VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN AND CHILDREN
Life Without Violence And Discrimination Against Women And Children Is Not An Utopia
Women and Conflicts
Political instability and war present enormous dangers for women and children. Sexual Violence against women and children is always used as a weapon of vengeance and discrimination, to punish or dehumanize the women. Violence against women doesn't necessarily start with conflicts. Women in peaceful societies often face unimaginable levels of violence at home and in their community.
DOMESTIC VIOLENCE
No Country Is Better Off.
For countless women home is not a safe heaven but a place of terror and fear. Every day, in every country in the world, women and girls are beaten and sexually assaulted by husbands, fathers, and other family members.
According to the American Medical Association, a current or former partner at some point in their lives will abuse more than 12 million American women.
Sexual assault is at an epidemic level in the world, one woman in eight will be a sexual assault victim in her lifetime. Approximately 2 million women are reported as rape victims each year. Sexual assault against children under the age of eighteen happens to one girl in three and one boy in five!
Sexual assault against women is closely associated with the problem of domestic violence and often occurs within the family unit. Domestic violence has been defined as assaultive and coercive behavior that includes physical, sexual, and psychological attacks, as well as economic coercion by adults or adolescents against their intimate partners.
America , Europe, Russia , Africa …
Domestic violence is the major cause of death and disability for European women aged 16 to 44 and accounts for more death and ill-health than cancer or traffic accidents. The Russian government estimates that relatives killed 14,000 women in 1999, yet the country still has no law specifically addressing domestic violence.
In South Africa , more women are shot at home in acts of domestic violence than are shot by strangers on the streets or by intruders.
VIOLENCES AGAINST WOMEN IN THE NEWS
Girl, 16, Flees Home Over Circumcision
Man allegedly bludgeons married sister to death
Symposium in Sanaa on women in Islam
Women Doing Most of the Unpaid Care Work - Research
Court: NYC violating battered women's rights
Punished for Being Mothers
Man gets 13 years for raping domestic helper
Authorities hunt for suspect in connection with woman's murder
Two million maids in Gulf face abuse
LINKS
Girl, 16, Flees Home Over Circumcision - July 20, 2004
A 16-year-old girl, Odion Elizabeth Enahoro, has fled home over plans by her family to have her circumcised. The young girl reportedly ran away from the family's Wire Road residence in Benin City , the Edo State Capital, last March, following plans by her family to have her female genitals removed. Odion, who hails from Udumogwaji village in O-wan-West Local Government Area of the state, City Diary sources said, was scared of what faith awaited her, having lost her immediate elder sister, Mrs. Osarene Okobuwa, in 2002, from complications she suffered after having her genitals removed.
The source said: "She lost a sister to circumcision about a year ago. The lady, who was said to be pregnant, lost so much blood as a result of the crude surgery carried out on her by the village 'experts,' who handled her circumcision."
A member of the family, who was in Lagos last week in search of Odion, said it was part of the village's tradition to see that a girl was circumcised before she qualifies to be delivered of a baby. "Otherwise, the child would be considered as filthy. It is also part of their beliefs that the gods would be angry if the surgery was performed," he said, stating that Odion lost her father, Omoregbe Enahoro, in 1991, when she was barely three years old.Female circumcision, according to the World Health Organization (WH-O), is the partial or total removal of the female genitalia or the cause of other injuries to the female sexual organs, whether for cultural, religious or other non-therapeutic reasons.
Now called Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), the name change was necessary to fully capture the gravity of the damage done to the female reproductive organ after circumcision. FGM is a destructive and invasive procedure that is usually performed on girls before puberty. Age varies from area to area and may even be performed at birth, or on pregnant women, just before their first delivery.
It is one of the many socio-cultural practices affecting the health of woman and children in Nigeria today. Other such practices include early marriage, forced prostitution, involuntary pregnancy, rape, and maltreatment of widows, among others.
According to a recent UNICEF report, the operation is forced on approximately 6,000 girls per day world wide, which means it carried out at about every second.
Due to widespread poverty and lack of medical facilities, the surgery is frequently done under less than hygienic conditions. Anesthesia is rarely used. Razor blades, knife-like instrument barga, were reserved specifically for the purpose.
After each operation, the operator, usually wipes the knife with a piece of cloth. The instruments were only something rinsed in water, and usually not properly sterilized.
Justification for the practice is same all over, essentially meant to terminate or reduce the sexual libido of women so that they will less engage in premarital intercourse or adultery.
Among other reasons usually given also for it were the claim that men prefer circumcised wives because they were considered more likely to be faithful; and that the clitoris is a dangerous organ and must be removed for health reason. They were considered filthy, believing that contact with a new baby or penis with clitoris could lead to death; Bad genital odor, they also believe, can be eliminated by removing the clitoris; arguing that FGM prevents vaginal cancer, that the clitoris holds massive number of nerve endings and generates feelings of sexual arousal when stimulated; that it helps to prevent masturbation and that if FGM was not done, men may not be able to match their wives' sexual drive. Added to that, are such other reasons as family honor, hygiene, prevention of promiscuity, increased sexual pleasure and enhanced fertility.
Man allegedly bludgeons married sister to death – August 08, 2004
AMMAN — The authorities are questioning a man who on Wednesday evening allegedly bludgeoned his married sister to death with an axe, official sources said. The 28-year-old victim received multiple blows on her head inflicted by an axe and an iron bar, allegedly by her older brother at their family's home on Wednesday, one source said.
“The suspect then headed to the nearest police station and turned himself in, claiming to have killed his sister to cleanse his family's honor,” the official source told The Jordan Times on Thursday.
According to the source, the victim reportedly went missing from her husband's house for two weeks. When her older brother, who lives in Amman , discovered she was missing, “he traveled some 20 miles to where his sister resided and when he entered the house he chased her while striking her with the deadly weapons until he made sure she was dead,” the source said. The victim's husband was not at the family house when the incident took place, the source said.
Pathologists Azzam Haddad and Hussein Abul Samen detected several bruises on her back and defense marks on her arms inflicted by the axe. They also concluded in their autopsy that the victim, a mother of two, was not pregnant. The coroners sent blood and tissue samples taken from the victim to the criminal lab for further analysis. The victim became the 12th woman reportedly murdered in the Kingdom this year in a so called “honor crime.”
Mum 'raped by boss of agency' – August 09, 2004
An Indonesian mother-of-two was allegedly raped by the boss of a manpower agency while three other women were in the same house. The 27-year-old woman was yesterday sent to police doctors for medical tests after claiming she was raped at least three times on Saturday. She says she was attacked by the Bahraini owner of a manpower agency that brought her to the country just over a month ago. He was taken in for questioning by the Public Prosecution after she complained to police. He was still in police custody last night. The woman was directed to the authorities after she contacted members of the Bahrain Center for Human Rights (BCHR) Migrant Workers Group (MWG). The man took her and three other girls to clean his house, a MWG volunteer told the GDN. (Golf Daily News). "She says he took her to another part of the house and raped her three or four times. He hurt her quite badly," said the spokesman.
The woman had been working for a family in Bahrain , but was returned to the manpower agency after a few weeks. It is thought the other three women in the house at the time were unaware of what was happening to her. It was only later when somebody from the agency asked if something was wrong that she spoke out. "She did not open her mouth until the secretary asked her what happened," said the MWG volunteer. "That is when she spoke out." She is now in the care of the MWG. The alleged incident was reported to Hoora Police Station.
Symposium in Sanaa on women in Islam - August 22, 2004
Yemen : The women forum for studies and training in Sanaa has recently organized a symposium on the rights of women in Islam. It was one of four similar forums held during 2004, financed by the German establishment for technical cooperation (GTZ).
Four work papers were submitted in the symposium, most of them concentrated on Koranic texts and "prophet's Muhammad's saying "which were misunderstood regarding issues pertinent to women. Other topics concentrated on the possibility of opening the door for further transparency in line with international changes.
The chairperson of the Forum, Souad al-Qudsi, said that the program which started in January this years and continues until its end has completed so far two training course. The first was on the vision of Islam on the rights of women, the second a course on skills, the third was an intellectual symposium on the rights in light of the Koranic texts and the Islamic jurisprudence. Al-Qudsi stressed that the program aims at spreading awareness on the rights of women via a comprehensive Islamic vision and targets women preachers, journalists and lawyers in five Yemeni governorates. On the theme of the last symposium that deals with the rights of women in Islam, al-Qudsi said that there are vast violations against the Yemeni women in a way that contradicts with the rights approved by Islam. She explained that the main of these violations are reflected in the question of equality between the man and the woman regarding rights and duties and also violating women's rights to learning, work and intellectual property.
Women Doing Most of the Unpaid Care Work - Research - August 29, 2004
Women constitute the greatest number of people that do unpaid care work in Zimbabwe , reports tabled at a recent workshop have indicated.
The workshop, which was on research findings on unpaid care work in Zimbabwe , Mozambique and Botswana was organized by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) in conjunction with Women's Action Group. Due to the advent of HIV/Aids, which has seen most countries in Africa adopting the concept of home-based care, participants at the workshop agreed that most of the burden in home-based care fell on women and children's shoulders. At least 18 participants from the region working in the field of gender responsive budgets who attended the workshop said while home-based care lowered the burden on Government by reducing the burden of attendance at health institutions, drugs and treatment, it increased the burden on women.
Besides ensuring that the ailing person is fed and clothed, it is up to women to assure that the patient is given medication and is taken for treatment at the right time. It is also up to the women to make sure the sick person is given the necessary love and is well nursed.
Research conducted in the three countries showed that the trends were similar. However, while Botswana had made some strides to recognize caregivers' efforts by giving them little incentives for use in their programs, this was not the case in Zimbabwe and Mozambique where there was no official recognition of the women's efforts.
In some instances, the women had to look after the sick without protective clothing while others had to leave formal employment in order to care for a sick relative. The workshop, therefore, sought to build the capacity of women's organizations on unpaid care work in order to lobby for policies that promote women's rights. Participants were, at the end of the workshop, able to formulate a strategy to influence policymakers to acknowledge women's contributions and take them into consideration when planning macroeconomic instruments such as the fiscal policy. They said unpaid care work was a major contributory factor to gender inequality and women's poverty.
A follow-up workshop to tackle the problem from a Zimbabwean context has been scheduled for next week. It will see women's groups coming up with a document to use in lobbying policy makers in the country to recognize care work.
In 2002 UNIFEM, commissioned a guidebook on unpaid care work for the Southern African region called "Why should we care about unpaid care work?" The objective for commissioning the guidebook was to move beyond statements about the importance of unpaid care work and to initiate research, which could then be the basis for advocacy around ways of lessening the burden of unpaid care work. Participants at the guidebook workshop in 2003, which was attended by government and non-government representatives from the three countries, all confirmed the importance of the home-based care and took the first steps in discussing what a multi-country research project would look like.
Court: NYC violating battered women's rights - October 28, 2004
Albany -- Women should not lose custody of their children solely because they are allowing the youngsters to witness them being battered by abusive spouses, the state's highest court ruled Tuesday.
The Court of Appeals said the removal policy of New York City 's Administration for Children's Services in domestic violence cases was prohibited by state laws, which require courts and child welfare officials to weigh several other factors when determining whether to seek to remove children from violent households.
"Exposing a child to domestic violence is not presumptively neglectful," the court said in a 7-0 decision written by Chief Judge Judith Kaye. "Not every child exposed to domestic violence is at risk of impairment. ... In many instances removal may do more harm to the child than good." The decision is in line with a 2002 ruling by a federal Judge Jack Weinstein in Brooklyn . He found that to routinely take children out of homes where their mothers were being battered is "in effect visiting upon them the sins of their mother's batterer." The city appealed Weinstein's ruling to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, and the state court Tuesday was answering questions posed by the federal appeals court about exactly what New York laws say about removing children from households due to domestic violence. The case involved three women who sued the city over its child removal policies. Several groups, including the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence and the National Network to End Domestic Violence, filed friend-of-the-court briefs in the case seeking to strengthen the custody rights of battered women.
Punished for Being Mothers - September 01, 2004
New Vision by Alice Emasu: TEN policewomen, eight expecting and two breast-feeding were recently discontinued from Masindi Police Training School . They were participating in a three-month promotional course that would elevate their status to the ranks of corporals and sergeants. They had completed one-month training. Only 28 women out of the 124 officers reported for the training.
The dismissal was disheartening. Pregnancy here is no right. Policewomen grind with bitterness in silence, lest the bosses hear. Human rights activists, the media and well wishers should not know. "Madam, I beg you not to disclose our names or else we shall be charged and dismissed from service. We've decided to confide in the press to fight suppression and discrimination against women officers in the police force," says one of the victims. Recently, a notice was passed informing pregnant or breast-feeding women not to report for similar police courses.
Police promotional courses come once in a blue moon. Besides, it is not easy for women officers to get a chance to attend them. "To qualify, one should have worked for five years and above without any disciplinary criminal record," says a victim, adding that, with the new changes, it would be very difficult for police women in the reproductive age bracket to either get promotions or give birth.
Most of the victims, who were in tears at the time of the interview expressed disappointment at the decision to discontinue them on the basis of pregnancy and breast-feeding alleging that they had been postponing pregnancy in anticipation for promotions. They also criticized the Police for not giving them prior notice to that effect. "After completing the first month, which is the most hectic time because it involves physical exercises like parade, they just woke up one day and asked us to quit training the following morning," interjects another victim. They argue that the manner in which the dismissal was communicated to them was barbaric, rude and belittling. A one-page dismissal letter, which the Women's Vision saw, read in part: "This is to inform you that, the Inspector General of Police has discontinued you from the ongoing course. Your discontinuation is as a result of being pregnant and unable to attend training programs, the compulsion, of which would put your health and that of the unborn child at a higher risk."
Most of the letters, which the Women's Vision saw are signed by Felix Kaweesi, the assistant superintendent of police on behalf of the commandant of the school. The directives, however, assure the officers that their recommendations remain valid for subsequent similar courses. But the worry is: when do the two years of pregnancy and lactation end?
"We're young-married-women and our bosses know it. They also know how long and cumbersome the procedures are to process these applications yet radical decisions are taken without consultations with senior women leaders in the force," said another victim.
The approach is new in the Police. Most senior female officers interviewed were ignorant of the decision. They openly admitted it would be an uphill task for them to push forward the matter in this male-dominated force if they were excluded in the first place.
In the past, policewomen carried babies and pregnancies to school. The police, however, insist that it is not of their making to violate any of their officers' rights, more so rights of the females, when the country is in the wake of agitating for women's rights.
Police spokesman Asuman Mugenyi heaps the blame on the police's daily dwindling resources. "We took that stand after one of those officers delivered under very difficult circumstances that could have caused loss of her life and that of the baby." "Previously when promotional courses used to be conducted in Kibuli Police training school, Kampala , where we had midwives and facilities like separate rooms for expectant mothers and ambulances, pregnant women that qualified for this courses benefited," Mugenyi explains. He adds that in Masindi, where they moved sometime back, such facilities are not there. "So a repeat of such an experience would reflect negligence in police management. We also fear that in case of death, the victims' relatives could easily sue the police," Mugenyi says. The training school is one-and-half miles from Masindi hospital. The hospital is one of the government hospitals with maternity facilities including a theatre.
Mugenyi admits the decision is radical and that it will never go down well not only with female officers but even their male compatriots. About denial of pregnant officers right to study, he observes that the courses come along with ranks so to discontinue one means a great loss in their career.
Police remains a less attractive field for women. The matter compounds itself with inadequate facilitation the force has had, which has led to stigma over corruption tendencies. Above all, the institution is only waking up to embrace gender sensitivity due to the women emancipation call sweeping across the globe. The Police standing order, which required every woman intending to get married to apply through the top management, barred many women graduates from joining forces. Women enrolment into the force remains minimal. In 1962, only one woman ventured. A handful then followed after the fall of Idi Amin's regime. Very few university female graduates today give it a second thought. Most of them call it a waste of time and the few that enroll for cadet courses want to be assured of top positions.
According to Mugenyi, police is doing all that is possible to attract women into the force by for instance encouraging female applicants, whenever they are advertising vacancies. Besides, he says with the 1995 Constitution, police no longer refers to the standing order."
The Convention on Elimination of all forms of Discrimination Against Women says: "Discrimination against women violates the principles of equality and respect... and is an obstacle to the participation of women, on equal terms with men..."
Man gets 13 years for raping domestic helper - September 01, 2004
AMMAN — A 47-year-old Arab national was sentenced to 13 years in prison in absentia after being convicted of raping his domestic helper in his apartment in June 2004. The defendant received 10 years for raping the woman and an additional three years because he sexually assaulted his employee. “The court decided to give him the highest punishment because he assaulted a woman who worked for him and this is stipulated in the penal code,” a judicial source said. The man left the Kingdom shortly after the 30-year-old victim filed a complaint against him, according to court papers. “The sentence is not final and the defendant is entitled to a second trial if he turns himself in,” the judicial source told The Jordan Times. Court papers said the victim worked for the defendant as a domestic helper, cleaning his furnished apartment. The defendant attempted to sexually harass the woman on several occasions but she always rejected his attempts, the court said. On the day of the incident, the court added, the defendant entered the victim's room and assaulted her sexually by force. The woman headed to the nearest police station and filed a complaint against him, the court said.
Authorities hunt for suspect in connection with woman's murder - September 05, 2004
AMMAN — Irbid authorities are searching for a man whom they suspect of stabbing and killing his married sister at her husband's house, official sources said. The victim, who was not identified by officials, received at least 12 stab wounds on her neck, chest and stomach, one official source said. “The woman was found on her bed with the murder weapon near her bed,” the source told The Jordan Times on Saturday. The victim's husband was not home at the time of the incident, the source said. “Officials are currently searching for her older brother who disappeared shortly after the victim's body was discovered,” the source said. The source added that officials suspect the woman was killed “in the name of family honor because her brother was always monitoring her movements and often argued with her about her behavior.”
A postmortem conducted on Saturday at Irbid's National Institute of Forensic Medicine did not find any signs of struggle on the victim's body, the source added. The source said the victim's husband is refusing to claim his wife's body from the morgue. “It seems that the man is sad about his wife's death and is refusing to claim her body until the authorities capture the killer,” the source said. If investigations reveal the woman was killed for reasons of family honor, she will be the 13th person reportedly murdered in the Kingdom in a so-called honor crime since the beginning of this year.
Two million maids in Gulf face abuse - October 20, 2004
KUWAIT CITY: More than two million Asian maids working in the Gulf without proper legal cover face various forms of maltreatment, including sexual abuse and non-payment of salary, according to an official study.
The study, reviewed by GCC labor and social affairs ministers who met in Kuwait last week, also outlined the negative effects of the huge number of foreign domestic helpers on Gulf societies.
It was prepared by a joint body on the basis of official data supplied by GCC states.
In the UAE and Kuwait , there is one domestic helper for every two citizens, while in Saudi Arabia , Oman and Bahrain there is one domestic helper for each family on average, it said.
Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women
G.A. res. 34/180, 34 U.N. GAOR Supp. (No. 46) at 193, U.N. Doc. A/34/46, entered into force Sept. 3, 1981
LINKS
http://www.amnesty.org/campaign/index.html
Department of Justice Violence Against Women Site
National Domestic Violence Hotline
National Coalition Against Domestic Violence
The Center for the Prevention of Sexual and Domestic Violence
Jordan : Petra News Agency , AL BAWABA , Jordan Times
Egypt : Middle East News Agency , Egypt Daily , Africa News Egypt
Algeria : Agence Algerienne , Algeria Watch , Algeria Interface
Bahrain : Bahrain Tribune , Daily news
Iraq : Iraqi News Agency , Iraq Foundation , Iraq Net
Kuwait : Kuwaiti Press Agency , Kuwait Times , Al Seyassah
Lebanon : National News Agency , Daily Star , Lebanese News
Libya : Libya News & Views , Libyan Affairs , Africa News Lybia
Mauritania: Africa News Wire , Economiques et Financieres
Morocco : Morocco Today , Maghreb Arab Press , Africa News Morocco
Oman : Oman News Agency , Oman Observer , Times of Oman
Palestine : Wafa News Agency , Palestine Info Center , Palestine Times
Qatar : Gulf Times , Al Sharq , AL Watan , Al Raya
Saudi Arabia : Islamic News Agency , KSA Today , All Saudi
Somalia : Al Muakhat , Almuakhat
Sudan : Sudan News Agency , Africa News Wire , Alwan , Akhbar Al Yom
Syria : Syrian Arab News Agency , Syria Times , Syria Daily
Tunisia : Tunisia Online News Updates , Akhbar Tunisia , Al Horria
UAE: Dubainews , Emirates Today , Khaleej Times , Gulf News
Yemen : Yemen News Agency , Al Gumhuryah , Yemen Network
Immigration: Ajeeb , Al Quds Al Arabi - UK , Arabia , Elaph , Moheet