One-day Conference to Focus on Dangerous Practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM)

November 9, 2010
PRLog


Nov 08, 2010 – The disturbing and emotive issue of female genital mutilation (FGM) is the subject of a one day conference being held at Coventry University on Wednesday 10 November. 

It has been organised by REPLACE FGM, an EU Daphne III funded research project being led by Coventry University which is investigating the psycho-social factors responsible for the continued practice of this traditional harmful practice amongst migrant communities in the EU. 

For many years, non government organisations (NGOs) and campaigners have engaged with practicing communities in Africa and African migrants in the EU to try to eradicate this practice. In addition, they have been raising awareness among health practitioners within the EU. 

A number of papers delivered by guest speakers on the day will address the various medical aspects relating to FGM and the scenarios that medical practitioners have to deal with when assisting women who have experienced FGM. 

Professor Hazel Barrett, Associate Dean of the Faculty of Business, Environment and Society at Coventry University, leads the work of the REPLACE team. 

She said: 

“Although the practice of FGM is largely conducted by women towards other women, we should not forget the role of men and their relationship to this practice. 

“Research conducted within Africa and the EU suggests that most men consider FGM to be a ‘women’s issue’ that does not concern them. 

“However the project partners of REPLACE believe that engaging and working with men is vital if we are going to end FGM and we are delighted that a number of speakers will be addressing this issue in their presentations.” 

Within the past two decades, a number of EU member states have passed legislation addressing the issue of FGM/C. In the UK there has not been one conviction for FGM even though legislation has been in place since 2003. 

Professor Barrett added: 

“With convictions being extremely low within the EU, you have to question the role and effectiveness of this legislation. Therefore, I am delighted that a number of papers being presented at the conference will discuss the complexities of convicting  those who practice FGM.” 

As well as Professor Barrett, the project partners of REPLACE FGM at Coventry University are Dr. Katherine Brown, a senior lecturer in Psychology and Dr David Beecham, a postdoctoral research assistant. 

Participating organisations at the conference include: Forward UK, Federation of the Somali Associations in the Netherlands (FSAN) and the West Midlands European Service. 

Note: 

Launched in April 2010, REPLACE FGM was selected from amongst hundreds of applications to develop a highly innovative approach to tackling FGM.  REPLACE is being led by Professor Hazel Barrett, Associate Dean within the Faculty of Business, Environment and Society at Coventry University with a multidisciplinary team including a health psychologist and sociologist. 

Coventry University has significant academic expertise in the methodologies that are being employed within the project and in utilising psychosocial approaches to facilitate behavioural change. 

Their experience extends to working with FGM practicing communities and engaging with hard-to-reach groups on sensitive issues.

British girls undergo horror of genital mutilation despite tough laws

Female circumcision will be inflicted on up to 2,000 British schoolgirls during the summer holidays – leaving brutal physical and emotional scars. Yet there have been no prosecutions against the practice.

July, 25, 2010
Tracy McVeigh and Tara Sutton-The Observer

Like any 12-year-old, Jamelia was excited at the prospect of a plane journey and a long summer holiday in the sun. An avid reader, she had filled her suitcases with books and was reading Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban when her mother came for her. "She said, 'You know it's going to be today?' I didn't know exactly what it would entail but I knew something was going to be cut. I was made to believe it was genuinely part of our religion."


She went on: "I came to the living room and there were loads of women. I later found out it was to hold me down, they bring lots of women to hold the girl down. I thought I was going to be brave so I didn't really need that. I just lay down and I remember looking at the ceiling and staring at the fan.
"I don't remember screaming, I remember the ridiculous amount of pain, I remember the blood everywhere, one of the maids, I actually saw her pick up the bit of flesh that they cut away 'cause she was mopping up the blood. There was blood everywhere."
Some 500 to 2,000 British schoolgirls will be genitally mutilated over the summer holidays. Some will be taken abroad, others will be "cut" or circumcised and sewn closed here in the UK by women already living here or who are flown in and brought to "cutting parties" for a few girls at a time in a cost-saving exercise.
Then the girls will return to their schools and try to get on with their lives, scarred mentally and physically by female genital mutilation (FGM), a practice that serves as a social and cultural bonding exercise and, among those who are stitched up, to ensure that chastity can be proved to a future husband.
Even girls who suffer less extreme forms of FGM are unlikely to be promiscuous. One study among Egyptian women found 50% of women who had undergone FGM "endured" rather than enjoyed sex.

Cleanliness, neatness of appearance and the increased sexual pleasure for the man are all motivations for the practice. But the desire to conform to tradition is the most powerful motive. The rite of passage, condemned by many Islamic scholars, predates both the Koran and the Bible and possibly even Judaism, appearing in the 2nd century BC.

Although unable to give consent, many girls are compliant when they have the prodecure carried out, believing they will be outcasts if they are not cut. The mothers believe they are doing the best for their daughters. Few have any idea of the lifetime of hurt it can involve or the medical implications.

Jamelia, now 20, who says her whole personality changed afterwards."I felt a lot older. It was odd because nobody says this is a secret, keep your mouth shut but that's the message you get loud and clear." She stopped the sports and swimming she used to love and became "strangely disconnected with her own body". Other girls have died, of shock or blood loss; some have picked up infections from dirty tools. Jamelia's mother paid extra for the woman to use a clean razor. It is thought that in the UK there are one or two doctors who can be bribed by the very rich to to carry out FGM using anaesthetic and sterilised instruments.

Comfort Momoh works at Guy's and St Thomas' Hospital in London, in one of the 16 clinics up and down the country who deal with FGM and its health repercusssions. Women who have had much of their external genitalia sliced off and their vaginas stitched closed, but for a tiny hole, also come to be cut open in order to give birth.

There are four types of female circumcision identified by the World Health Organisation, ranging from partial to total removal of the external female genitalia. Some 140 million women worldwide have been subjected to FGM and an estimated further two million are at risk every year. Most live in 28 African countries while others are in Yemen, Kurdistan, the US, Saudi Arabia, Australia and Canada.

The UK Prohibition of Female Circumcision Act 1985 makes it an offence to carry out FGM or to aid, abet or procure the service of another person. The Female Genital Mutilation Act 2003, makes it against the law for FGM to be performed anywhere in the world on UK permanent residents of any age and carries a maximum sentence of 14 years imprisonment. To date, no prosecutions have been made under UK legislation.
"Obviously in summer we get really anxious. All activists and professionals working around FGM get anxious because this is the time that families take their children back home. This is the time when all the professionals need to be really alert," said Momoh.

"There is no hard evidence in figures about what is happening in the UK because it's a hush-hush thing. It's only now that a few people are beginning to talk about it, which is good because change will only come from within and the numbers coming forward are rising. But there is a lot of family pressure. When I first started in 1997 we had two clinics in the country, now we have 16."
One woman told the Observer how a midwife examining her had raced retching and crying from the room. She had no idea she was "abnormal" before that happened. There is a clear need for women who have suffered FGM to be able to visit health professionals who understand what has happened to them. Momoh said that for those who wanted it, some surgical reversal work could sometimes be done on women with the most severe FGM procedure, Type III. For those with other types, counselling and support is all that can offered.

"Periods are agony – you get a lot of women who are determined to have reversals while they are having their period but then when the pain has stopped they lose their nerve again," said Leyla Hussein, 29, who has had to have years of counselling to cope with her own anger and distress at what was done to her as a child. It has helped her forgive her own mother's complicity in the mutilation she endured, though the older woman could not understand why Hussein would not have her own child, now aged seven, cut. But Hussein has vowed that she will be the last generation of women in her family to suffer.
"It was my husband who said on our honeymoon, 'We are not going to do this thing to any child of ours.' I was quite shocked, I hadn't questioned it. But I now realise a lot of men are not in favour of FGM, not when you tell them the woman is not going to enjoy herself."
Hussein is among a slowly but steadily growing band of women who have reacted against what happened to them with courage and a determination to stamp out FGM. Hussein has run support and discussion groups for affected women and for men, and formerly worked at the African Well Women's Centre in Leyton, east London.
"I can really relate to some of the women who are very angry, but how do you blame your mother, who loves you yet planned this for you? There is a lot of anger and resentment. Many women blame themselves and of course there are flashbacks to deal with. I had blackouts – anytime I had to have a smear test, I would pass out because lying in that position brought it back to me, but the nurse is used to me now and allows a little more time with the appointment."
"The new generation, born and raised here in Britain, they are used to expressing their views and it will be a lot harder to shut them up. Last month was the first ever march against FGM [in Bristol where 15 to 16 mothers protested] and that is a sign of something new."
Asha-Kin Duale is a community partnership adviser in Camden, London. She talks to schools and to families about safeguarding children. "Culture has positive and negative issues for every immigrant community. We value some traditions, and most are largely good.
"FGM is not confined to African countries. It has no basis in Christianity, it has no basis in Islam; none of Muhammad's daughters had it done. For some parents it is enough to let them know that and they will drop it completely. Everyone needs to understand that every child, no matter what the background or creed, is protected by this law in this land."
She said there needed to be an understanding of why FGM took place, although that was not the same as accepting that the practice had a cultural justification.

"FGM has a social function and until this is understood by social services and other bodies they will never stop it. It is a power negotiation mechanism, that women use to ensure respect from men. It prevents rape of daughters and is a social tool to allow women to regain some power in patriarchal societies. With girls living in the UK there is no need to gain the power – it has to be understood that girls can be good girls without FGM."
For Jason Morgan, a detective constable in the Met's FGM unit, Project Azure, the solution lies with those girls themselves: "Empowering youth, giving them the information, is the way forward. They are coming from predominantly caring and loving families, who genuinely believe this is the right thing to do. Many are under a great deal of pressure from the extended families.
"Sometimes it might be as simple as delivering the message of what the legal position is; sometimes we even give them an official letter, a document that they can show to the extended family that states quite firmly what will happen if the procedure goes ahead. The focus has to be on prevention."

Project Azure made 38 interventions in 2008, 59 in 2009 and 25 so far this year. For Morgan those statistics are just as important as getting a conviction. "We know it happens here although we have no official statistics, but we have seen very successful partnerships and we don't want to alienate communities through heavy-handed tactics.

"While a prosecution would send out a very clear message to practising communities, really it is very difficult and you would be relying on medical evidence, and in turn that would all hinge or whether the child consents to an examination."
But Naana Otoo-Oyortey is not so content with the softly-softly approach: "We have anecdotal evidence that it is being done here. So someone is not doing their job: it's an indication that the government has been failing to protect children. The commitment is hollow."
Head of the leading anti-FGM charity Forward UK, Otoo-Oyortey said people value the FGM tradition as something which holds a community together and gives it structure. "It's seen as a party, a cutting party because it's a celebration – people expect it as a way of welcoming a girl. A lot of women will mention to us that there have been no prosecutions here so why do we worry about the law? At the end of the day who will know?

"And we cannot just blame the women as the men are silently supporting it by paying for it. The new government's lack of a position on FGM is very worrying. We don't know what they will do, but we do know that the summer holidays are here again and we will be left to pick up the pieces in a few weeks' time."
And for those who will be "cut" this summer, the effects will be lifelong. Miriam was six when she had her cutting party at her home in Somalia, two years before war arrived to force her family out.
When she was 12, doctors were horrified to find that what they thought was a cyst in her body was actually several years of period blood that had been blocked from leaving her body. Unable to have children, she now lives and works in England and worries about other girls. "I'd seen so many people circumcised, all my neighbours, so I knew one day it was going to happen to me. We knew what was happening," Miriam said.
"The little girls who were born in Europe have no clue. They will be traumatised a lot more. The only thing they know is that they are going away – that's what they say, 'We're going on a holiday'.
"Then her life and her head are going to be messed up. It's amazing how many people are in mental health care because of their culture. Don't get me wrong, I have religion and culture and I love where I'm from and I love what I stand for. But culture should not be about torture.
"Why would anyone want to go and cut up a seven- or eight-year-old child? People need to wake up — you are hurting your child, you are hurting your daughter, you're not going to have a grandchild, so wake up."

Pamela Izevbekhai loses appeal to stay in Ireland

July 9, 2010
By The Irish Examiner





Mother of three Pamela Izevbekhai has lost her Supreme Court fight to stay in Ireland.

Ms Izevbekhai claims her daughters - nine-year-old Naomi and seven-year-old Jemima - are at risk of female genital mutilation if returned to Nigeria.

The court has found by a four-to-one majority that the Minister for Justice has no discretion to further review her deportation following an EU directive.

Pamela Izevbekhai's solicitor Matthew Ezeani said Ms Izevbekhai would still have another day in court - at the European Court of Human Rights.

Time for concrete EU action against female genital mutilation

July 1, 2010

By EurActiv

Female genital mutilation (FGM) continues throughout the world, including across Europe. The EU needs to act and the incoming Belgian Presidency must support the European Commission in developing a strong, comprehensive and rights-based strategy to combat FGM and protect women and girls affected by this practice, writes Dr. Christine Loudes, director of Amnesty International's 'END FGM European Campaign', in an exclusive commentary for EurActiv.

This commentary was sent exclusively to EurActiv by Dr. Christine Loudes of Amnesty International.


''Aissatou Diallo was 14 years old when she was held down forcibly by six people while the seventh person cut her in her home in Guinea. She was made to believe that this was how she could become a woman and get married. Today, Aissatou lives in Belgium with her two daughters and is determined to protect them from being subjected to the same practice of female genital mutilation (FGM). The Belgian state is assisting Aissatou by giving her and her daughters asylum in Belgium. There are many other girls at risk in the EU and beyond. What can the EU and the Belgian Presidency do to end FGM and protect those at risk?

Female genital mutilation is a practice in which the genitals of girls, often as young as three years, are pricked, cut or removed and sometimes stitched up. Often done without anaesthesia, the young girl bleeds for days and after the initial pain, she can continue to suffer chronic pain, infections, decreased sexual enjoyment and psychological problems such as post-traumatic stress disorder for the rest of her adult life.

A pregnant woman who has been cut will have added risk of complications during childbirth and her newborn baby is also subjected to additional dangers. It is no surprise that Manfred Nowak, the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, said that FGM is like ongoing torture throughout a woman's life.

FGM is recognised internationally as a human rights violation; it is a discriminatory practice that subjects women to violence because they are women. Furthermore, the practice violates the rights of women and girls to physical and mental integrity, right to health and right to life. All EU member states have signed up to international treaties such as the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW), the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC) and the Convention Against Torture (CAT), which protect these rights and therefore make it obligatory for states to protect women and girls affected by or at risk of FGM.

Despite the international and regional standards, the practice continues, not just in Africa, Asia and the Middle East, but also among the diaspora communities in Europe, USA and Australia. In Europe, it is estimated that 500,000 women and girls are living with the harmful consequences of FGM. But this is only an estimate. The exact scale of the problem is unknown in Europe.

We have found that it is most likely that girls living in Europe are taken to their countries of origin during the holidays to be mutilated. Sometimes the girls stay behind in their countries of origin when parents fear prosecution upon their return to Europe.

Anecdotal evidence suggests that in some cases an excisor is brought to Europe and girls are taken from one European country to another where the protection measures are less stringent or non-existent.

The cross-border nature of the practice makes it essential for the EU to develop and adopt a comprehensive structure to prevent FGM, protect those at risk and provide adequate services for those women and girls who have survived it. There are a number of opportunities in the next few months for the EU to stand together and combat this practice.

The European Commission is developing a proposal for a strategy to combat violence against women. This includes female genital mutilation as well as domestic violence. While it is laudable that the proposal will address FGM, it would be counter-productive if it only deals with criminalisation of the practice, as has been suggested in a number of EU platforms.

FGM is a child-specific violence and the perpetrator is most often the parent or a close relative. In most cases, the parents are under pressure from their communities to continue the practice. Therefore, a collective, community-based approach would be more effective than simply prosecuting individuals.

A number of EU member states have developed specific legislation against FGM; although only a handful have initiated prosecutions. There is no evidence to suggest that legislation has led to a reduction in the practice of FGM. Protection measures against FGM must be comprehensive and criminalisation of the practice must be complemented with training and community involvement.

Community pressure to conform plays a large part in continuing this practice. Awareness campaigns amongst practising communities are crucial and must go hand in hand with any criminal measures.

The EU's strategy on FGM must address all aspects of prevention, protection and provision of adequate services. For instance, we need to train health and education professionals to identify girls at risk as well as deal with health complications of girls who have already been subjected to FGM.

The European Commission will be releasing the results of two studies in the next few months, the first being a study on harmful traditional practices and the second being a feasibility study on whether legislation on violence against women across the EU can be harmonised.

Both studies have the potential to make concrete recommendations that will be incorporated into the EU strategy. The studies should be widely disseminated and debated by EU officials and the civil society to make sure that women from the practising community and women directly affected by FGM have the opportunity to raise key issues that may help in creating effective and feasible recommendations.

The Belgian Presidency will hold the seat of the EU during these upcoming developments. It must support the European Commission in developing a strong, comprehensive and rights-based strategy to combat FGM and protect the women and girls affected by this practice.
Belgium's asylum system has protected Aissatou's daughters. Now it is time for the Belgian Presidency of the EU to ensure that other daughters living in the EU are equally protected.''

Links

International Organisations

• END FGM European Campaign, Amnesty International

Ending FGM to promote achievement of Millennium Development Goals

May 2010,
By Amnesty International

The Millennium Declaration represents the international community’s commitment to further development in line with an agreed framework of eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) to be achieved by 2015.
In the UN General Assembly’s High Level Forum on 20-22 September 2010, the progress on these goals will be reviewed. The European Union has stated a strong commitment to this framework in the European Consensus on Development, which represents the common values and principles held by the European Commission and the EU Member States.
On occasion of Mother's Day, END FGM European Campaign has released a document that explores the importance of raising female genital mutilation as an underlying cause of the lack of progress on the MDGs and makes recommendations to the EU in this regard.

Read Ending FGM to promote the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals here

Court awards damages after genital mutilation test

April 22, 2010
By Eurones

Uppsala Municipality has been ordered to pay 60,000 kronor ($8,400) to the family of a girl of Somali origin who was forced to undergo an examination to check whether she had been circumcised.
Uppsala social workers forced the then 10-year-old girl to submit to the examination to see whether she had been subjected to genital mutilation (circumcision) while on a family holiday in Kenya in 2004. The girl was collected by police from school shortly after returning from a visit to relatives.
The girl's family took their case to the Discrimination Ombudsman (DO) which ruled in 2007 that the social workers' suspicions constituted discrimination.

Discrimination Ombudsman Katri Linna concluded in her 2007 ruling that the suspicions "were based entirely on the fact that the parents have Somalian heritage."
The decision to examine the girl was taken despite the fact that the parents had told their district nurse and social workers that they were opposed to female circumcision and that they were going to Kenya with the sole purpose of seeing their relatives.

The examination showed that the girl had not been circumcised (...)

Campaigning against Female Genital Mutilation

April 14, 2010
By SoFeminine.Co.Uk

According to the World Health Organization (WHO), more than 150 million women live with the consequences of genital mutilation. And every day, at least 8,000 more girls are mutilated. Now, a new book is being distributed declaring genital mutilation a crime.

In Aisha's household there are no razor blades. The 43-year-old could not bear it. So instead, her husband uses an electric razor. These days, Aisha (whose real name has been changed to protect her identity) lives in Europe. But she is still haunted by the memory of what was done to her when she was a 5-year-old living in Djibouti, a small desert state in north eastern Africa.

"I was told at the time that it was going to be a marvellous day," she says.
Instead, she was mutilated, her entire external genitalia were cut off, and her vagina was sewn up. As a result, Aisha has had many medical complications, and will never be able to experience a normal sex life. She says that she will never forgive her relatives, the people she trusted most, for lying to her.


The custom of female genital mutilation (FGM) is predominant among Muslims, but is also sometimes practiced by Coptic Christians, Jews and followers of natural religions. It is most widely practiced in Africa, in some 28 countries. The tradition has been in existence for thousands of years – the most brutal form, which Aisha experienced, is referred to as "pharaonic". These days, many advocates of FGM invoke Islam.

Male proponents of female genital mutilation often refer to the practice as female circumcision, and like to point out that many men are circumcised, too. But from a medical point of view, this comparison is invalid. While it is true that some women only have the clitoral hood removed, in the majority of cases FGM – which is carried out using anything from razor blades to glass shards and even the lids of tin cans – goes much further, depending on regional tradition. In most cases the entire outer and/or inner labia are cut away along with the clitoris. The women who carry out the mutilations are held in high regard and earn good money.

The pharaonic variant of FGM involves yet another aspect: closing the vagina completely – total control of female sexuality. Aisha remembers the most horrific day of her life as if it was yesterday. Her aunts came to help her mother, as she recalls.

"They sat on my arms and legs, while the old woman cut everything away," says Aisha. There was no anaesthetic. "Then they tied my legs together and I had to lie like that for four or six weeks." During this period, the wound, which is stitched up or closed with the aid of acacia thorns, is meant to heal. An inserted twig or straw ensures that a tiny opening remains.

The list of the consequences, which usually remain for life, is long: peeing can take half an hour, a period can last two weeks, and women are often prone to chronic infections of the bladder or fallopian tubes. This, in turn, frequently causes infertility. In the case of pregnancy, a normal birth is often not possible, but there is rarely a doctor around who could perform a caesarean. In all cases, infant mortality is clearly elevated, by around 55 percent.

With the pharaonic mutilation, there is yet another cruel aspect: on a woman’s wedding night, she is often cut open if the opening is too small for intercourse. This is sometimes done by the mutilation practitioners, but more frequently by the husbands, who use knives and scissors, often damaging the bowel or bladder in the process.

Aisha will only say that her wedding night was terrible, without going into details. She has since had a son and a daughter, both of whom were born in Germany by caesarean. She says that she is lucky that her husband is considerate. "But I only know that being with a man is supposed to be beautiful for a woman from books and from talking to my German girlfriends. For me, it has remained torturous."

It is fates like Aisha’s that the German human rights activist Rüdiger Nehberg cites in his fight against female genital mutilation. He is keen to illustrate that such a practice cannot be justified by Islam, even if there is a persistent belief that corresponding instructions can be found in the Koran. The origin for this is probably to be found in the Hadiths, pronouncements and traditional sayings ascribed to the prophet Mohammed.

Nehberg and other opponents of FGM, on the other hand, point out that the respective Hadiths are weak and unreliable, and that Mohammed's daughters were not circumcised or mutilated. Nehberg argues that the Koran praises the creation of both man and woman by Allah: "Sura 95, Verse 4 states, 'We have created man in the most perfect image' – and man must not presume to destroy this creation."

"I wanted to call together leading Islamic clerics for them to condemn female genital mutilation," Nehberg says. His idea became reality in November 2006. At the Al-Azhar University in Cairo, one of the most respected educational institutions in the Islamic world, the most eminent Islamic scholars from around the world came together for a two-day conference. At the end of the conference, after occasionally heated discussions, female genital mutilation was condemned as irreconcilable with Islam by a ruling issued by the Islamic scholars, a fatwa.

But how to convey this to the many millions of people in some three dozen countries, who often live in the remotest areas? Nehberg developed the idea of the "Golden Book," a small, elaborately designed book with a firm fold-over cover, a magnetic clasp in green (the colour of Islam), with gold embossing and pages edged in gold. It contains the fatwa, speeches by the scholars, as well as the most common prejudices on the topic and their refutation – in Arabic, English, French and German. The core messages are also illustrated in pictures.

At the follow-up conference in Addis Ababa, 120 imams ordered 100,000 copies in the first half hour alone. In Mauritania, where some three million people live in an area three times the size of Germany, 1,200 books have been distributed already, to imams, Islamic schools and scholars.

Three thousand copies are currently being brought into circulation in Djibouti; 50,000 in Ethiopia. Distribution will soon follow in Mali, Sudan, Somaliland and Chad; getting the book out in some countries, like Etrirea and Somalia, will be difficult from a security point of view.

Some positive effects have already been reported. In a town at the edge of the Danakil desert, practitioners of female genital mutilation have up their work and instead undergone training to become midwives. In the town of Barahle, 60 mothers swore by Allah not to have their daughter mutilated.

To achieve sustained abolition of the practice it is also important to bring the imams, heads of clans and mayors on board, too. Because in the societies where the practice in widespread, uncut women are generally considered unclean and not fit to be married – which then makes them unable to support their parents in old age. This will only change when those in power really start laying down the law.

A woman and little girl with a copy of the fatwa, condemning female genital mutilation. Das

Ending Female Genital Mutilation: Calling For A Comprehensive Strategy In UK And Europe

March 23, 2010
By Forward UK

FORWARD UK and Amnesty International’s END FGM European campaign call on European leaders to adopt concrete measures to end female genital mutilation (FGM) and to protect young girls and women affected by FGM who live in the European Union (EU).

In partnership with the UK All-Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Population, Development and Reproductive Health, FORWARD UK and END FGM European Campaign launched a strategy with practical recommendations for the EU in London on 22nd March 2010 in the Jubilee Room of the Houses of Parliament.

These recommendations are based on human rights principles and informed by experiences of women and girls’ in Europe. Touring across five cities in Europe between February and March 2010, the END FGM European Campaign is urging European leaders to act against this violence against women, and particularly, the girl child.

FGM is a form of violence against women and girls and a human rights violation. The practice is illegal in the UK, yet in 2001 it was estimated that over 66,000 women and girls were affected by FGM in the UK and a 2005 study estimated around 32,000 girls were at high risk of FGM.

Christine McCafferty Member of Parliament and Chair of the APPG and delegate to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (CoE) says that:
“Since the APPG Parliamentary Hearings on FGM in 2000, the UK government has made progress in supporting the health needs of women and girls living with FGM, and the FGM Act 2003 has tightened legislation to prevent FGM. What is needed now is stronger multi-agency collaboration within the UK and Europe to ensure the full protection of all girls residing in Europe.

“I very much welcome CoE’s draft Convention to prevent and combat violence against women and domestic violence, which will prevent, combat and prosecute violence against women and promote international co-operation.”

Naana Otoo-Oyortey the Executive Director of FORWARD stresses that:
“While FGM features in the new UK strategy on violence against women and girls, there is still need for a national UK action plan on FGM. This is because the nature of FGM requires a commitment to a comprehensive EU strategy to end FGM globally and build bridges between communities in Africa and Europe.”

“The UK already has some promising initiatives in place to prevent FGM. It should use the existing EU framework to share such practices with other countries and take a leading role in the EU for protection of the rights of women and girls”, says Dr Christine Loudes, Campaign Director, END FGM European Campaign.

The five key dimensions through which the EU can protect women and girls living with, or at risk of, FGM are as follows:
•Collection of data on FGM prevalence in Europe
•Accessible and appropriate healthcare for women living with FGM
•Better protection mechanisms to address violence against women and children
•Clear asylum guidelines for those under threat of FGM, and
•Mainstreaming of FGM in EU’s dialogues on cooperation with third countries where FGM is prevalent

Leyla Hussein – an FGM survivor, a mother and a youth outreach worker - will be speaking about her personal experience of FGM at the launch event.

Will the EU help end FGM?

March 21, 2010
By Teri Shultz - Global Post

BRUSSELS, Belgium — As a young girl in Guinea, Aissatou Diallo couldn’t save herself. She was 14 and six people were holding her down while a seventh cut her.

Somalian Ifrah Ahmed couldn’t even comprehend what was happening to her. She was only 8 years old and there were people holding her arms and legs. She had no anesthesia of any kind before or after, just raw agony and then the 40 days of isolation imposed on newly circumcised girls. Five years later, inexplicably, they did it to her again.

Diallo and Ahmed are just two of the estimated 140 million women girls and women worldwide who have been subjected to female genital mutilation (FGM). But unlike the vast majority of girls unable to fight back either during the procedure or after, these women are defying it now — and demanding the rest of the world do the same.

They are some of the leading voices in the latest push in a long campaign spearheaded by Amnesty International against FGM.  The new drive is specifically geared toward pressing the European Union to coordinate the laws, statistics and even foreign policy of its 27 member states into a united front to halt the practice.

Diallo is now in Belgium, one of the handful of countries that does grant asylum based on FGM claims. She claimed asylum on the basis that she could not protect her two young daughters from family and community members in Guinea determined to subject them to FGM. Ahmed, now 21, arrived as a war refugee in Ireland three years ago, unable to read or write as a result of never being sent to school in Somalia. Now fluent – and fearless – in English, she’s determined to change the culture of her own country, where almost 98 percent of adult women are believed to have been circumcised, the highest rate in the world.

But activists are working to make clear that while African countries are infamous for the practice, people in the West should not think it only affects women “somewhere else.” Figures compiled by the European Parliament indicate there are approximately half a million women living in the EU who have already undergone FGM. An estimated 180,000 more girls each year in Europe reach the age when the procedure is usually done, which ranges from birth up to age 15.

In the U.S., legislation has been in place since 1996 offering asylum to any woman fleeing the threat of FGM or who has already experienced it. But in Europe, though the majority of the 27 EU member states outlaw FGM under either specific or general criminal laws, only a handful officially recognize FGM as a form of persecution warranting protection and they do not apply the law in the same way. (This is also true among different courts in the U.S. where, for example, a Malian asylum seeker who had been subjected to FGM as a child was rejected by the state of Maryland because there was no reason for her to fear it happening again.) End FGM wants uniform laws adopted throughout the EU and the most generous possible interpretation of them.

But living in a country where there are laws against FGM by no means grants these girls automatic protection from the practice — it’s technically illegal in many of the African nations too. Sometimes the cutting is actually performed in Europe, but more frequently young girls are taken on “vacation” back to Africa, where it’s done in the traditional setting. The End FGM campaign wants data collected from across Europe to gauge the extent of the problem.

The European Parliament (EP) in March 2009 passed a strongly worded resolution condemning FGM as a “violation of fundamental human rights, as well as a savage breach of the integrity and personality of women and girls and therefore … a serious crime in the eyes of society.” The resolution called on the EU executive and member states to prepare plans “aimed at banishing FGM from the EU” and providing all means possible to protect and help vulnerable women. In short, it looks a lot like Amnesty’s wish list.

EP Vice President Isabelle Durant, attending the campaign's Belgian kick-off earlier this month, pledged her support for putting some teeth in the good intentions. “We’ve got the resolution, now we need the action,” Durant said. She promised to push for implementation of the parliamentary directive in addition to the possibility of linking trade and aid to countries’ willingness to give up the practice.

But there are also valid concerns about whether such pressure could be counter-productive, not just with foreign governments that may resent attempts to influence their traditions, but also with the people the policies are seeking to support. Women may be reluctant to seek medical care for themselves or their children if they worry they or other family members could be prosecuted.

Those concerns are far outweighed, says the campaign’s director Christine Loudes, by the need to protect innocent girls. “It’s a matter of her human rights, it’s a matter of her right not to be tortured, and her rights to access to health and her rights to physical integrity.”

Activists also want to promote sympathetic medical care so that when circumcised women see a doctor they do not have to answer embarrassing or ignorant questions about what kind of “accident” caused the deformity.

Ifrah Ahmed said she was at first very reluctant to go to the hospital for the very serious problems she suffers with each month’s menstrual period as a result of her double mutilation, including pain so bad she says “sometimes I fall down and I feel like I’m going to die.” And after having to explain time and time again to stupefied or even just curious attendants, she finally got an explanatory note from one sympathetic doctor that she could just hand over every time she needs care. It saves her from having to recount the excruciating details endlessly.

She said the doctors always ask her “why do they do this to you?” and she herself cannot explain. “I actually asked some old women why they are doing circumcision to a child, who is innocent, why are they hurting us?” she said. “But there is no answer.”

There wouldn’t be any answer that could satisfy Ahmed anyway. She is determined to see this practice stopped. While she agrees laws need to be strengthened, Ahmed insists the true solution is prevention, not prosecution, and that’s why she’s working in African immigrant communities day in and day out, despite the resistance she meets there.

“They are following what mothers, grandmothers, grand-grandmothers used to do,” Ahmed sighed. “But we in Europe, we are fighting for change. They won’t change everything within a day or two days or a year or two years but with campaigning and work, it will come.”

Developing a Common European Asylum Strategy

End Female Genital Mutilation (FGM):
Developing a Common European Asylum Strategy
Wednesday 24th February
EU House, Nicosia

The Mediterranean Institute of Gender Studies in cooperation with the European Parliament Office in Cyprus will host an event tomorrow, Wednesday, February 24, 2010 titled End Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) - Developing a Common European Asylum Strategy.

For questions, visit the Mediterranean Institute of Gender Studies website.

EUROPE: Fight Female Mutilation Harder Activists Urge EU

February 17, 2010
By Pavol Stracansky -  Ethiopian Review

VIENNA, Feb 17 (IPS) With hundreds of thousands of girls and women believed to be at risk of female genital mutilation (FGM) in Europe, rights groups have mounted a campaign to get EU leaders to stop what they see as a barbaric and dangerous procedure.


FGM – an umbrella term for procedures involving partial or total removal of the female external genitalia or other injury to the female genital organs for non-medical reasons – has been condemned by governments, rights groups and health organisations across the world.

But while many European governments have introduced laws to ban the practice, campaigners have warned that far from dying out it continues in communities across the continent and those same governments must do more to stamp it out.
"We need action. Political commitments are encouraging but the time has come for concrete action at national and European level," Dr. Christine Loudes, who is heading an Amnesty International-led European campaign on FGM, told IPS.

As many as 140 million women and girls worldwide have been subjected to FGM, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). It also estimates that as many as 8,000 women per day are at risk of mutilation.
The practice varies in its form according to factors such as the ethnic background of the victim and the location of her community. Girls less than a year old are victims of the procedure and it is most commonly practiced on girls up to the age of 15.

Carried out in what rights groups describe as ‘’horrific" conditions, it often involves terrified young girls being held down while traditional practitioners use a sharp object such as a knife, a razor blade or broken glass to carry out the mutilation.

There has been some evidence too that doctors and medical staff are also involved in some cases.

Four types of FGM have been classified by the WHO. Type I or clitoridectomy consists of partial or total removal of the clitoris and/or its prepuce. Type II, also known as excision, is where the clitoris and labia minora are partially or totally removed, with or without excision of the labia majora. Type III is also known as infibulation and consists of narrowing the vaginal orifice with creation of a covering seal by cutting and appositioning the labia minora and/or labia majora, with or without removal of the clitoris.

A small opening is left for urine and menstrual blood to escape. An infibulation must be opened either through penetrative sexual intercourse or surgically. Type IV consists of all other procedures to the genitalia of women for non-medical purposes, such as pricking, piercing, incising, scraping and cauterisation.

The practice is justified in communities on grounds like local tradition, religion and culture. Some argue that it is carried out to protect girls from illicit sexual desires or because female genitals are considered to be unhygienic. In some FGM-practicing societies, unmutilated women are regarded as unclean and are not allowed to handle food and water.

But health organisations say that FGM has no medical benefits and instead carries life-threatening health risks. The short-term risks of the procedure include severe bleeding, chronic pain, infection and death through shock, haemorrhaging or septicaemia. The long-term effects include infections, genital ulcers, damage to the reproductive system as well as psychological conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder.

A multi-country study by the WHO in six African countries showed that women who had undergone FGM had significantly increased risks for adverse events during childbirth, and that genital mutilation in mothers has negative effects on their newborn babies. According to the study, an additional one to two babies per 100 deliveries die as a result of FGM.

FGM has been largely documented in African and Middle Eastern states and among ethnic communities in central and south America – creating a false impression that the problem is confined to poorer, less developed parts of the world, say rights groups.

But migration has spread the practice to Europe and groups like Amnesty International as well as WHO say that up to 500,000 women in Europe are living with FGM and 180,000 are at risk of mutilation every year.
Waris Dirie, a Somalian former supermodel who is also a victim of FGM and who heads her own foundation campaigning against FGM headquartered in Vienna, Austria, said that although legislation has been passed in Europe to try and stop FGMthe practice is thriving illicitly in communities.

She told IPS: "FGM is a social taboo in many countries. In Europe it is practiced by different immigrant communities from African or Asian countries where FGM is practiced. It is estimated that 500,000 victims of FGM live in Europe, but most estimates are based only on the number of women from African countries although FGM is also practiced in many Asian countries, as well as in Iraq and Iran (by the Kurds) where many refugees in Europe come from.’’

"We know that many girls in Europe are taken abroad during school holidays to be mutilated in their parents’ home countries. But there are also cases of FGM being performed here in Europe.’’

"Since this happens in secret and illegally, it is impossible to say precisely how it is done. There have been cases where doctors have illegally performed FGM, but usually it is done by African circumcisers who sometimes come especially to perform FGM."

The WHO has said that the true scale of the problem in Europe could be much larger than current estimates suggest.

Elise Johansen, WHO spokeswoman on FGM issues, told IPS: "There have only been small-scale studies carried out in Europe on FGM so a lot of what we know of the problem in Europe is guesswork and estimates. As it is illegal it is very hard to find out the scale of the problem because so few people would admit to planning to have it carried out. The situation could be much worse than we think."

Legislation specifically banning FGM has been passed by some European states, including Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, Italy, Norway, Spain, Sweden, and Britain. It is also illegal under existing criminal legislation in countries such as France where prison sentences have been handed down in more than 30 court cases involving FGM practices.

Rights groups claim the legislation is only partially effective. They warn that problems in detection and reporting of cases, as well as frequent lack of sufficient evidence to take a case to court prevents effective protection of girls at risk.

"Some European states have included the term FGM explicitly in their legal code. Enforcement is very difficult, however, and rarely happens," Dirie told IPS.

Groups also point to unclear asylum rules in cases of female refugees who have fled their home countries for fear of becoming victims of FGM.

"FGM is grounds for asylum under EU directives, but not all EU countries have implemented the directives properly into their laws and some women refugees are not getting the protection they should," Prerna Humpel, spokeswoman for Amnesty’s campaign against FGM, told IPS.

Amnesty International has now launched a campaign with 12 partner organisations across Europe calling on European politicians to do more to stopthe practice.

The ‘END FGM’ campaign involves events in Lisbon, Vienna, Nicosia, Brussels and London this month and next, aimed at raising awareness of the issue and also to press EU officials into creating a definitive strategy on FGM.

The campaign is urging EU officials to adopt measures to protect women and children from FGM, including access to healthcare for women living with FGM in Europe, better protection mechanisms for women and children against violence, clear asylum guidelines for those threatened by FGM, as well as data collection on FGM prevalence in Europe and mainstreaming of FGM in EU dialogues with third countries where FGM is prevalent.

"Women and girls need protection from FGM. Governments have a responsibility to inform immigrant communities about FGM and its effects on women and girls.

"EU governments also have a duty to put in place measures to protect women and girls against FGM, to prosecute those who carry it out and to prevent and stop the practice. Awareness has to be raised at a community level," said Loudes.

Meanwhile, other groups are also urging governments to act, arguing that only comprehensive information campaigns can help stop the practice.

Johansen of WHO said: "Systematic and repeated discussion of FGM is needed in communities where it is practiced. This has been shown to be the most effective method of reducing it. People involved in it need to be educated and fully informed about it. This is happening in Africa but something like this is lacking in Europe’’.

"It is down to governments to put this in place. It is their responsibility."

Cyprus joins battle against female genital mutilation

February 5, 2010
By Sebastian Heller - Cyprus Mail

CYPRUS is starting to look at the issue of female genital mutilation both in terms of granting asylum and with a view to establishing whether migrant women here are being subjected to the barbaric practice.
The Health Ministry has promised the House Committee for Equal Opportunities to look into the issue and to enlist the help of gynaecologists on the island after Committee chairwoman Dina Akkelidou recommended the registration of cases of women who might have been victims.
“Female genital mutilation has been legislated against internationally, and in terms of national legal statutes also. Yet there are mutilated women in Cyprus,” said Akkelidou. “In the context of international efforts to stop this practice it is certainly useful to find statistics and figures on this practice in western countries, including Cyprus.”
According to surveys carried out by the World Health Organisation the practice of female genital mutilation is almost endemic in some African countries, with the majority of women having undergone the procedure, usually as young girls aged 4-8. Specifically, Sudan, Eritrea, Egypt, Somalia, Mali, Guinea and Djibouti all display an incidence of the practice exceeding 85 per cent.
Being almost universal amongst these cultures it is probable that immigrants from these communities will include a number of women who have been mutilated. What concerns the legislature is to prevent genital mutilation from continuing amongst the immigrant communities who deem it a cultural tradition.
Nicolleta Charalambidou, a lawyer with immigrant rights group KISA, clarified that having undergone genital mutilation did not necessarily constitute grounds for the granting of asylum, or protected person status, in Cyprus. What did necessarily constitute such grounds was if a woman was unmutilated yet would face genital mutilation upon return to her home country.
Akkelidou suggested the practice is either going on illegally in Cyprus, or is performed when the girls go home on holidays.
“These women, for various reasons, hide the fact that they went through this traumatic experience,” said Doros Polycarpou of KISA.
In Europe as a whole, according to Akkelidou, there are 500 000 women who have gone through the procedure. According to a survey recently conducted in Switzerland, 51 per cent of gynaecologists have encountered at least one instance of female genital mutilation.
Haemorrhaging, problems in giving birth, sterility and death whilst giving birth are normally the problems which gynaecologists are called on to attend to in instances where genital mutilation has previously occurred.
Akkelidou recommended campaigns to inform and sensitise the public to the issue so as to begin the difficult process of changing long-embedded customs. She also recommended the education of doctors in specific techniques for dealing with the complications which arise where genital mutilation has been practiced, regarding which doctors in Cyprus were currently often ill-prepared to handle.

Female Genital Mutilation - a European issue

January 28, 2010
By Mary Honeyball (Member of European Parliament)

FGM/C (female genital mutilation/cutting) is a controversial and divisive issue which tends to spark strong feeling from those on all sides of the debate. This practice, which in my view is deeply abhorrent, is typically associated with countries such as Somalia and Nigeria. Yet what most people fail to realise is that this harmful custom is also increasingly affecting girls and women in parts of Europe, including the UK.
While figures on FGM are patchy (particularly in Europe as it is often not reported to authorities), it is nonetheless estimated that almost 130 million women throughout the world have been subject to mutilation. The UK has in recent years seen a rise in the numbers of cases. A study by the Foundation for Women’s Health, Research and Development estimated that 66,000 women living in England and Wales had been circumcised, usually prior to leaving their country of origin. The 2003 Female Genital Mutilation Act is supposed to protect girls and women taken overseas for the purpose of genital mutilation; yet, shockingly, there have been no prosecutions under the law to date.
In order to raise awareness about this issue, I was asked to host an event yesterday in the European Parliament, ‘Abandonment of Social Norms Harmful to Girls and Women’, which focused on the practice of FGM. It was organised by UNICEF, and brought together speakers, predominantly women, from all over the world. I opened the event with a few words about how the problem of FGM has been addressed at the European level. Others, such as Francesca Moneti, who is a Senior Child Protection Specialist at UNICEF’s office in New York, spoke about how the practice has been impacting upon women generally.
While there is currently no harmonised EU legislation on FGM, the EU has nonetheless made some important gains. The EU-funded Daphne programme, which seeks to combat violence against children, young people and women, has been the prime source of funding for awareness-raising, prevention, and protection of those who experience, or are at risk from, FGM. As of September 2008, it had financed 14 FGM-related projects, involving a total of €2.4 million.
During the past two years, The European Network for the Prevention of Female Genital Mutilation (EuroNet-FGM) has supported the establishment and development of National Action Plans for the elimination of female genital mutilation in 15 EU countries. It also organised an International Conference on Female Genital Mutilation in the EU, held in Brussels in April 2009.
The problem is that measures like these, while praise-worthy, have so far been ineffective in stopping FGM in Europe. So what more should we expect of the European Union? In a 2008 report by the Women’s Rights Committee, it was suggested that a European Health Protocol should be established to monitor the numbers of women who have undergone FGM. It is true that the gathering of scientific data might be an important tool to assist efforts in ridding the world of FGM. Yet before that can happen, I believe that all European governments should publicly recognise the problem of FGM in Europe and bring it up as a key issue at all levels. One opportunity to do this would be on ‘International Zero Tolerance to FGM day,’ which began in 2003 and takes place on the 6th of February.
However, simply denouncing FGM and condemning perpetrators cannot alone bring about the necessary change. FGM will only disappear if people, both women and men, are satisfied that they could give up the practice without doing away with important aspects of their culture. For this to happen there needs to be more dissemination of information and appropriate education about this issue.

Uniting Europe and Africa to Fight Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) and Circumcision

November 25, 2009 From the International Conference on Prevention of Female Genital Cutting, speech by Minister Koenders

"I am convinced that community dialogue is one of the most effective ways to put an end to harmful traditional practices like FGM. Fathers want their daughters to marry, so they have to agree together that FGM is not a condition, to the contrary, it makes marriages impossible and unhappy."

Your Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen,

You have just seen a film by the Nike Foundation.This is where this conference is all about in a nutshell. I was in Addis Ababa just recently at a conference on MDG5, where I spoke to Maria Eitel, director of the Nike Foundation. I congratulated her on her views and ask her permission to use this movie.

Ladies and gentlemen, I wanted to show you this film because of its underlying theme. If girls and women get the rights and opportunities to develop, they can build their own futures. And ultimately, they will make a substantial contribution to the development of their countries. That is why we need to look at girls from a different angle, from oppression to opportunity.That is also where this conference is all about.

Today we are talking about an instrument of oppression: Female Genital Mutilation. A practice that condemns girls to a lifetime of pain and affliction. A practice that stunts girls' – and society's – development.

Invest in a girl and she will do the rest.

The practice of FGM makes this very difficult and that is taking place when effective development can make all the difference. A girl who has had seven years’ education marries four years later and has two children fewer. She is at less risk of dying in childbirth. A girl with an education invests 90% of her income in her family. A boy will invest just 35%. Each member of her family is healthier and better nourished, and the economy of both her community and her country grows.

That is implicitely where this conference is all about – about contributing to equal rights and opportunities for women and girls – MDG 3 – and to sexual and reproductive health and rights – MDG 5. That is a priority of my development cooperation policy and is also hampered by FGM.We know the statistics.

It is therefore not only a privilege but also a duty to be delivering the opening speech at this conference. Especially since today is the twenty-fifth of November, the day the United Nations has proclaimed the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. Because the subject of this conference, Female Genital Mutilation, is all about violence against women, and it is one of my main concerns.

FGM destroys a young girl’s body and possibly her life. From the outset, she is denied the prospect of a healthy, successful, enjoyable life. The World Health Organisation estimates that in Africa, 92 million girls aged ten and over have undergone genital cutting, and that every year three million girls are at risk of it happening to them. And this is done for cultural, traditional or religious reasons, for the girl's ‘own sake’.

Ladies and gentlemen, I refuse to accept that FGM should be practised because of cultural and religious tradition. It has absolutely no health benefit, but puts the health of millions of girls at risk. FGM must be banned. I know that many people agree with me on this point. The question is, what is the best, most efficient way of working together to tackle this problem. Together we will achieve more. That is why we are here today to discuss freely openly and with respect.

A few weeks ago, I was in Egypt where I spoke to Ms Moushira Khattab, Minister of State for Family and Population. Ms Khattab wants to create employment opportunities for girls. She is working to control population growth, and is committed to children’s welfare. We talked about reproductive rights and female genital mutilation.

In 2005, 91% of all Egyptian women in the 15 to 49 age group had been cut. In 2000, that figure was 97%. There has been a decline, though it has been slow.

Ms Khattab and I discussed how religious and traditional values can determine and dominate a culture. They are the social norm, which is very difficult to change.

That is why eradication of FGM is a difficult, complex problem, not only in Egypt but in other countries too. And yet there have been some successes. It is very important for the government to assume its responsibility. A ban on FGM is a major step, but I am convinced that change must come from within the community. That is where it has to happen, where traditional values and norms have to change. And that transformation is taking place in Egypt at the moment.

Ms Khattab told me that for many years now, various NGOs have been active in Egypt in the fight against FGM. They are receiving increasing support and cooperation from the community. That means that the people themselves are questioning their traditional values and norms. And we want to help them do so in the future.

Fortunately, it is people themselves who are beginning to oppose the practice of female circumcision. Whenever I visit an African country where FGM is practised, the issue is always raised, even if it wasn’t the main focus of my visit. During my visit to Burkina Faso in September, I talked to the President’s wife about the subject. She is working for its abandonment in her country, but of course it was also raised with her husband. This ia also an issue for men and for political leaders.

I have told you about my experiences for a reason. What matters to me is that countries are not imposing changes on the norms and values of other countries where FGM occurs. Increasingly, there is a worldwide movement that wants to abandon this horrible practice.

Many developing countries are launching campaigns and setting up special programmes. I believe that there couldn’t be a better departure point for change. What is more, the western world can learn from these countries. That, ladies and gentlemen, is development cooperation in reverse, and that is what I am aiming for with my new-style policies reverse development cooperation. I will come back to that in a minute.

I saw a good example during a recent visit to a health centre in Mali, a country that still hasn’t banned female genital mutilation. Supported by Dutch development aid, this centre is running a highly effective campaign against female circumcision. During the same visit to Mali, I talked frankly about female genital mutilation with President Toure, and with members of the government. I also listened to people in the community. They explained how the practice of circumcision is taken for granted, how the tradition is passed on from mother to daughter. That circumcision is part of growing up. They also said that very few people dared to question the need for the ritual. The issue is totally off limits.

But the information and activities campaign run by volunteers and students breaks through the taboo. Using wooden models and plays, they inform people about the enormous health risks attached to circumcision. Risks many parents have never heard of – to their daughters' lives, their sense of enjoyment and future well-being.

The campaign in Mali aims to persuade both individual men and women and communities as a whole to decide collectively to abandon the practice of circumcision. I am convinced that community dialogue is one of the most effective ways to put an end to harmful traditional practices like FGM.Fathers were really taking a stand for their daughters and women who had made FGM their profession were now part of the campaign against it. Fathers want their daughters to marry, so they have to agree together that FGM is not a condition, to the contrary, it makes mariages impossible and unhappy.

In addition to community dialogue, it is essential that traditional and religious leaders play their part in bringing about this change of mentality. If they condemn harmful traditional practices, the community listens to them. It is important that they tell the community that the Koran does not require female circumcision at all. I am glad to see so many participants from Sudan here today. Because despite all its international problems, Sudan is devoting quite a lot of attention to the abandonment of FGM.

A good example here is the Sudanese Sheikh Ali al Hashim al Siraj. He has campaigned for the past twenty years against female circumcision. He has even written a book about it – Circumcision: Killing Girls Alive. And he has sparked discussion on the issue. We are working closely with him and other religious leaders.

Ladies and gentlemen, genuine change is only possible if the entire community takes part. If we are to tackle FGM, we will have to take account of social pressure from the community. And we will have to make use of the fact that parents want the best for their children. We will need to focus not on abandoning bad old traditions but on giving their daughters a better future. We will need to convince parents that their daughters can have the opportunity to build their own future, that abandoning FGM will give their daughters the prospect of a prosperous, happy and healthy life.

To eradicate FGM forever, we have to invest in the futures of girls and women, and adopt a multisectoral approach. Apart from effective legislation, we need to invest in decent health care services and education and in information on sexual and reproductive health and rights.

Only then will girls and women get the opportunities they need to develop. Only then will they be able to develop into fully-fledged members of society, and find a route out of poverty. Only then will they be able to contribute to society, and will others benefit.

Invest in a girl and she will do the rest.

Ladies and gentlemen, I have said it before: more and more often, I am reaching the conclusion that African countries themselves want to eradicate FGM. And that for them too existing cultural norms and values are an obstacle to this.

In the west, we are also being confronted with these norms and values, brought here by African immigrants. FGM is migrating with them, literally and figuratively. The practice was outlawed in this country in the 1990s. But because African immigrants send their daughters home to be circumcised, Europe is nonetheless being confronted with FGM and its consequences.

The point I am making here is that Africa, the Netherlands, Europe and the rest of the world have a shared problem, and that is FGM. We regard FGM as a violent act, we must promote the abandonment together.

And this is the moment to do it.

In the past decades, the Netherlands has contributed to eradicating FGM in various countries. Years of experience have taught us that it is an extremely persistent problem.

I want to thank the Ministry of Health, Welfare and Sport for taking the initiative to organise today’s conference. It gives everyone here the opportunity to exchange experience and take concrete steps together. My aim to is bring together African and European experience of combating FGM, pool our knowledge and take some big steps forward.

Studies by WHO and UNICEF have shown us the most effective strategy in Africa. UNICEF’s Francesca Moneti will no doubt be telling us all about it in a moment.

What we want to hear from you is how can we adapt this strategy to our own country. As I mentioned earlier, we are talking about development cooperation in reverse. African countries can advise us, the western world, on the most effective strategies to eradicate FGM.

At the International Girl Child Conference last March, recommendations were formulated, including the need to build bridges between communities in countries of origin and immigrant organisations in Europe.

Today, at this conference, we are going to build those bridges. During the workshops we will exchange knowledge and experience. Today, Africa will advise Europe. Today African delegates can tell their European counterparts which strategy worked in their country.

Ladies and gentlemen, you were welcomed here this morning by Jet Bussemaker, our State Secretary for Health, Welfare and Sport. She too has made FGM a policy priority. She too has gender equality high on her agenda. We have to work together to fight FGM in both Africa and Europe.

Let me tell you what the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is doing.

This spring I promised to support the European network Euronet-FGM in organising a conference for members of the European Parliament.

I have set aside €1.5 million from the MDG 3 fund for the Inter-African Committee on Traditional Practices. The Committee is active in 28 countries. Thanks to its efforts, legislation against female genital mutilation has now been enacted in 16 African countries. Later today, Berhane Ras-Work, President of the IAC, will tell you more about the Committee's work. For the past 25 years, she has been trying to convince authorities and communities in all of those 28 African countries of the damaging, irreversible impact of FGM on women's lives.

What is more, Dutch embassies in Burkina Faso, Benin, Mali, Ethiopia, Eritrea, Uganda, Egypt, Sudan, Yemen and Iraq are supporting organisations that combat female genital mutilation.

I am delighted to hear that Plan International’s African and European offices are now discussing ways of adapting the strategies used in Africa to combat FGM in Europe. While money and expertise flow from Europe to Africa, we are now receiving advice from countries like Sierra Leone and Mali. Community agreements to stop FGM are hihly effective. Now they can be made more operational in the Netherlands.

Ladies and gentlemen, the Netherlands is doing everything it can to put gender equality on the global agenda. But we are a small country. To tackle FGM effectively, we need you all. That is why I am delighted that you have come to this conference today. We now have the momentum to launch a joint, international strategy to tackle this joint problem.

I hope and expect that today, at this International Conference on Uniting Europe and Africa to fight FGM, we will take a number of concrete steps.

Ladies and gentlemen, everyone here today is convinced that not one girl or woman should be exposed to genital mutilation. Whether we are talking about a Muslim woman, a girl from Sub-Saharan Africa or a Dutch woman. FGM is unacceptable. It prevents girls and women from developing. It means that they have fewer chances in society, and fewer opportunities to contribute to the development of their countries. And so we all miss out.

So let us invest in girls. They will do the rest.

I wish you a very inspiring and productive conference.

Thank you.

The scourge of Female Genital Mutilation

November 10, 2009 By France24 Though female genital mutilation is widely considered to be a violation of women's rights, it remains common practice in parts of the world. We take a closer look at an entrenched tradition and efforts to stamp it out. Naana Otoo-Oyortey, executive director of the Foundation for Women's Health, Research & Development (FORWARD) interviewed at France24. To watch the video, please follow the link.

Website launched to end female genital mutilation

Posted by Nathan Solomon
September 21, 2009

A website dedicated to tracking the response of the European Union (EU) to female genital mutilation (FGM) has been launched by Amnesty International Ireland.

It will document the response of EU institutions and the Council of Europe to assess developments on preventing FGM and will feature an interactive map of Europe, which will contain information on prevalence rates and legislation on the issue in member states.

The campaign — the site for which is located at www.endfgm.eu — is committed to ensuring the EU delivers a definitive strategy to end FGM in Europe and to protect women and girls who flee their countries for fear of being mutilated.

The European Parliament estimates 500,000 girls and women living in Europe are suffering lifelong consequences of FGM.

- by Niamh Mullen | IMT News

Catalan Police in Crusade to Educate Ethnic Minorities about Genital Mutilation

July 9, 2009 By Gabrielle Devon THANKS to members of Cataluña’s regional police force, the Mossos d’Esquadra, during 2008, 104 girls living in the region were prevented from going through the suffering caused by genital mutilation, a practice carried out mainly in African and Asian countries. Since 2000, the Mossos have contacted the families of girls whom they consider could be at risk of having to undergo this practice, considering their country of origin and the fact that they may not have abandoned this type of tradition. They explain the dangers involved, dissuading them from returning to their countries of origin for the mutilation to be performed or from having it carried out by clandestine witchdoctors residing in Spain. The parents are also informed that, in Spain, this practice is considered a crime punishable by law. According to the regional government, in Cataluña alone, there are more than 13,000 girls at risk and 4,846 of them are under the age of 19. Their objective to prevent female genital mutilation (FGM) is unique in Europe and has prevented almost 100 cases per year since it began. Last year, 300 officers took a special course to learn more about FGM and recently a delegation travelled to Gambia to provide information on site to families there, even managing to get one community to promise not to carry out any more genital mutilations. Many of the families living in Spain apparently don’t want to carry it out, but upon returning to their countries of origin they feel pressured into it by their society. Many communities believe that it is good for a woman’s health, maintaining cleanliness as there are no sexual secretions. Others believe that if a child touches its mother’s clitoris while being born, it will die. However, it is mainly used to prevent young girls from having sexual urges and maintain their virginity until marriage, something which guarantees they will be accepted. Many women allow the procedure as it is believed it will pleasure their partners and guarantee a successful marriage. The origin of female genital mutilation is unknown and although it is carried out in many Moslem countries, it is not related to Islam or any other known religion. There are several types of FGM, but all procedures involve partial or total removal of the external female genitalia. In some cases there is a narrowing of the vaginal orifice as well as cutting of the clitoris, labia minora and/or labia majora, which are then held together using thorns or stitching. In some cases the girl’s legs are tied together for two to six weeks, to prevent her from moving and to allow healing. This can be reversed to allow sexual intercourse or when undergoing labour, which becomes extremely difficult and painful, and can result in tearing and death of the child if the canal is not opened sufficiently. A study surprisingly revealed that the majority of women who have been subjected to this extreme sexual mutilation claim to experience sexual desire, pleasure and orgasm, in spite of their being culturally bound to hide these experiences. Egypt has passed a law banning FGM. Sheikh Ali Gomaa stated: “The traditional form of excision is a practice totally banned by Islam because of the compelling evidence of the extensive damage it causes to women’s bodies and minds.”