Showing posts with label Indonesia. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Indonesia. Show all posts
Monday, October 24, 2011
Health Official Claims Circumcision Guidelines Prevent Female Mutilation
October 22, 2011
The Jakarta Globe
Dessy Sagita
The Health Ministry has spoken out against criticism by women’s rights activists and health experts of a ministerial guideline on female circumcision, saying the instruction was issued specifically to combat genital mutilation.
Ministry spokeswoman Murti Utami said that many families, especially in rural areas, still believed in the importance of circumcising female babies for religious reasons.
“I would like to stress that female circumcision is not genital mutilation, which is indeed dangerous. They are two things that are very different,” she said on Friday.
In June, community organizations spoke out in a letter to the government, opposing the ministerial instruction, which directs health professionals not to cut a girl’s genitals but to “scrape the skin covering the clitoris, without injuring the clitoris.”
Medical experts also spoke out against the ministry’s move. “This will give doctors a new motivation to circumcise [girls] because now they can say the Ministry of Health approves of this, and the Indonesian Council of Ulema [MUI] approves of it,” said Jurnalis Uddin, a doctor and lecturer at Yarsi University in Jakarta.
On Friday, Murti said the ministerial instruction, which was issued in June, governed procedures for female circumcision in cases where it is deemed necessary by families. It did not constitute government support for the practice, she claimed.
“The minister wants to protect girls from genital mutilation,” she said.
Murti added that the guidelines provided directions on performing the procedure properly and safely and required that circumcision must only be carried out with parental consent. Furthermore, parents must be given information beforehand on pros and cons of the procedure.
Circumcision is typically done at birth, or before a girl reaches the age of 5. Traditionally, the procedure was mostly symbolic, with a small cut made on the clitoris, or by rubbing it with tumeric root..
However, Uddin said he had found that when medical practitioners performed the procedure, there was a trend toward more extensive cutting of the clitoris.
To read the full article on The Jakarta Globe website, click here
Friday, September 9, 2011
INDONESIA: FGM/C regulations mistaken as endorsement, experts fear
September 1, 2011
IRIN Asia
WEST JAVA, 1 September 2011 (IRIN) - Guidelines on how to perform female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) issued by the Indonesian Ministry of Health could cause an increase in the practice, medical experts and rights groups fear.
"This will give doctors a new motivation to circumcise [girls] because now they can say the Ministry of Health approves of this, and the Indonesian Ulamas' Council approves of it," Jurnalis Uddin, doctor and lecturer at Yarsi University in Jakarta, told IRIN.
Though FGM/C was banned in 2006, two of Indonesia's Muslim organizations, including the largest and mostly moderate Nahdlatul Ulama, ultimately condone the practice advising "not to cut too much", and, as a result, many continue to perform the procedure.
By directing health professionals not to cut a girl's genitals but to "scrape the skin covering the clitoris, without injuring the clitoris", the Ministry of Health stands by the regulations, passed in June, as a medically safe form of FGM/C representing an effort to further regulate the illegal practice and protect women.
But recent uproar has questioned this reasoning. Others are concerned the guidelines could well be misinterpreted as an endorsement of the procedure, combined with an enticement for doctors to encourage the practice, Uddin said.
"I think that doctors will use these guidelines to make money from circumcision," Uddin said, adding that Indonesia's poorly regulated medical practitioners often viewed medicine as a business.
FGM/C is typically done at birth, or before a girl is five years old and in the past was often performed by local healers, called dukun, or by birth attendants. Traditionally, FGM/C was mostly "symbolic" with a small cut on the clitoris, or rubbing the clitoris with tumeric root, making it less invasive than other types of FGM/C.
However, Uddin, who conducted an Indonesia-wide survey of FGM/C practices in 2009, said he had found that when medical practitioners performed the procedure, there was a trend toward more extensive cutting of the clitoris.
Public outcry
Dozens of Indonesian groups continue to call for the Ministry to revoke the guidelines.
"This gives a justification for health practitioners to damage women's bodies," said Frenia Nababan, spokeswoman for the Indonesian Family Planning Association. She added, "We fear it will increase control of women's bodies by the state and religious groups."
Amnesty International, is one of more than 100 signatories to a letter stating that the guidelines should be revoked partially on the grounds of Indonesia's child protection laws, as well as the government's commitment to the international Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), signed by Indonesia in 1984.
Experts say there has been increasing support for the practice from Muslim groups since the downfall of authoritarian leader Suharto in 1998, resulting in greater religious and political freedom, known as "Reformasi".
"Before Reformasi [FGM/C] was mostly done on an individual basis, but since Reformasi, it has been done in mass events," said Siti Musda Mulia, an academic specializing in Islamic studies, who initially conducted research on the process during the Suharto era, and has conducted follow-up research since 1998.
Uddin found Indonesia-wide FGM/C had not increased dramatically since the Suharto era; however in some areas, such as Bandung, West Java, there was an increasing tendency to perform it, even among moderate Muslims.
Across Indonesia approximately 12 percent of female babies born in hospitals, birthing centres or assisted by government midwives have been circumcised, a figure that excludes FGM/C procedures done outside such facilities, Uddin said.
FGM/C remains a controversial practice, with debated origins. Religious experts say it is a foreign cultural practice not sanctioned in any of Islam's religious texts.
Even a scratch or small cut on the clitoris is a dangerous procedure to perform on infants, say medical practitioners. Long-term consequences include bladder and urinary tract infections, as well as cysts and infertility.
The Ministry of Health argues it is not "legitimizing or legalizing" FGM/C with its standards but only trying to make the practice less risky by encouraging trained health professionals rather than traditional healers to perform the procedure.
"It is feared that community members who want to circumcise female babies will therefore go to traditional healers for this procedure, and it will increase the number of [medical] complications. If this procedure is done by health professionals, then it has to be done in accordance with the ministerial instruction 1636, and this will guarantee the protection of the female reproductive system," the Ministry stated in response to national criticism.
To read the full article on the IRIN website, click here
mk/nb/mw
IRIN Asia
WEST JAVA, 1 September 2011 (IRIN) - Guidelines on how to perform female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) issued by the Indonesian Ministry of Health could cause an increase in the practice, medical experts and rights groups fear.
"This will give doctors a new motivation to circumcise [girls] because now they can say the Ministry of Health approves of this, and the Indonesian Ulamas' Council approves of it," Jurnalis Uddin, doctor and lecturer at Yarsi University in Jakarta, told IRIN.
Though FGM/C was banned in 2006, two of Indonesia's Muslim organizations, including the largest and mostly moderate Nahdlatul Ulama, ultimately condone the practice advising "not to cut too much", and, as a result, many continue to perform the procedure.
By directing health professionals not to cut a girl's genitals but to "scrape the skin covering the clitoris, without injuring the clitoris", the Ministry of Health stands by the regulations, passed in June, as a medically safe form of FGM/C representing an effort to further regulate the illegal practice and protect women.
But recent uproar has questioned this reasoning. Others are concerned the guidelines could well be misinterpreted as an endorsement of the procedure, combined with an enticement for doctors to encourage the practice, Uddin said.
"I think that doctors will use these guidelines to make money from circumcision," Uddin said, adding that Indonesia's poorly regulated medical practitioners often viewed medicine as a business.
FGM/C is typically done at birth, or before a girl is five years old and in the past was often performed by local healers, called dukun, or by birth attendants. Traditionally, FGM/C was mostly "symbolic" with a small cut on the clitoris, or rubbing the clitoris with tumeric root, making it less invasive than other types of FGM/C.
However, Uddin, who conducted an Indonesia-wide survey of FGM/C practices in 2009, said he had found that when medical practitioners performed the procedure, there was a trend toward more extensive cutting of the clitoris.
Public outcry
Dozens of Indonesian groups continue to call for the Ministry to revoke the guidelines.
"This gives a justification for health practitioners to damage women's bodies," said Frenia Nababan, spokeswoman for the Indonesian Family Planning Association. She added, "We fear it will increase control of women's bodies by the state and religious groups."
Amnesty International, is one of more than 100 signatories to a letter stating that the guidelines should be revoked partially on the grounds of Indonesia's child protection laws, as well as the government's commitment to the international Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW), signed by Indonesia in 1984.
Experts say there has been increasing support for the practice from Muslim groups since the downfall of authoritarian leader Suharto in 1998, resulting in greater religious and political freedom, known as "Reformasi".
"Before Reformasi [FGM/C] was mostly done on an individual basis, but since Reformasi, it has been done in mass events," said Siti Musda Mulia, an academic specializing in Islamic studies, who initially conducted research on the process during the Suharto era, and has conducted follow-up research since 1998.
Uddin found Indonesia-wide FGM/C had not increased dramatically since the Suharto era; however in some areas, such as Bandung, West Java, there was an increasing tendency to perform it, even among moderate Muslims.
Across Indonesia approximately 12 percent of female babies born in hospitals, birthing centres or assisted by government midwives have been circumcised, a figure that excludes FGM/C procedures done outside such facilities, Uddin said.
FGM/C remains a controversial practice, with debated origins. Religious experts say it is a foreign cultural practice not sanctioned in any of Islam's religious texts.
Even a scratch or small cut on the clitoris is a dangerous procedure to perform on infants, say medical practitioners. Long-term consequences include bladder and urinary tract infections, as well as cysts and infertility.
The Ministry of Health argues it is not "legitimizing or legalizing" FGM/C with its standards but only trying to make the practice less risky by encouraging trained health professionals rather than traditional healers to perform the procedure.
"It is feared that community members who want to circumcise female babies will therefore go to traditional healers for this procedure, and it will increase the number of [medical] complications. If this procedure is done by health professionals, then it has to be done in accordance with the ministerial instruction 1636, and this will guarantee the protection of the female reproductive system," the Ministry stated in response to national criticism.
To read the full article on the IRIN website, click here
mk/nb/mw
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Female Circumcision Decree Must Be Revoked: NGOs
June 23, 2011
The Jakarta Globe
Dessy Sagita
Hundreds of activists demanded on Thursday that Indonesia's Health Ministry revoke a 2010 ministerial decree regulating the proper procedure for female circumcision.
“The decree is extremely discriminatory, we want it to be revoked immediately,” Ratna Batara Munti from the Federation of the Women’s Legal Aid Foundation (LBH Apik) said.
More than 170 NGOs, including Amnesty International, and activists signed a joint statement asking the ministry to revoke the decree, which they said contradicted a 2006 circular from the director general of community health prohibiting health workers from performing female circumcisions.
“Female circumcision will damage women’s sexual pleasure. We need to stop it,” Ratna said.
Further, Masruchah, the deputy chairwoman of the National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan), said female circumcision was not medically recommended because it could damage reproductive health.
“Female circumcision is an abuse that has to be stopped. The discussion about this issue has been going on for 32 years. It has to stop now,” she said.
Siti Musdah Mulia, a progressive Islamic scholar from the Indonesian Conference on Religion and Peace, said she had conducted a survey to track female genital mutilation in Indonesia. “What I found was horrible. There are some female circumcision procedures that cut the whole clitoris. [Practioners] thought the more they cut, the more religious [the girls] become,” she said.
The Indonesian Council of Ulema (MUI) has issued a fatwa that female circumcision was allowed but not obligatory. However, it also stated that prohibiting the procedure was not allowed.
But the ministry’s director of mothers’ health, Ina Hernawati, said the protest was unjustified because the ministry had never supported female circumcision. “Read the decree carefully, there’s nothing there saying we are supporting female genitalia mutilation or any kind of abuse,” she said.
Ina said the decree was issued because no health worker in Indonesia has received any formal training about how to perform female circumcision and the decree provided guidance on how to conduct it safely if necessary.
“We do not condone the practice. If parents come to midwives, we ask the midwives to explain that medically female circumcision is useless,” she said.
However, she said, many times parents insisted on getting their daughter circumcised for religious or traditional reasons.
“In such case, we prefer the circumcision were done by a trained health worker rather than some random shaman or traditional healer, which may not be safe,” she said.
Ina denied the decree legitimized abuse against women. She said people often associated female circumcision with genitalia mutilation. “They’re totally different. Circumcising is merely scratching a piece of skin.”
The Jakarta Globe
Dessy Sagita
Hundreds of activists demanded on Thursday that Indonesia's Health Ministry revoke a 2010 ministerial decree regulating the proper procedure for female circumcision.
“The decree is extremely discriminatory, we want it to be revoked immediately,” Ratna Batara Munti from the Federation of the Women’s Legal Aid Foundation (LBH Apik) said.
More than 170 NGOs, including Amnesty International, and activists signed a joint statement asking the ministry to revoke the decree, which they said contradicted a 2006 circular from the director general of community health prohibiting health workers from performing female circumcisions.
“Female circumcision will damage women’s sexual pleasure. We need to stop it,” Ratna said.
Further, Masruchah, the deputy chairwoman of the National Commission on Violence Against Women (Komnas Perempuan), said female circumcision was not medically recommended because it could damage reproductive health.
“Female circumcision is an abuse that has to be stopped. The discussion about this issue has been going on for 32 years. It has to stop now,” she said.
Siti Musdah Mulia, a progressive Islamic scholar from the Indonesian Conference on Religion and Peace, said she had conducted a survey to track female genital mutilation in Indonesia. “What I found was horrible. There are some female circumcision procedures that cut the whole clitoris. [Practioners] thought the more they cut, the more religious [the girls] become,” she said.
The Indonesian Council of Ulema (MUI) has issued a fatwa that female circumcision was allowed but not obligatory. However, it also stated that prohibiting the procedure was not allowed.
But the ministry’s director of mothers’ health, Ina Hernawati, said the protest was unjustified because the ministry had never supported female circumcision. “Read the decree carefully, there’s nothing there saying we are supporting female genitalia mutilation or any kind of abuse,” she said.
Ina said the decree was issued because no health worker in Indonesia has received any formal training about how to perform female circumcision and the decree provided guidance on how to conduct it safely if necessary.
“We do not condone the practice. If parents come to midwives, we ask the midwives to explain that medically female circumcision is useless,” she said.
However, she said, many times parents insisted on getting their daughter circumcised for religious or traditional reasons.
“In such case, we prefer the circumcision were done by a trained health worker rather than some random shaman or traditional healer, which may not be safe,” she said.
Ina denied the decree legitimized abuse against women. She said people often associated female circumcision with genitalia mutilation. “They’re totally different. Circumcising is merely scratching a piece of skin.”
Thursday, September 2, 2010
INDONESIA: Female genital mutilation persists despite ban
September 2, 2010
IRIN
JAKARTA - Though the Indonesian government banned female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) four years ago, experts say religious support for the practice is more fervent than ever, particularly in rural communities.
A lack of regulation since the ban makes it difficult to monitor, but medical practitioners say FGM/C remains commonplace for women of all ages in this emerging democracy of 240 million - the world’s largest Muslim nation.
Although not authorized by the Koran, the practice is growing in popularity.With increased urging of religious leaders, baby girls are now losing the top or part of their clitoris in the name of faith, sometimes in unsanitary rooms with tools as crude as scissors.
“We fear if [FGM/C] gets more outspoken support from religious leaders it will increase even more. We found in our latest research that not only female babies are being circumcised, but also older women ask for it,” said Artha Budi Susila Duarsa, a university researcher at Yarsi University in Jakarta.
While the procedure in Indonesia is not as severe as in parts of Africa and involves cutting less flesh, it still poses a serious health concern.
IRIN
JAKARTA - Though the Indonesian government banned female genital mutilation/cutting (FGM/C) four years ago, experts say religious support for the practice is more fervent than ever, particularly in rural communities.
A lack of regulation since the ban makes it difficult to monitor, but medical practitioners say FGM/C remains commonplace for women of all ages in this emerging democracy of 240 million - the world’s largest Muslim nation.
Although not authorized by the Koran, the practice is growing in popularity.With increased urging of religious leaders, baby girls are now losing the top or part of their clitoris in the name of faith, sometimes in unsanitary rooms with tools as crude as scissors.
“We fear if [FGM/C] gets more outspoken support from religious leaders it will increase even more. We found in our latest research that not only female babies are being circumcised, but also older women ask for it,” said Artha Budi Susila Duarsa, a university researcher at Yarsi University in Jakarta.
While the procedure in Indonesia is not as severe as in parts of Africa and involves cutting less flesh, it still poses a serious health concern.
Wednesday, August 26, 2009
Genital mutilation grounds for asylum bid
August 25, 2009
By Bob Egelko
SAN FRANCISCO -- A Northern California family whose daughter underwent forced circumcision in Indonesia is entitled to seek political asylum in the United States, a federal appeals court said Monday.
The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco criticized immigration officials who, in ordering the family deported, decided that the girl had suffered no serious harm when her genitals were mutilated as a newborn.
Any form of female genital mutilation is "horrifically brutal" and amounts to persecution under established precedents in federal courts and the Justice Department's immigration courts, the court said.
The 3-0 ruling gives Bob Benito Benyamin, his wife, Anabella Rodriguez, and their three daughters another chance to challenge deportation to Indonesia, where the oldest daughter underwent forced circumcision at 5 days old in 1992 at the orders of a grandmother. The family said she has felt pain from the procedure ever since.
The family entered the United States legally in 1999 and applied for asylum in 2002 after Benyamin's business visa expired. They live in the Sacramento area, their lawyer said.
Federal courts have granted asylum to women who fled their countries after being genitally mutilated or threatened with mutilation. In this case, the parents argued that one of their younger daughters would face ritual mutilation if deported to Indonesia, and that sparing her from deportation would be meaningless if the rest of her family was deported.
In denying asylum, immigration judges cited a State Department report that said female genital mutilation as practiced in Indonesia "involves minimal short-term pain, suffering and complications."
Contrasting the procedure to a court's description of mutilation in Ethiopia, where the genitals are cut with knives and recovery takes 40 days, immigration courts said the Indonesian girl had not been persecuted and that neither she nor her family was entitled to asylum.
But the appeals court said its rulings and a World Health Organization report have found that even in its least drastic form, the genital mutilation of women and girls causes physical and psychological harm and the risk of serious complications.
An immigration review board's "attempt to parse the distinction between differing forms of female genital mutilation is ... a threat to the rights of women in a civilized society," Judge Margaret McKeown said in the court ruling.
The court returned the case to the immigration board to decide whether the younger daughter faced a likelihood of genital mutilation in Indonesia. If so, the board must decide whether the entire family is eligible for asylum or whether the parents and their daughters might instead be sent to Venezuela, the mother's native country. The younger daughter was born there.
Robert Ryan, an attorney in San Francisco who represents the family, said the court had corrected a series of legal errors by the immigration judges, including their downplaying of the older daughter's trauma.
"There's no such thing as mild female genital mutilation," he said.
By Bob Egelko
SAN FRANCISCO -- A Northern California family whose daughter underwent forced circumcision in Indonesia is entitled to seek political asylum in the United States, a federal appeals court said Monday.
The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco criticized immigration officials who, in ordering the family deported, decided that the girl had suffered no serious harm when her genitals were mutilated as a newborn.
Any form of female genital mutilation is "horrifically brutal" and amounts to persecution under established precedents in federal courts and the Justice Department's immigration courts, the court said.
The 3-0 ruling gives Bob Benito Benyamin, his wife, Anabella Rodriguez, and their three daughters another chance to challenge deportation to Indonesia, where the oldest daughter underwent forced circumcision at 5 days old in 1992 at the orders of a grandmother. The family said she has felt pain from the procedure ever since.
The family entered the United States legally in 1999 and applied for asylum in 2002 after Benyamin's business visa expired. They live in the Sacramento area, their lawyer said.
Federal courts have granted asylum to women who fled their countries after being genitally mutilated or threatened with mutilation. In this case, the parents argued that one of their younger daughters would face ritual mutilation if deported to Indonesia, and that sparing her from deportation would be meaningless if the rest of her family was deported.
In denying asylum, immigration judges cited a State Department report that said female genital mutilation as practiced in Indonesia "involves minimal short-term pain, suffering and complications."
Contrasting the procedure to a court's description of mutilation in Ethiopia, where the genitals are cut with knives and recovery takes 40 days, immigration courts said the Indonesian girl had not been persecuted and that neither she nor her family was entitled to asylum.
But the appeals court said its rulings and a World Health Organization report have found that even in its least drastic form, the genital mutilation of women and girls causes physical and psychological harm and the risk of serious complications.
An immigration review board's "attempt to parse the distinction between differing forms of female genital mutilation is ... a threat to the rights of women in a civilized society," Judge Margaret McKeown said in the court ruling.
The court returned the case to the immigration board to decide whether the younger daughter faced a likelihood of genital mutilation in Indonesia. If so, the board must decide whether the entire family is eligible for asylum or whether the parents and their daughters might instead be sent to Venezuela, the mother's native country. The younger daughter was born there.
Robert Ryan, an attorney in San Francisco who represents the family, said the court had corrected a series of legal errors by the immigration judges, including their downplaying of the older daughter's trauma.
"There's no such thing as mild female genital mutilation," he said.
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