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Female Genital Mutilation: Over 3 Million Women & Girls at Risk
Some three million women and girls
worldwide face Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting (FGM/C) each year, that is
about 8000 girls a day. An estimated 140 million have already been subjected to
this practice.
FGM/C has been termed as one of the most widespread and
systematic violations of the universal human right to personal integrity,
committed against millions of women and girls worldwide, abusing their physical
and psychological integrity and damaging their lives irreversibly.
During a panel discussion which was held on the periphery of
the latest session of the Human Rights Council titled “Harmful Traditional
practices, rhetoric or reality” and organized by the NGO/Commission on the
Status of Women (CSW) and WUNRN (Women’s UN Report Network) with UN Human
Rights Office as a participant, the speakers stated that FGM/C is a harmful
traditional practice not based on any religious, medical, or social premise.
The practice is a reproductive health concern and a human rights violation. It
is an affront to human dignity, gross violation of fundamental human rights,
the geographic reach of which extends well beyond those countries that have
been historically considered to be its bastions.
The panel included Isha Dyfan, Chief of the Women Rights and
Gender Section in the UN Human Rights Office; the other speakers were Nyaradzai
Gumbonzvanda, President of CSW and General Secretary of World Young Women
Christian Association (YWCA), Manon Boisclair from Canada Mission, SR VAW, SR
Health, SR Cultural Rights, Lois Herman from WUNRN and a representative from
CRC-CEDAW.
Dyfan emphasized that harmful traditional practice persists
in environments where there are unequal gender structures and where women and
girls have unequal access to education, wealth, health and employment. In this
regard, harmful traditional practices are both as an act of violence and a form
of discrimination.
The UN Human Rights Office guided by information gathered by
field presences in 60 countries, has not shied away from speaking out on
harmful traditional practices. The UN Deputy High Commissioner for Human
Rights, Kyung wha-Kang, during her mission to
UN Human Rights Office is a member of the UN Population
Fund-UNICEF Joint Programme entitled “Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting:
Accelerating Change.” The Programme brings together UN
agencies and countries where it is still being practised and to support the
operationalization of a common coordinated approach to address this human
rights violation. The Programme objective is to contribute to a 40 per
cent reduction of the practice among girls aged 0-15 years, with at least one
country declared free of FGM/C by the end of 2012.
During the 54th meeting of the UN Commission on the Status
of Women, a resolution urged member States to end FGM/C, to among other things,
enact and enforce legislation to prohibit the practice, develop social and
psychological support services and care, and take measures to improve health in
order to assist women and girls subjected to this type of violence.
The Human Rights Council also adopted a resolution on
accelerating efforts to eliminate all forms of violence against women and FGM/C
as one of the issue. The resolution calls for the provision of visible and
sustained leadership at the highest level to prevent all forms of violence
against women. It also calls for mobilisation of support from various sectors
to enhance the campaign. Most of the member States are party to the Convention
on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) and the
Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC).
According to Article 24 of the CRC, “States parties shall
take all effective and appropriate measures with a view to abolishing
traditional practices prejudicial to the health of children.” Similarly,
Article 5 of CEDAW requests governments to abolish traditions and practices
that are discriminatory to women and girls and to modify social and cultural
practices based on the notion of female inferiority. In addition, the United
Nations CEDAW Committee issued a general recommendation No 14 “Female
Circumcision-FGM-Female Genital Mutilation” during the ninth session in 1990,
and called on States parties to “take appropriate and effective measures with a
view to eradicating the practice of female
circumcision.”
“Ending harmful traditional practices against women and
girls requires a comprehensive approach which includes action both in the
public and private sphere”, Isha Dyfan underscored. It is the primary duty of
families to protect children from violence and to refrain from engaging in violent
acts. States have primary legal obligation to create the framework and
conditions in society which protects women and girls from violence and for the
elimination of discrimination against women and girls. The State is accountable
for passing legislation and adopting policies (including plans of action) to
end harmful traditional policies, and for enforcing such legislation and
implementing policies, she further added.
There is an urgent need to raise awareness, support victims
and to protect women and girls who are at risk, by involving all sectors and
levels of society, she said.
2 September 2012