WUNRN
UN Commission on the Status of Women Session 59 - Panel
WITCHCRAFT ACCUSATIONS - VIOLENCE & TORTURE
UN Commission
on the Status of Women Session 59 – Panel
WITCHCRAFT
ACCUSATIONS - VIOLENCE & TORTURE
WITCHCRAFT ACCUSATIONS – WOMEN & GIRLS WITH DISABILITIES
Statement:
Accusations of ‘Witchcraft’ – Women & Girls with Disabilities
by Stephanie
Ortoleva, Esq., President and Founder, Women
Enabled International
President@WomenEnabled.org - www.WomenEnabled.org
UN Commission
on the Status of Women 59 Panel on Witchcraft Accusations
As we discuss
the impact of accusations of ‘witchcraft and violence against women and girls,
I implore you to include our forgotten sisters, women and girls with
disabilities. We are women too!
The 2012 report
of Rashida Manjoo, UN Special rapporteur on Violence Against Women, focused on
gender-related killings of women and pointedly states: “Rather than a new
form of violence, gender-related killings are the extreme manifestation of
existing forms of violence against women. Culturally and socially
embedded, these manifestations continue to be accepted, tolerated or justified
— with impunity as the norm.” Additionally, in her 2011 Report Ms. Manjoo
highlighted the impact of the multiple and intersecting dimensions of women’s
lives on violence and discrimination.
Caution is
required, as some parties have been referencing "traditional values"
to justify harmful practices and thereby legitimize violations of women's human
rights. This undermines the
fundamental principle of universality of human rights through promoting
cultural relativity. On the other hand, some traditional
values may be vehicles for promoting and implementing human rights. For
example, dignity, sometimes described as a “traditional value,” is also a
concept in human rights law, defining dignity as an inherent aspect of being
human, directly linked with equality and respect. These concepts are
intrinsic to the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination
Against Women and also the Convention on the Rights of Persons with
Disabilities, as dignity is linked to autonomy
as a core principle. Furthermore, when such acts of violence arise in the
private sphere, governments also have a due diligence obligation to protect
women and girls subjected to accusations of witchcraft-based violence.
Many human rights violations, justified by
traditional, cultural or religious values, are targeted against minority or
disenfranchised groups, including women and girls with disabilities. In light of the myriad impacts of some
traditional myths and cultural views of disability, combined with attitudes
toward women in general, women and girls with disabilities are in a double
bind. These linkages must be addressed from a gender-sensitive,
disability-inclusive approach.
The notion that
disability is a “curse” and that people with disabilities are “possessed” or
“evil” and the societal views of women as “witches” or “demonic,” persists
today, with origins dating from 1485 and earlier and these violations are found
in all countries. Murder of women and girls with disabilities as witches
is highlighted as a human rights violation by Philip Alston, Former UN Special
rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions in his 2009
Report. The medieval notion that one can identify a “witch” by the fact
that her offspring are children with disabilities still persists.
Further, having an offspring with a disability is seen as a curse on the woman
herself for some wrongdoing or breach of a societal taboo.
Women
and girls who challenge accepted socio-cultural norms, traditions, perceptions
and stereotypes about femininity and the role, behavior and status of women and
girls in society are often labeled with psychosocial disabilities. As a
mechanism of control, they frequently are subjected to forced psychiatric
interventions and treatment that are harmful and deprive them of legal capacity
and autonomy, resulting in the erasure of personhood.
Professor Nora
Groce focuses on the persistent misguided myth that sex with a woman or girl
with a disability, because of the assumption that she is a virgin, can
cure HIV/AIDS, resulting in rapes of women and girls with disabilities and
increased risk of HIV-infection and unwanted pregnancy. Special
Rapporteur Alston notes that women
and children with albinism are hunted and killed based on superstitious beliefs
that their skin or body parts transmit magical powers which bring good health or
prosperity. In other cases, they are killed based on the belief that they
are evil or cursed. Recently, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad
Al Hussein expressed outrage that over the past six months
at least 15 people with albinismwere
kidnapped, woundedor killed. Of the 15 cases highlighted.
Other
violations also cross borders and cultures based on traditional values
regarding the value of the lives of women and girls with disabilities.
Neglect, through starvation or ill-treatment often results in severe injury,
health impacts and sometimes even death. Parents may refuse to register
the births of girls with disabilities or, even worse, kill them because of the
family’s view that it lacks the capacity or willingness to nurture,
support and care for a girl child who they and the community consider useless
and a burden.
Forced
sterilization and imposed contraception and abortion are based on cultural
attitudes about the value of the lives of women and girls with disabilities, as
well as their right to self-determination, are often sought by parents or
guardians and with the support of the legal system. Australia was called
to task for sanctioning such practices by both the CEDAW Committee and the
Human rights Council, Columbia also has been cited by the CEDAW Committee for
violations based on forced sterilization and France was sued by five women
before the European Court of Human Rights.
Accusations of
witchcraft generally ae hurled at women by men who label women as witches in
order to assert their patriarchal power over women and children. Interestingly,
under the medical model view of disability, disability is something to be
“cured” and similarly, action taken against those accused of witchcraft often
is also taken to allegedly “cure” them of the evil spirits which allegedly
possess them. Researcher Eleanor Ann Nwadinobi notes that the harmful practices
and alleged treatments imposed on those accused of witchcraft or saucery are an
extreme example of violations of the Right to Health as enumerated in the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Covenant on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, among other international instruments.
Additionally,
in some areas, illness and disability are seen as a curse of a witch, thus
justifying killing of the alleged witch whose curse caused the illness or
disability. Of course, often the physical and psychological harm of
accusations of witchcraft can exacerbate existing disabilities and result in
new disabilities among women and girls.
Women and girls
with disabilities, like all women and girls, are subjected to harmful practices
such as female genital mutilation, forced marriage, and rape
(including rape by a spouse. Forced marriage in the context of disability
is based on misguided ideas that the daughter with a disability will need
someone to care for and financially support her or that if she does not marry,
her siblings will not be viewed as eligible for marriage by the community or
the young woman with a disability is forced to marry a man who has “disgraced
family honor.” Women
and girls with disabilities are subjected to gender-specific and
disability-specific harmful traditional practices, and therefore are more
discriminated against, violated, marginalized and exploited.
The role of
human rights education, focusing on core human rights principles and
traditional values that coincide with those principles is an important tool for
change. States are responsible for taking systematic
action to modify or eliminate stereotypes and negative, harmful and
discriminatory practices justified by traditional values. Both approaches
are required under the CEDAW and the CRPD. The basic absence of data on
accusations of witchcraft and resultant harm to women and girls with
disabilities must be remedied with accurate and disability and
gender-desegregated data. Additionally, to ensure that the rights of
women and girls with disabilities are included as we embark on this discussion,
the international women’s rights movement must include our sisters with
disabilities in analysis and advocacy. If you would like to explore these
ideas further, please contact me at President@WomenEnabled.org.
Resources:
Stephanie
Ortoleva & Hope Lewis: “Forgotten Sisters - A Report on Violence against
Women with Disabilities: & Overview of Its Nature, Scope, Causes
& Consequences,” available at: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2133332.
Rashida Manjoo, Special Rapporteur on
Violence Against Women, Report of the Special Rapporteur on Violence Against
Women, Its Causes and Consequences, Report on Violence Against Women with
Disabilities, U.N. Doc. A/67/227 (August 3, 2012), available at: http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A%2F67%2F227+&Submit=Search&Lang=E
Rashida Manjoo, UN Special Rapporteur on Violence Against
Women, Report to the Human Rights Council: Gender-Related Killings of Women, 23
May 2012, A/HRC/20/16,
available
at:
http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Issues/Women/A.HRC.20.16_En.pdf
Rashida
Manjoo, Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women, Report of the Special
Rapporteur on Violence against Women, its Causes and Consequences, (considering
multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination) U.N. Doc. A/HRC/17/26 (May
2, 2011), available at:
http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrcouncil/docs/17session/A-HRC-17-26.pdf
Philip Alston,
UN Special Rapporteur on extrajudicial, summary or arbitrary executions, REPORT TO THE Human
Rights council, 27 May 2009, A/HRC/11/2 27, available at: http://www2.ohchr.org/english/bodies/hrcouncil/docs/.../A.HRC.11.2.pdf.
Human
Rights Council resolution
A-HRC-23-L.25 on attacks and discrimination against persons with albinism,
available at: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Bs-yQ6Rh1ujxnYsNg92DKZdt4P0lL1yZxjL_34du544/edit?pli=1 .
U.N.
High Commissioner for Human Rights, Women’s Rights and Gender Section, Responses
to the Note Verbale on Human Rights Council Resolution 17/11: "Violence
against women and girls and disability,”
http://www2.ohchr.org/english/issues/women/docs/A.HRC.20.5.pdf.
UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein expressed revulsion at a recent surge in violent attacks against people with albinism in several East African countries, Press Release, March 10, 2015, http://www.ohchr.org/EN/NewsEvents/Pages/DisplayNews.aspx?NewsID=15673&LangID=E.
Convention on
the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, G.A. Res. 34/180,
U.N. Doc. A/RES/34/180 (Dec. 18, 1979), available at http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/3ae6b3970.html.
Convention on
the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, G.A. Res. 61/106, U.N. Doc.
A/RES/61/106 (Dec. 13, 2006), available at
http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/45f973632.html.
David W. Anderson, Ed.D., Human Rights and Persons with Disabilities in Developing Nations of Africa, 2004, http://www4.samford.edu/lillyhumanrights/papers/Anderson_Human.pdf
Forced Marriage and Learning Disabilities:
Multi-Agency Practice Guidelines, (December 2010) p. 6, available at: http://www.fco.gov.uk/resources/en/pdf/travel-living-abroad/when-things-go-wrong/fm-disability-guidelines.
Eleanor Ann
Nwadinobi, “Harmful Cultural Practices in the Context of the Right to
Health: The Case of Child Witchcraft Accusations in Akwa Ibom State of
Nigeria”, AfricaAfricAgenda Limited (2011).
Gary Foxcroft,
Hunting Witches, World Policy Journal (Spring 2014), available at: http://www.wunrn.com/pdf/witchcraft2.pdf.
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