Today’s Good News: Progress in Ending Female Genital Mutilation
The UN’s Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) is meeting now through March 7, and a new report to be discussed there shows real progress in ending female genital mutilation (FGM), which happens both in its home turf of Africa, Asia and the Middle East, and in immigrant communities worldwide.
Common Dreams and IPS brought this important story to my attention. According to the UN study, about 3 million women every year undergo this mutilation. It not only destroys their sexual response, but causes problems with childbirth, and is a violation of basic human rights.
Some highlights:
- The U.N. Population Fund (UNFPA), which has taken an active role against FGM, has been promoting culturally sensitive programming to address the underlying social values of the practice. Both UNFPA and the U.N. children’s agency UNICEF have launched a 44 million dollar programme to reduce the harmful effects of FGM by 40 percent by 2015 “and to end it within a generation.†The new initiative encourages communities in 16 African nations to abandon the practice.
- AFRICA/MIDDLE EAST: A number of African countries — including Ghana, Uganda, Morocco and Eritrea — have criminalised FGM in their penal codes or through other laws. 11 states in Nigeria have adopted legislation against some “harmful traditional practices, including female genital mutilation.†Egypt and Yemen have also taken steps to curb the practice within their health-care systems, banning health-care professionals from performing it.
- Worldwide: In Austria, FGM is considered a form of physical assault to which a person cannot give consent. Similarly, Swedish legislation prohibits the practice regardless of the consent of the victim or her parents. In Germany, the consent of the parents is considered as an abuse of parental custody. In Finland and the Netherlands, health care professionals have been obligated to report cases involving FGM. In Canada, forced FGM is considered gender-related persecution and grounds for refugee status. Although Austria and Spain do not list FGM explicitly as a ground for asylum, both countries recognise it in practice.
- UNFPA has a broad program for addressing the problem, funding and implementing culturally sensitive programmes for abandoning the practice, advocating legal and policy reforms, while building national capacity to stop all forms of FGM, he said. They support treatment and care for women and girls suffering from its immediate or long-term complications. And here’s a key action item: They work on providing women, who do the cutting, with new skills that allow them to generate income in a better way.
- UNFPA has formed partnerships with relevant stakeholders, including government ministries, particularly ministries of health, social affairs, finance, gender, youth and education. UNFPA has also developed ties to NGOs, safe motherhood projects, community and faith-based organizations and religious leaders.
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