Rights experts say that the Myanmar government “has long shown a lack of commitment to breaking the cycle of impunity for widespread sexual and gender-based violence”. This is a dated photo of women travelling on a crowded train in Myanmar. Credit: Amantha Perera/IPS

By Samira Sadeque
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 28 2020 (IPS)

A legislation that aims to protect women against violence in Myanmar, while long overdue, is raising concern among human rights advocates about its inadequate definition of rape, vague definition for “consent”, and anti-lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender rhetoric.

Myanmar is soon to see the latest version of its Prevention of and Protection from Violence Against Women (PoVAW) introduced in parliament. But the Global Justice Centre (GJC), an international human rights and humanitarian law organisation focusing on advancing gender equality, has pointed out that the legislation falls short of addressing violence against women.

According to GJC, the language used in the law borrows from Myanmar’s 1861 Penal Code and thus perpetuates antiquated understandings of rape, such as; considering rape as violence committed only by men, the definition of “rape” constituting only of vaginal penetration, and no acknowledgement of marital rape.

“The Myanmar government has long shown a lack of commitment to breaking the cycle of impunity for widespread sexual and gender-based violence, a problem that is exacerbated by broader structural barriers with respect to Myanmar’s military justice system, and a lack of robust domestic options for accountability,” the GJC analysis has claimed.

Last week, Khin Ohmar, an exiled human rights advocate from Myanmar and founder and chairperson of the advisory board of Progressive Voice — a participatory rights-based policy research and advocacy organisation rooted in civil society, with strong links to grassroots and community-based organisations throughout Myanmar  —  shared how sexual violence in the country is used in a “systematic pattern to target ethnic women and girls”.

Ohmar was speaking at the United Nations Security Council Open Debate on Sexual Violence in Conflict, where she further reiterated how the military in Myanmar has carried out “unspeakable crimes” against ethnic minorities in the country.

Meanwhile, GJC has also published a list of recommendations that leaders can follow to ensure the law is comprehensive as well as applicable in today’s time.

IPS had a conversation with Akila Radhakrishnan, president of GJC, on the issue. Some parts have been edited for clarity purposes.

Inter Press Service (IPS): The year is 2020. How is Myanmar only now introducing the Prevention of Violence against Women Law (PoVAW)?

Akila Radhakrishnan (AK): There’s been a couple of things – I think the lack of will is a starting point. This is something consistently being pushed for by women in civil society since about 2013.

It has been raised as an issue and a part of the reason it’s such a priority is because the original laws we’re talking about date back to 1861.

We’re really talking about laws that haven’t been updated so with the political transition there was a moment when women in civil society saw the opportunity to think it’s time we had a comprehensive law on violence against women, updating progressive positions in the penal code and bring in things like protective orders or a more robust categorisations of kinds of sexual and other types of violence.

And in some ways, the military continues to perpetrate mass sexual violence. Some of the key things that civil society has been pushing for is bringing the military under a mandate of the law, which is antithetical to the military’s interest as well.

IPS: Despite Aung San Suu Kyi being the leader of the country, why are there still discrepancies in the legislation?

AK: Aung San Suu Kyi is no feminist. She has certainly in the past made stronger statements on sexual violence than she currently takes on but she’s very much seen certain types of political reform as her priority. If you look at the trajectory of the laws that were initially passed through the transition, most of the laws were really wound around issues that enabled foreign investment, for example.

There were certain laws that were due to be changed around issues such as certain types of press freedoms, many of which have been regressing in recent times in any case. There was never kind of a feminist priority set from the leadership.

There were certainly some amazing feminists who got elected, including from local women’s civil society who were elected to parliament. They even felt they’ll have the power to set what are the priorities to be passed, to be considered to be looked at in the context of a country that has a range of reforms that need to be undertaken.

Another issue is that it’s been really slow going in the part of some of the agencies that are involved in this as well such as others, such as the attorney general’s office, department of social welfare. There’s a complicated range of actors involved in the development of the law and in the pushback against the law as well

IPS: Where would you say the PoVAW law lacks most glaringly and needs to be most urgently addressed?

AK: Probably the most urgent one is the places where they continue to cling to the penal code and not really think through how to amend it. They kind of cling to the penal code definition of rape itself – it refuses to let go of rape as it was defined in the 1861 penal code.

We detail a range of issues with that specific definition. And a major part of the impetus was to say our more modern definitions of rape, that are more inclusive, that are gender neutral and have better definitions of consent and at the end of the day you’re creating this whole process and you’re clinging to something that’s there.

And related to that is issues such as marital rape as a crime that is somewhat separate from rape, it’s a lesser crime, a lesser penalty and you know that also stems out of an antiquated mindset.

IPS: Is this legislation only for cisgendered women?

AK: There’s a little bit of a tension there. The law itself is a violence against women law and that’s in the framework it’s been developed over quite a bit of time, so there’s been tension wanting to certainly to try to make the law as inclusive as possible [and] really thinking through how difficult it is to even bring this to fruition.

In this moment, it’s important to try to think of how you take an intersectional inclusive approach to this. But unfortunately we’re going to end up only with a VAW framework so we want to at least within that context — and this is really belying on the expertise of groups that do this work better than we do — to really think through how to make something like this as inclusive as possible.

IPS: There are many ethnic minorities in Myanmar, many who often flee the country. How are ethnic minorities targeted for violence and sexual violence?

AK: The military uses sexual violence as a tactic weapon in its conflict, as its violent actions against all ethnic minorities. It is a systematic pattern —  one that is met with impunity which is why legal reforms and accountability are so important. 

IPS: What are your hopes for the steps ahead for the PoVAW law?

AK: The law is an important step forward but in order for it to be a meaningful step forward it actually needs to take into account — and through the process be amended — so it meets international standards, and addresses some of the key issues with the law itself. Otherwise you get kind of a patchwork law where a lot of time and energy has been put into it, but it’s not going to achieve what it could’ve achieved to actually come in line with international standards.

New Zealand has one of the highest rates of domestic violence in the developing world. Recent legislation there that gives victims of domestic violence 10 days of paid leave, without having to present any documentation in support, has been praised across the globe.

The Domestic Violence – Victims’ Protection Bill was passed at the end of July with 63 to 57 votes and was launched by Green member of parliament Jan Logie.

“We were very happy to hear about the passage of legislation in New Zealand affording victims of domestic violence 10 days of paid leave and scheduled flexibility from their employment to leave their partners, find new homes and protect themselves and their children,” Kristine Lizdas, legal policy director at Battered Women’s Justice Project (BWJP), shared with IPS.

According to United Nations Women, 30 percent of women experience physical or sexual violence from an intimate partner, and in some countries that number goes up to 70 percent.

“Such policy can contribute to and facilitate the exercise of the right of women who experience domestic violence in New Zealand to support, services and protection for themselves and for their children,” Juncal Plazaola, an expert on ending gender violence at U.N. Women, told IPS.

Back in 2004, the Philippines also passed the Anti-Violence Against Women and Their Children Act of 2004, which provided the same 10 days of paid leave to victims of domestic violence.

Civil society and law experts have analysed the benefits of this new policy, given that women who suffer from domestic violence underperform at work. In the United States, victims of domestic violence lose around 10 days of paid work every year, and they work 10 percent of hours less than those who do not suffer from abuse at home.

Plazaola, from U.N. Women, explained: “Women can be constantly harassed at work, delayed getting to work or prevented from going to work. This can lead to either quitting their job or being terminated.” Seeing these types of occurrences, it is vital to promote a corporate environment that takes this reality into account.

“Women who experience domestic violence have high rates of absenteeism at work and such a measure can support them keep their employment. This policy can therefore contribute to more job security, economic opportunities and independence and greater chances for abused women to abandon an abusive relationship,” Plazaola added.

Employment and labour attorney Mark I. Shickman, from Freeland Cooper & Foreman LLP, also expressed his agreement with the New Zealand policy: “Employers can allow time off to do what is necessary legally or medically without fear of adverse work consequence or lack of confidentiality.”

However, he did not idealise it.

“Employment accommodations won’t solve every problem, but they are a big help. Vulnerable survivors do not want to risk the work situation which is often their most secure environment, so knowing that they cannot be retaliated against or fired for the time they need to speak to law enforcement, or to counsellors, or to children/family agencies, etc., is a huge help,” Schickman said.

Regarding the risks of the policy—as it does not require the victim to justify in any way that she/he is being abused—all experts seemed optimistic. The risk of the company being subject to fraud by its employees are low.

“The benefits of the law far outweigh the risks involved. The prevalence of false reporting is historically hyperbolised in many contexts. Very few individuals will fraudulently assert that they are victims of domestic violence for the sole purpose of receiving paid leave days,” Lizdas, from BWJP, said.

Plazaola agreed with her by saying that this policy “will most probably contribute to more empowered and satisfied staff with higher productivity.” The issue, she claimed, is not fraud, as most cases are not reported; less than 40 percent of women who have been abused look for help.

“Reasons for this often include shame, as well as blame, from one-self and from others. Therefore, it is not expected that this type of measures will lead to an over- or mis-use of it,” she concluded.

For Lizdas, this kind of policy was a good way to avoid victims’ isolation: “If awareness of intimate partner violence pervades the private/corporate sectors, as well as employers more generally, and if employers are incentivised to identify and provide assistance to employees suspected of being victims of IPV, this should have the effect of reducing victims’ isolation.”

Isolation, an abusive relationship, and a lack of external help increase the risk of domestic violence; at least half of the women victims of homicide every year have been killed by their intimate partners. But homicide is the last step of a violent relationship.

“An abusive relationship doesn’t start with murder, but the abuse escalates and without timely intervention and support, the women may end up murdered,” Plazaola said.

Asked how to avoid this fatal ending, Plazaola was adamant: “We need  legislation and policies on femicide, as well as the tools to properly investigate and punish all forms of violence against women, including femicide. Ending impunity is critical.”

Lizdas agreed: “Reducing intimate partner homicide requires a commitment from a wide variety of social sectors – legal, medical, public health, education, social service, military, etc.”

However, in the U.S, there is another factor that plays into the numbers of female homicide—the easy access to guns. In 2015, 55 percent of the intimate partner homicides in the U.S. were by gun. Shickman warned IPS: “The first issue is getting guns out of the house.”

“Abused women are five times more likely to be killed if the abuser has a gun,” he added.

For Plazaola, the solution to end, or at least reduce, the number of fatal victims on the hands of an intimate partner lies within the whole society.

“Understanding that femicide is the ultimate act in a chain of acts of violence against women, means understanding that health sector, social services, the police and the justice sectors must work together,” she said.

“Having policies that recognise the rights of abused women to protection as well as to other measures that will help them deal with the consequences and harm of this violence, can help us all have a better understanding of their realities, and can contribute to questioning the blaming and shaming too often associated with it.”

A group of Rohingya children emerge from a nearby religious school in Kutupalong camp. Credit: Naimul Haq/IPS

By Naimul Haq
COX'S BAZAR, Bangladesh, Dec 5 2017 (IPS)

Mariam Akhtar, 23, is desperately searching for her young daughter two weeks after arriving from Myanmar in Cox’s Bazar, a southeastern coastal district in Bangladesh.

Already traumatized by the extreme violence she and her family suffered in Buthidaung district in Myanmar, Mariam now faces fresh agony."There are agents looking for opportunities around the clock to lure and smuggle out the children." --Sarwar Chowdhury, Ukhia upazila chairman

“With God’s blessings I was able to reach this camp in Kutupalong alive. But where is my safety here when I have a child lost?” asks the mother of three small children.

Faria Islam Jeba*, a mother of four, also expressed fears when this correspondent approached a group of women in Kutupalong camp. It is the biggest of more than 30 refugee camps scattered across a 35 km stretch of land between Teknaf and Ukhia, two of the small towns in southern Cox’s Bazar where Rohingya refugees are still pouring in every day by the thousands from neighbouring Myanmar.

Jeba experienced rapes and beatings in Myanmar. She says her brothers were shot by Burmese security forces. But Bangladesh isn’t the safe haven she’d hoped for.

“I feel so scared, especially at night when it is dark all around. The hilly terrain and the meandering, muddy roads here make it hard to keep watch on my children when they go out.”

Mariam and Jeba are among many young single mothers who say they lost children inside the camps. The disappearances have been documented by the government and the aid agencies working in the crowded camps.

Over 1,000 children, mostly young girls under aged less than 18 years, have gone missing since the influx of refugees reached its height in late August. Many are believed to have been smuggled out to other parts of the country by human traffickers. Others might have been taken abroad.

Ali Hossain, Cox’s Bazar district commissioner who is supervising all activities in the camps under his command, told IPS, “In last three months we have punished 550 such alleged criminals who were caught red-handed while attempting to traffic children from the camps.”

“It is difficult policing [criminal activity] considering the sheer vastness of the camps. Many of the traffickers enter the camps in the guise of volunteer relief workers [and] they get easy access this way.”

To prevent fake relief workers from getting in, the administration recently introduced registration of all humanitarian organizations.

Still, the unaccompanied Rohingya children badly require protection in an organized manner. Only a fraction of the estimated 500,000 children attend religious schools (madrasas) instead of formal schools. Most are very vulnerable to trafficking as they have no guardians.

“What they [children] need is a ‘safe’ shelter, not just a physical bamboo shed shelter to live in. There are agents looking for opportunities around the clock to lure and smuggle out the children. So, basically they need caretakers and a mechanism to monitor their presence,” said Sarwar Chowdhury, Ukhia upazila chairman.

A Rohingya woman at Kutupalong camp in Bangladesh. Credit: Naimul Haq/IPS

Rohingya refugees are very poor and have had no formal education. “I don’t know who to talk to about the pain in my abdomen,” says a woman named Rina in a soft, broken voice. She came from a village in Buthidaung.

The most common problems women cited were lack of security, privacy and leadership for the refugees. The overwhelming majority are women who have no organized voice in the camps.

Nilima Begum from Maundaw district in Myanmar says, “While in Myanmar we never had any healthcare. We don’t even know what is a hospital or school, as we were highly restricted from moving around even within our own community.”

Amran Mahzan, Executive Director of MERCY Malaysia, an international aid agency working in the camps since a long time, told IPS, “The most common complaint we get from the traumatized women is malnourishment, followed by pregnancy-related complications.”

“The number of pregnant women is very high, and they have poor knowledge of nutrition or pre or post-natal care. Our doctors are continuously providing advice to women on maternity care and safe delivery, but with language and cultural differences being barriers, the level is compliance remains to be seen.”

There are 18,000 pregnant women waiting to deliver and thousands more who may not yet have been identified and registered for healthcare.

The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) is now at the forefront of addressing some of the challenges of emergency reproductive healthcare.

Dr Sathyanarayanan Doraiswamy, Chief of Health at UNFPA, Bangladesh, told IPS, “Our priority response has been to offer access to emergency obstetric and newborn care services, clinical response services for survivors of sexual violence, provide a basic package of prevention for HIV and sexually transmitted infections, safe blood transfusion and practice of universal precautions in health facilities.”

Megan Denise Smith, gender-based violence (GBV) Operations Officer for the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Cox’s Bazar, told IPS, “Community outreach teams share essential information with women and girls regarding available services, whether this be medical, psychosocial or recreational activities to facilitate empowerment.”

She adds, “Mapping out specific areas where women and adolescent girls feel unsafe in talking to them directly will allow the community to then target these areas more effectively and establish a protective presence to prevent further risks.”

Mahmuda, Mental Health Programme Associate of United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) told IPS, “The biggest challenge in dealing with the women is the need for stress management which I think should be the priority. It is now a question of survival and psycho-social counseling already given to over 3000 women in the past three months shows the positive impact.”

Mahmuda, a psychiatrist leading a small team in Kutupalong camp, says, “The women are emotionally numb. Atrocities for Rohingy refugees are nothing new, even the recent ones. They have been exposed to such violence for years and so they continue to suffer from such psychological distress.”

The camps are gradually setting up Child-Safe Spaces for children to play and learn, as well as dedicated services for women. Privacy is an issue in the cramped and overcrowded camps.

Separate examining rooms and private consultation spaces where women can relate their health problems to doctors are also in place, though more are needed.

Dignity and safety are key as many of the women are pregnant as a result of rape and cannot speak up for fear of being stigmatized by others. Many international agencies working in the camps are considering recruiting more female health care professionals.

The challenge is colossal, with over million refugees from Myanmar’s Rakhine State, dubbed the ‘fastest growing humanitarian refugee crisis in the world’.

So far, only 34 percent of the 434 million dollars pledged has been disbursed. One in four children is malnourished, and vaccination against communicable diseases and safe water are urgently needed.

*Names have been changed to protect the victims’ identities.

The series of reports from the border areas of Myanmar and Bangladesh are supported by UNESCO’s International Programme for the Development of Communication (IPDC)

Excerpt:

Gender inequalities drive the disproportionate rate of HIV infection among young South African women aged 15 to 24. Credit: Mercedes Sayagues/IPS

By Nqabomzi Bikitsha
JOHANNESBURG, Dec 1 2014 (IPS)

When she found out that she had human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), Thabisile Mkhize (not her real name) was scared.

She knew little about the virus that had been living in her body since birth and did not know whom to ask. Her mother had just died and she lived with her grandmother in rural KwaZulu Natal, where the HIV prevalence is the highest in South Africa, at 17 percent.

Today, at the age of 16,  Mkhize is an enthusiastic peer educator at her school,  discussing HIV prevention, safe sex and sexual rights. “I want young women to be safe, to make healthy sexual choices,“ she told IPS.South Africa has a perfect storm of early sexual debut, inter-generational sex, little HIV knowledge, violence, and gender and economic inequalities that lead young women aged between 15 and 24 to have a disproportionately high rate of HIV infection

South Africa has a perfect storm of early sexual debut, inter-generational sex, little HIV knowledge, violence, and gender and economic inequalities that lead young women aged between 15 and 24 to have a disproportionately high rate of HIV infection.

They account for one-quarter of new HIV infections and 14 percent of the country’s 6.4 million people living with HIV, according to the ‘South African National HIV Prevalence, Incidence and Behaviour Survey’.

Alarmingly, HIV incidence – the number of new  infections per year – among women aged between 15 and 24 is more than four times higher than among their male peers.

Professor Sinead Delany-Moretlwe, director for research at Wits Reproductive Health and HIV Institute (Wits RHI) in Johannesburg, describes the factors that put young women at higher risk.

“Structural drivers – gender, social and economic inequalities – interact in a number of ways and influence behaviour such as choice of sexual partner and condom use,” she said.

Explaining that young women find it difficult to protect themselves against HIV, she noted that they “end up with controlling partners and fail to negotiate condom use or are forced to have sex.”

Tumi Molebatse, a 20-year-old student from Soweto, is an example. Years ago she had an HIV test and would like to have another with her boyfriend of two years, or at least to have safe sex.  “But my boyfriend will think I am cheating on him if I ask for condoms,” she told IPS.  “He supports me financially so it’s better to not bring it up.”

In South Africa, one of the most unequal countries in the world, relationships with older men often pen the way for young women’s social mobility and material comfort.

According to Kerry Mangold from the South African National AIDS Council, inter-generational and transactional sex increase the risk of infection because older men have higher HIV rates than young men.

“It’s not rare to see a young girl sleep with an older man for food or a little bit of money,“ said Mkhize. “Young women aspire to have nice things in life but they don’t have money, they don’t have jobs, and they go for partners who can provide those things.”

According to the ‘South African National HIV Prevalence, Incidence and Behaviour Survey’, one-third of girls aged between 15 and 19 reported a partner five years or more their senior.

Risk and choices

“At its most extreme, gender inequality manifests as gender-based violence,” says Delany-Moretlwe.

In South Africa, young women who experienced intimate partner violence were 50 percent more likely to have acquired HIV than women who had not suffered violence, according to the UNAIDS Gap Report.

Despite decades of awareness campaigns, less than one-third of young women know how to prevent HIV.

Mkhize says that many girls hear about sex and HIV from friends and teachers, and often  the information is wrong. “I know girls who believe you cannot get HIV if you boyfriend has just come back from circumcision school and so they have sex without a condom,” she told IPS.

Mangold would like to see “an enabling environment for young women to make their own choices and reduce their risk.”

Since last year, the ZAZI initiative has been trying to do just that. A sassy campaign, ZAZI (from the Nguni words for “know yourself”) builds knowledge around sexual health through social media, video clips, poetry readings, street murals, music and fun activities that boost girls’ sense of self-worth.

“We hope to discourage them from opting for relationships with older men for material gain and give them confidence to negotiate condom use,” ZAZI advocacy manager Sara Chitambo told IPS.

ZAZI’s motto is “finding your inner strength”. On its website, girls can look up practical advice on what to do if they are raped, where to find contraception and how to prevent HIV.

(Edited by Mercedes Sayagues and Phil Harris)

Damián Valencia (second right) and other members of the young people's network against machismo. Credit: Courtesy of Cascos Rosa

By Leisa Sánchez
QUITO, May 14 2013 (IPS)

At the age of 20, Damián Valencia speaks knowledgeably about every aspect of gender equality. He is a member of Cascos Rosa, a young people’s initiative working for cultural change against machismo and violence against women in Ecuador.

“We seek and promote gender equality and equal rights and opportunities for men and women,” said Valencia, one of the founders of the network of young people – originally all men – united against machismo, whose members call themselves Cascos Rosa (Pink Helmets).

The group was formed in 2010 by teenagers and young adults who had received awareness raising training on gender equality, violence and ways of expressing masculinity from the Ecuadorean chapter of Acción Ciudadana por la Democracia y el Desarrollo (ACDemocracia – Citizens’ Action for Democracy and Development) and the Coalition against Trafficking in Women and Girls in Latin America and the Caribbean.

Valencia said that gender equity “is such a huge problem that it affects everyone.” He acknowledged that “an improvement can be seen” in the country, but added that “even so, we are still living in a patriarchal society.”

Belonging to Cascos Rosa has had a major impact on his life, he said. At home there was “a machista scheme of things” in which the men “did not wash clothes or do the ironing, did not cook or wash dishes, and expected everything to be done for them.

“Now we all share the same jobs at home, no one is above anyone else, and we have the same rights and opportunities,” he said.

The network promotes a new mentality for combating gender violence and the consumption of prostitution and pornography.

Their pink helmets and T-shirts “break the stereotype that only women wear pink; that boy babies are dressed in blue and girls in pink,” said Valencia, the network’s spokesman.

Cascos Rosa originally had 33 members who emerged from the first workshops held in educational centres, and now has 140. So far 900 teenagers and young people have received training. At first, only young men were included, but as of this year women have joined the ranks.

The network members replicate their knowledge by giving talks in schools and conducting awareness raising activities at gatherings that draw young people, like music festivals. The work of the Cascos Rosa has spread from Quito to four other municipalities in the northern province of Pichincha, where the local government supports the project.

They wear pink T-shirts at their talks, meetings and other activities, in order to create an impact and practise what they preach.

Carolina Félix, who runs workshops for the network, told IPS that it is an ongoing effort, because deep-seated change is not achieved in a 12-hour training session. “That is not enough to modify behaviours and attitudes, let alone reality,” she said. But she added that the workshops do spark reflection, interest, questions and new practices among young people.

“We do not impose a way of thinking. We encourage the construction of a society based on equality, human rights and equity. The goal is to create spaces where men do not have power over women, where they express their emotions, and where women also understand that we have rights, freedoms and responsibilities, just as men do,” Félix said.

The aim, as well as shaping character and educating youngsters, is to encourage leadership traits and to make each young person a multiplier agent of their knowledge and experience, at home as well as at educational centres.

What happened in Valencia’s home shows that this can be done. In this middle-class family of three children, where the parents are shopkeepers, “everyone has changed, especially my father, who now washes the dishes and sometimes does the ironing. My mother is happier and calmer because her burden is lighter,” Valencia said.

“A definite change is taking place,” said Félix, describing the impact on the new generation taking up the baton for gender equity. “They are not afraid of showing themselves as they are, and neither do they say, ‘poor women, such victims!’ because it is an issue both men and women have to work on.”

Violence: the tip of the iceberg

The Transition Commission set up by the government to determine the public institutions that will guarantee equality between women and men recognises the need to “promote cultural transformations” to eradicate inequality and discrimination.

The priority, according to Alexandra Ocles, who chairs the commission, is to transform “cultural patterns involving values, customs, practices, the social imaginary, habits, sexist stereotypes, representations and symbols to do with sexual diversity and the traditional roles that society assigns to women and men.”

Gender violence is one of the most serious problems, according to the National Survey on Family Relationships and Gender-Based Violence against Women, the first of its kind to be carried out in this country of 14.5 million people.

The survey, carried out in 2011, found that 60.6 percent of the women interviewed had suffered some type of gender violence: physical, psychological, sexual or financial.

Psychological or emotional violence was the most frequently cited, by 53.9 percent of the respondents, followed by physical violence (38 percent), financial or property violence – the removal or retention of property or economic resources belonging to the victim – (35.3 percent) and sexual violence (25.7 percent).

“Ninety percent of married or cohabiting women (in the sample) who had experienced violence were not separated from their partners. Some 52.5 percent of them said that couples must overcome their difficulties and stay together, and 46.5 percent said their problems were not so serious,” says the study, carried out by the National Institute of Statistics and Census (INEC).

The debate on gender-based violence emerged into the public arena in the late 1980s. The first special police units providing services for women and families were introduced in 1994, and one year later the law on violence against women and the family came into force.

In 2007, the National Plan for the Eradication of Gender-Based Violence against children, adolescents and women was launched, which includes in its aims “changing discriminatory social and cultural patterns.” The constitution approved in 2008 mandated the integration of a gender perspective into all public projects and established institutional guarantees for women’s human rights.

In recent years there have been advances, including provision of comprehensive services in the justice system, campaigns against machismo and gender violence, and a strategy to mainstream a gender perspective in higher education.

Progress has also been made in women’s participation in the different branches of government: the proportion of women in the judiciary climbed from six percent in 2006 to 43 percent in 2011; in the executive branch their participation rose from 14 to 33 percent in the same period; and in the legislature the share increased from 25 to 34 percent.

Left-leaning President Rafael Correa has declared that achieving gender equity is one of the priorities of his government.

Her face covered with a maroon  scarf and with large old -fashioned goggles hiding her eyes, Sonali Mukherjee lived one of the most cherished moments of her life when she earned a jackpot on a show hosted by Indian film star Amitabh Bachchan.

Chaperoned by Bollywood actress Lara Dutta, she went on to win the prize money of 2.5 million rupees (46,000 dollars) on the Indian version of ‘Who Wants to Be a Millionaire’.

But almost blind, she could not see Bachchan. Her eyes were severaly damaged in an acid attack in 2003. She was a sociology student in Dhanbad in eastern India when three men whose advances she had spurned threw acid on her face.

The fate of the 27-year-old is similar to that of many Indian women assaulted by sex offenders in gang rapes and vicious acid attacks.

The London-based Acid Surviors’ Trust International puts the figure of such attacks worldwide at 1,500 a year. But in India it can be a long road to treatment and to justice.

“What my sister is undergoing should not be faced by anyone,” her brother Debasish Mukherjee tells IPS. “What angers us is that the guys who did this got bail and are free. Why are they not arrested and punished?

“People should come out and protest. Society has to awaken. We want to see justice done,” says Mukherjee, whose sister is under treatment in a Delhi hospital now.

“She might be able to see with one eye perhaps after these surgeries. She has had 22 surgeries already and about ten more are to be done.”

Following the gang rape on a Delhi bus in December, acid attack on women has been included as a sex crime. Stronger punishments are now set out for stalking, voyeurism and acid attacks.

In October last year four men threw acid on 19-year-old Chanchal Paswan and her 15-year-old sister after they protested the sexual advances the men made.

“Four men from our district in Patna (in eastern India) had been harassing her for months. One night they got into our house and threw acid on Chanchal and her sister. The four accused have been arrested, but their trial hasn’t started yet,” their father Sailesh Paswan tells IPS.

In an online petition for justice through change.org, the father writes: “I’ve seen how public pressure forced the authorities to take action during the Delhi gang rape case and I want your help to ensure justice for my daughter.

“That’s why I started a petition on change.org telling the district magistrate of Patna to ensure speedy justice and provide adequate compensation. Chanchal narrates this brutal incident to me everyday as she struggles without proper treatment and compensation.”

Women’s rights activist Varsha Jawalgekar says that for the last nearly five months the Paswan family has been going from one court to another.

Moyna Pramanik, 29, of West Bengal state has been living with a scar for a decade now. Her husband and in-laws poured a mixture of acid and kerosene on her over dowry.

“I remember the day they pinned me down, and three of them – my husband, my sister-in-law’s husband and my mother-in-law, poured acid and kerosene oil on me,” Moyna tells IPS.

According to Acid Survivors Foundation India (ASFI), there is no proper record of acid victims. A Right to Information (RTI) petition in the state of West Bengal elicited a figure of only 56 recorded cases from 2006 to 2012.

“We found 53 recorded cases, 77 victims and 19  victims just in Kolkata. We believe there could be 700 to 800 recorded cases across India in the past six years,” says Dr Subhas Chakraborty, executive director of ASFI. The group works in association with the London-based ASTI.

“An acid attack in most cases is no less than a sexual crime. It is because the offender could not physically assault the victim that he throws acid on her,” Dr. Mukherjee tells IPS.

“When the Verma Commission (a panel under former Indian apex court judge Justice Verma formed after the Delhi gang rape) was drafting the new anti-sexual assault recommendations, we requested the panel to include acid attacks under sexual crimes,” says Dr Mukherjee.

Mukherjee says easy availability of acid in the retail market needs to be checked. “You can get a bottle of acid for just 50 rupees (a dollar) from the market.”

Midiam Lobaina, a member of an ecumenical network of Christian women. Credit: Jorge Luis Baños/IPS

By Ivet González
HAVANA, Dec 3 2012 (IPS)

Midiam Lobaina describes herself as a “Christian militant” who takes a feminist reading of the Bible to workshops and religious services around Cuba, to discuss gender equality and a culture of peace.

Participants learn about gender violence, its prevention and ways to break free, among other issues.

“All churches know that the abuse of women is also a family and community problem,” says Lobaina, who is coordinator of the Women and Gender Programme of the Cuban Council of Churches (CIC).

Lobaina, who is also coordinator of the “Débora” Christian Women’s Network, founded in 2009, spoke with IPS about her work preventing violence against women.

Q: What is the reaction to these issues in Christian communities?

A: Sometimes there is a great deal of apprehension or expectations about what we are going to say. But when we address the issues of gender-based violence and discrimination through biblical texts, we are met mostly with acceptance.

The Bible has many liberating stories and others where women’s exclusion is denounced.

We have also encountered rejection. The gender issue can be disturbing because it addresses very difficult realities, and not everybody wants to know about them.

We have made progress compared to more than 20 years ago, when women’s problems had just begun to be discussed in Cuban churches. Now there is a greater openness to talking about gender inequality and many congregations ask us to hold workshops.

Q: What does this “alternative” reading of the Bible consist of? How are sexist passages addressed?

A: It is true that the Bible contains texts that are discriminatory toward women — in some communities they were expressly forbidden from speaking — but it also contains liberating ones.

For example, many say that for God there are no differences of sex or race. We cannot forget that some passages were a result of very patriarchal eras and contexts, in which women were not taken into consideration.

Q: Who tends to come to the workshops?

A: They are open to everyone, but it is mainly women who come. Nevertheless, the number of men taking part in the workshops has grown across the country, through the CIC programme.

The question of masculinity is also addressed using biblical passages, although this focus is new. People tend to confuse questions of masculinity with sexual diversity, an issue that many people are still reluctant to discuss.

Q: What special characteristics does the prevention of gender-based violence have in Christian communities?

A: Many women are abused in their homes and even in their churches, and they don’t tell anyone. They keep their problem a secret out of shame and the idea that “family matters” are not talked about in public. Some underestimate the seriousness of their situation, others don’t realise that they are in danger, and others reveal their secret only very confidentially.

That is why it is essential to train and raise the awareness of congregation leaders. That way they can assist women who ask for help or talk about their problem. Sometimes the solution is not within reach, but sometimes it is.

People who are abused generally lack the tools and resources to get out of the situation they find themselves in.

In Cuba not all of the structures exist, either, for victims to break that vicious cycle. I know of Christian congregations that support abused women, especially in the most extreme cases. On the other hand, people need to identify other, more subtle forms of violence.

Q: What are these other faces of abuses?

A: When women are made invisible, silenced, ignored and not allowed to participate, and their contributions are not recognised, they are very much abused.

Psychological violence, in all of its magnitude, is the most widespread. Women are centrally involved in pastoral work with children, caring for the sick and evangelical work, roles that they have always embraced.

I was the adviser to a student from Havana’s Instituto Superior de Estudios Bíblicos y Teológicos (Higher Institute of Biblical and Theological Studies), who conducted a study on gender-based violence among 28 women from a community in the Cuban capital.

When we processed the data, we found that six of them were in a dangerous situation. Unfortunately, one of them was murdered by her spouse that week, and he subsequently committed suicide. It was a tragedy…we were unable to save her. But we alerted the other five to the danger they were in.

Q: How much has women’s participation in Protestant churches changed?

A: I come from a Baptist denomination that does not ordain women. I later joined another Baptist group that does.

The history of women who have wanted to be pastors has been hard. For example, women missionaries studied in seminaries just like men, but when they graduated, they did not have the right to be pastors. In fact, if they married, they couldn’t even be missionaries.

That is why at a young age I joined a Christian group that stood up for the role of women in the church, and that asked for more equality and justice for them.

A gender-based approach has become much more influential in pastoral and ecclesiastical work and at Christian research institutes since the Decade of Women, from 1985 to 1995. This year we are celebrating the 20th anniversary of the ordainment of the first three women in the Fraternity of Baptist Churches in Cuba.

Q: How much can religious communities contribute to the struggle against gender-based violence?

A: Congregations that work for gender equality are fortresses in their communities. In some, their work goes beyond the neighbourhood. When a woman is abused at home, the whole family is abused, and the whole community is affected.

Excerpt:

Violence against women is on the rise in Bangladesh. Credit: Naimul Haq/IPS

By Naimul Haq
DHAKA, Oct 17 2012 (IPS)

Bangladesh, often cited as a model of progress in achieving the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), appears to be sliding backwards when it comes to dealing with violence against women (VAW).

Police statistics and assessments by non-government organisations (NGOs) working to establish women’s rights show that there is in an increasing trend in VAW.

According to police records, while there were 2,981 cases of dowry-related violence in 2004, the figure has already hit 4,563 in the first nine months of 2012. Also, where there were 2,901 rape cases recorded in 2004, the figure for the current year, up to August, stands at 2,868.

Farida Akhtar, an internationally known rights activist, told IPS that the disturbing aspect of this rising trend in VAW is that it is “taking on different deceptive forms that go beyond the statistics.”

“When women are better aware of their rights through education, and want to assert them, they suffer violence,” said Akhtar, a founder of the NGO, ‘UBINIG’, acronym for ‘Policy Research for Development Alternatives’ in the Bangla language.

With school enrolment at 95 percent, Bangladesh is well on track to achieving the MDGs that deal with gender parity in education by 2015. But gender equity and women’s empowerment are another matter.

Akhtar said there is evidence that Bangladeshi women are now facing more mental torture than before. “Unfortunately, mental torture cannot be quantified and often goes unreported. But, the fact that suicide is the biggest cause of female deaths in this country is telling.”

Women’s rights leaders say that atrocities go unreported because of fear of harassment by religious or political leaders and, of the cases that are registered, a large number end up being dismissed as false allegations.

Police data show that 109,621 complaints of various forms of VAW were lodged during the 2010-2012 (up to August) period.  Of these, 18,484 complaints were taken into cognizance, but only 6,875 cases were deemed ‘genuine’ and fit for further proceedings.

Mohammad Munirul Islam, additional inspector-general of police responsible for dealing with crimes related to VAW at the police headquarters, told IPS, “On many occasions our investigations showed that the law was used to harass the accused. It does seem that not all complaints are genuine.”

Afroza Parvin, executive director of Nari Unnayan Shakti, a women’s rights NGO, told IPS, “Due to better awareness female victims have learnt to raise their voices, but stop short of seeking police help. During our 20 years of experience on VAW we have found that police often do not cooperate with victims and favour the accused.”

Leading women’s movement activist Shireen Huq says that the main difficulty is that of “establishing a prima facie case for lack of eye witnesses, evidence, etc., with the result that the accused are easily acquitted and cases are recorded as false.”

Huq, who is also a founder member of Naripokkho, a local NGO, told IPS that “no matter what the offence or what the form of violence, police and lawyers find it convenient to file the complaint under ‘torture for dowry’, and since this is a non-bailable offence we often hear of the elderly parents of the accused being arrested.”

Failure to fulfill dowry demands is a major cause for VAW in Bangladesh. On average 5,000 complaints of dowry are recorded annually. In 2010, police reported 5,331 cases of dowry, which jumped to 7,079 in 2011.

Despites the debates, official statistics show that VAW continues unabated and many complaints are dismissed without justice. Data from Bangladesh National Women Lawyers’ Association (BNWLA) show that of the 420 recorded rape cases in 2011, only 286 reached the prosecution stage.

Salma Ali, executive director of BNWLA, told IPS that one of the difficulties in establishing the rights of women is the fact that Bangladeshi society is strongly patriarchal. “This means that women suffer discrimination in respect of matrimonial rights, guardianship of children and  inheritance – often through religious injunctions or directives,” the prominent lawyer said.

Hameeda Hossain, chairperson of Ain-o-Shalish Kendra, a leading women’s rights  organisation, told IPS that if  “women are still suffering socially, culturally and politically” it is due to “social acceptance of women’s subordination, discriminatory laws and poor law enforcement.”

“Crimes against women within the family are often ignored, and the women  silenced,” Hossain said. “There is social tolerance of domestic violence and limited intervention.”

To its credit the Bangladesh government has taken a number of legal steps to  improve the situation of women, starting with the Suppression of Violence against Women and Children Act in 2000. In 2009 the National Human Rights Act was passed followed by the Domestic Violence Act in 2010.

Bangladesh is also signatory to international conventions designed to protect women and their rights. Yet, very little is being done on the ground to ensure a secure and safe environment for them, rights activists say.

Access to justice for women who suffer sexual violence in Central America and southern Mexico remains limited despite the high incidence of rape and other crimes, of which underage girls are the main victims, experts say.

“This kind of violence is the most hushed up, hidden, and invisibilised, which means it enjoys the greatest impunity,” Marcela Suazo, the United Nations population fund (UNFPA) regional director for Latin America and the Caribbean, told IPS.

The numbers bear this out.

According to El Salvador’s attorney-general’s office, only six percent of the 8,108 complaints of sex crimes filed between January 2008 and July 2010 led to convictions.

The situation is similar in Nicaragua, where 56 percent of the 1,133 complaints of sexual violence that reached the courts in 2008 were closed. Of this proportion, 70 percent were dismissed, 15 percent ended in acquittals, and only 15 percent led to convictions.

Graffiti in Mexico City: "No More Femicides" Credit:Dennis Bocquet/CC BY 2.0

A multiplicity of factors give rise to these bleak figures in Belize, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama and the nine states of southeast Mexico – a region known as Mesoamerica, which is home to some 70 million people.

These include the reluctance of victims to report sexual violence due to shame or fear, the lack of an effective response by the authorities, and the unequal power relations between men and women, Suazo said.

The main victims are minors. “Girls and adolescents between the ages of 12 and 18 are the population group most affected by sexual violence,” the expert said, adding that they are often sexually harassed or abused by family members or by people close to the family.

“Access must thus be improved to information and education, and to justice – with interdisciplinary services including health, the police and assistance in the judicial process – and a timely, effective legal process must be guaranteed,” she said.

These difficulties and observations are outlined in the report Access to Justice for Women Victims of Sexual Violence in Mesoamerica 2011, published by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), which puts a special emphasis on the cases of El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Nicaragua.

But despite the hurdles to access to justice faced by women victims of sexual violence, the study also reports progress made in the region.

Tracy Robinson, the IACHR rapporteur on the Rights of Women, told IPS that the adoption of laws to fight violence against women and the creation of new justice system institutions with a gender perspective were some of the advances made.

She also cited “the introduction of policies and protocols to guide the actions of everyone who should ensure justice for and protect the victims, and the development of comprehensive approaches to protect them and guarantee their welfare.”

Robinson acknowledged, however, that “many, many women” still do not have access to justice in cases of sexual violence, which means “the levels of impunity for sexual violence are very high.”

“Our main concerns include girls who are at particular risk and poor women who live in rural areas, because the search for justice for them implies an economic cost, above all, if they don’t live near places where legal services are provided,” she added.

Ángela Acevedo, coordinator of the gender secretariat in Nicaragua’s judiciary, told IPS that her country had made some progress in terms of access to justice.

“The proportion of cases that ended in convictions rose from 10 percent in 2004 to 15 percent in 2010. In other words, there has been an improvement in access to justice for women victims of sexual violence,” she said.

And Nicaragua hopes to significantly improve these figures, because of the passage of the Integral Law on Violence Against Women, in January.

The law, which goes into effect this month, defines the crime of “femicide” or gender-related murder, and creates penalties for physical, psychological, property-related, economic and workplace violence, and violence against women perpetrated by public employees or government officials.

But the challenges are still enormous.

“Social tolerance (for this kind of violence) means there is little sensitivity in society towards victims and little support for investigations, with respect to providing evidence, and victims are revictimised by the justice system,” all of which stands in the way of clearing up cases, Acevedo said.

Silvia Rosales, a Central American Court of Justice magistrate, told IPS that the Mesoamerican region has also improved in terms of coordinating law enforcement efforts between the police, prosecutors and judges, in the area of sexual crimes.

But “funds are lacking, as is specific training on the issue for judges and prosecutors,” he said. (END)