WUNRN
Women Without Borders
04. May 2010
PAKISTAN - ACID ATTACKS ARE
INCREASING - BURNING GENDER INJUSTICE
Last week, three Pakistani sisters, age 20, 16, and 14, had their lives
irrevocably changed. As they walked from Kalat city to Pandarani village in the
Baluchistan province, two motorcyclists threw acid on them, causing severe
burns over their faces and bodies. Two weeks earlier, two sisters in the same
province suffered the same attack—and they are only 11 and 13 years old. Their
crimes? Not wearing hijabs and traveling unaccompanied by men. The Baloch
Ghaeratmand Group, which was until recently unknown in the province, circulated
a pamphlet in April that warned, “Acid will be thrown on the faces of women and
girls who step out of their houses without covering their faces… People who
fail to comply with these orders will themselves be responsible for the
consequences.”
Five victims in three weeks in one province of Pakistan: you could consider
these attacks commonplace. Their attackers will probably not face punishment
for their actions. And what can the victims’ families do? What steps can the
townspeople in this region take to prevent further attacks? The police claim
not to know who is in the Baloch Ghaeratmand Group, and they do not know if the
attackers were affiliated with the group. These five young women and girls will
suffer from the physical and psychological effects of these attacks for the
rest of their lives, and the towns and villages in this area will be subdued by
the threat of violence, knowing that there is no way to prevent or deter these
attacks from happening again.
This is violent extremism at its most insidious: controlling communities and
individuals in the name of a radical ideology through the threat of violence.
And as with all extremist groups, ideology is just an excuse to seize power
through inhuman actions—to commit acts that defy even the most basic urges
towards fellow feeling, and to do so in the name of an abstract principle that
cannot be held accountable.
If the victim survives, the effects of acid attacks are life-changing. Acid
burns through eyes, skin tissue, and bone. Usually, the victims are left blind
and with permanent scar tissue. Their bones are often fused together—jawbones
sealed tight, chins locked to chests, hands left permanently contorted in the
position they held as they tried to deflect the splash. The psychological scars
are even worse. Depression, anxiety, shame—these would be part of the emotional
aftermath of any scarring injury, but victims of acid attacks are also often
ostracized by their communities and even held responsible for incurring the
attack they suffered. When the victims are married, their children are forced
to assume their mother’s caretaker roles, and if the husband leaves, they have
to shoulder the heavy burden of caring for the family as well. If the victims
are not married, they face a lifetime of dependency on the charity of their
parents and community and continued vulnerability to further attacks. Women who
are lucky enough to have money may be able to afford a series of operations
that would incrementally replace skin on their face, restore partial sight in
an eye, or realign bones fused together. Women without money can hope to make
the most of what the acid does not burn. With or without surgery, the victim of
an acid attack will never look the way she did the day before the attack—that
woman is gone forever.
The five women attacked in Baluchistan are only a small sample of a problem
that is widespread throughout South Asia and growing. Pakistan’s acid attacks
are mirrored by similar attacks in Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Cambodia, and
India, and in recent years even in areas where acid attacks have not been seen
before, including Hong Kong, China, and the United Kingdom. The attackers often
cite political or religious grounds for their actions—defying sharia or tribal
law, attending school, not wearing a headscarf, leaving the house unaccompanied
by a man, suspicion of adultery or immorality—but the attacks are just as often
grounded in petty vengeance. 22 year old Manzoor Attiqa, also from Pakistan,
was attacked by her in-laws when she did not wash the dishes. 13 year old Naila
Farhat had acid thrown in her face by a rejected suitor and his friend, her
science teacher at school. Haseena Husain, from India, had two liters of acid
dumped over her body by her boss when she refused his marriage proposal.
Acid attacks are devastating for individuals, but their effects on communities
and societies are crippling for all women. How can women start businesses when
walking unaccompanied down a road can warrant a random attack by a stranger?
How can they advocate for suffrage, equal rights, or protection from domestic
violence when any dissenter can silence them through violence? How can women
care for their families when access to education or medical care is limited by
fear of reprisal? What will happen to the next generation, when all they see is
lawlessness, violence, fear? What kind of adults will they grow up to be?
The prevalence of acid attacks is a danger to the whole world. In societies
where violence rules, violence will increase and spread beyond those
boundaries. If countries cannot offer the next generation any hope for a future
in which education or industry can lead to a job, a home, and a family, even
the best minds will be transformed by frustration and anger. Only extremist
groups will be able to offer security or upward mobility, and women will
continue to suffer the consequences.
For more information about the most recent attack in Baluchistan, please
see the BBC article here.
For more information about the earlier attack, please see the article in
Pakistani newspaper The News International here.
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