βοήθειας 1440 – for people living in the Republic of Cyprus: tel.: 1440, for people calling from abroad: tel.: +357 22339001). It is run by the Association for the Prevention and Handling of Violence in the Family (SPAVO), is free of charge and operates 24/7, offering multilingual support in Greek and English; thus, it meets the standards of the Istanbul Convention. The SPAVO helpline also offers a live chat (available on www.domviolence.org.cy) and an SMS service (tel.: +357 99984042), which are both free of charge and available 24/7. Through these three channels, SPAVO offers support for all forms of violence against women, domestic violence and gender-based violence. The helpline receives state funding. In 2024, it received 6,883 calls/contacts, and the most common form of violence reported was domestic violence, including in particular psychological, physical and economic violence.

There are four women-only shelters in the Republic of Cyprus operated by the Association for the Prevention and Handling of Violence in the Family (SPAVO), offering 79 beds; 3 shelters for survivors of domestic violence and 1 shelter for young and underage migrant mothers. Another shelter for survivors of trafficking accessible to women is operated by the Social Welfare Services. Women-only shelters offer 24/7 access, and women are not expected to pay for their accommodation. On average, women stay in the shelters between three and six months, but all cases are evaluated separately, and high-risk cases can receive accommodation for longer. The types of in-house services provided by women-only shelters include casework, counselling, practical advice and referrals/collaboration with other services.

All shelters can accommodate women with uncertain residence permits/undocumented women, refugee women, homeless women, older women, transgender women and women with children with disabilities. Most shelters can be accessed by and are accessible to women with physical, sensory and cognitive disabilities, women with substance abuse issues, women with older sons and unaccompanied girls. Since 2023, Sophie’s House has been operating by SPAVO following a Ministerial Decision, to support young and underage migrant mothers who have arrived in Cyprus as asylum seekers or survivors of trafficking. At the time of writing, the programme hosts twelve young women and eleven newborns and children. It provides women with a safe space to live, as well as practical support, counselling, accompaniment, childcare, training on parental skills, vocational support, medical services, and legal counselling.

Women-only shelters are funded through state funding and donations. Shelters are present in most regions, and a fifth shelter is expected to be opened in 2026, covering the last two provinces of Larnaca and Ammochostos, which currently have no shelter. If women-only shelters had to decline referrals, the main reasons were the lack of space/capacity to accommodate survivors with children, survivors being ineligible for support, or the shelters not being adequately equipped for the needs of the women/children. If women-only shelters for domestic violence survivors do not have capacity, SPAVO rents alternative safe accommodations that offer the same services as shelters. The most common forms of violence reported by survivors to the women-only shelters in 2024 were domestic, physical and economic violence, and in that year, 447 women found support in women-only shelters.

There is one women’s centre in the Republic of Cyprus, called Woman’s House, which is only for survivors of violence against women, operating as one-stop-centre where all competent agencies cooperate under one roof, including the Association for the Prevention and Handling of Violence in the Family (SPAVO), Cyprus Police, Social Welfare Services, and Mental Health Services. The centre provides needs and risk assessment, counselling/psychological support, legal advice, financial and social welfare support/advocacy, housing advice, employment, referrals/collaboration with other services, as well as multidisciplinary multi-agency meetings. The Woman’s House Crisis Intervention Team provides survivors’ accompaniment services, and if a woman needs residential support, she is referred to SPAVO shelters. The centre also provides support for survivors of sexualised violence, including specialist forensic and medical care, needs and risk assessment, specialist psychological care, specialist advocacy services, legal advice, as well as community awareness and education for prevention.

The Woman’s House can be accessed by and is accessible to women with uncertain residence permits/undocumented women, refugee women, women with physical, cognitive and sensory disabilities, older women, transgender women and unaccompanied girls. Additionally, staff are trained to support survivors from specific groups, including survivors (at risk) of forced marriage, honour-based violence, female genital mutilation, trafficking in persons, as well as women with uncertain residence permits/undocumented women, refugee women and black and minority ethnic women.

The centre is coordinated by SPAVO and is funded by the state. It is located in the capital city, and cases from other regions may also be referred to the Woman’s House if deemed necessary by the Police and/or the Social Welfare Services. Survivors of rape are referred to the Woman’s House regardless of their province of residence. In 2024, the House supported 405 women.

The Woman’s House provide specialist support for survivors of sexualised violence, including specialist forensic and medical care, needs assessment, specialist psychological care, specialist advocacy services, community awareness and education for prevention, and legal advice for women, young women and girls under 18. Funding is provided by the state, and the Woman’s House is located in the capital city. Additionally, the centre “NIMA” is the first specialised centre in Cyprus that provides psychological support and treatment to adults, including women, who have suffered sexual abuse in their childhood, and their families. It is operated by the Cyprus Family Planning Association following a Ministerial Decision since July 2023. It offers psychological therapy and support for healing trauma, legal advice, a referral and information hub, and prevention through education and community outreach. All of its services are provided free of charge, and the centre operates with a multidisciplinary team.

In Cyprus, public authorities collect limited data on primary prevention activities. Cyprus is implementing a National Action Plan for the Prevention and Handling of Violence against Women for 2023–2028. This includes provisions for primary prevention activities (campaigns, educational seminars, capacity-building), which are monitored by various ministries, the Advisory Committee for Preventing and Combating Violence in the Family, and the National Coordinating Body for the Prevention and Combating Violence against Women. The National Action Plan focuses on priorities arising from both the Istanbul Convention and the law “On the Prevention and Handling of Violence against Women and Domestic Violence”, as well as from the results of the GREVIO Evaluation Report on the compliance of Cyprus with the provisions of the Convention. The National Action Plan includes a definition of primary prevention, and a specific budget is allocated to primary prevention activities. These include empowerment activities for girls and women, school-based primary prevention programmes, training for primary prevention practitioners and awareness-raising campaigns or programmes. No evaluation of the impact of primary prevention activities is conducted in the country. In practice, NGOs such as SPAVO and the Mediterranean Institute of Gender Studies play a central role in implementing prevention measures, including EU-funded projects, trainings for professionals and practitioners, school-based programmes and community awareness activities. Cyprus also participates annually in the international ‘16 days of Activism against Gender-Based Violence’ campaign, which raises public awareness but is not systematically evaluated.

Northern Cyprus

Women’s Specialist Services

There is one women’s helpline in the northern part of Cyprus, called Hello 183 Domestic Violence Support Line (Alo 183 Şiddetle Mücadele Hatt, tel.: +90 183), which is free of charge, and available 24/7, therefore meeting the standards of the Istanbul Convention; nevertheless, it does not offer multilingual support. The helpline is run by the social services department functioning under the Ministry of Employment and Social Security and is funded by central authorities. It is a general violence prevention and support helpline which specifically supports women and children facing violence. The most common forms of violence reported by callers to the state-wide women’s helpline in 2024 were domestic, physical and sexualised violence.

The Association of Women to Support Living (KAYAD) previously operated a helpline, which was discontinued due to insufficient resources. There are no other helplines available in northern Cyprus.

There is one women-only shelter in northern Cyprus, which is located in Nicosia and offers 48 beds. The shelter offers 24/7 access, and women are not expected to pay for their accommodation. Women can stay in the shelter up to three months, and the types of in-house services most often provided are counselling/psychological support and legal advice. The shelter is accessible to women with uncertain residence permits/undocumented women, refugee women, homeless women, older women, transgender women, women with older sons, and women with children with disabilities. There are no other shelters specialised in supporting particular groups of survivors, nor different shelters accessible to women. The shelter is funded through state funding and international funding, and is run by municipal staff of the Turkish Municipality of Nicosia. If the shelter had to decline referrals, it was mostly due to the survivors being ineligible for support, for instance, in the case of women with substance abuse issues. The most common forms of violence reported by survivors to the women-only shelters in 2024 were domestic, physical and sexualised violence.

There are two women’s centres in northern Cyprus that support all survivors of gender-based violence. The one run by the Association of Women to Support Living (KAYAD) provides counselling/psychological support, legal advice, financial and social welfare support/advocacy, housing advice, employment, referrals/collaboration with other services, representation at court/police/social services and residential support services. Additionally, it also supports survivors of sexualised violence through specialist psychological care, specialist advocacy services, community awareness and education for prevention and legal advice. The centre receives international funding and is located in the capital city. Additionally, the Turkish municipality of Nicosia runs a municipal women’s centre. Women’s centres are open to survivors of specific forms of violence (e.g., forced marriage, honour-based violence, trafficking in persons, etc.) and can support survivors from specific groups (e.g., refugee women, women with disabilities, etc.), but they are not specialised in providing support tailored to their specific needs.

There are no specialised services for women and girls who have experienced sexualised violence in northern Cyprus.

Public authorities do not collect data on primary prevention activities, and there is no budget allocated to conduct them. Primary prevention activities organised in northern Cyprus include feminist self-defence trainings, empowerment activities for girls and women and awareness-raising campaigns or programmes.

1. Number of beds in the four women-only shelters operated by SPAVO. ↩︎