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Emirates Women: FGM In The Middle East | Investigating Cutting Customs
28.4.2015. By Lindsey Stevens
Emirates Woman investigates the culturally sensitive issue of female genital mutilation, and asks what is being done to put an end to this practice in the Middle East.
The preparations have been made. In a makeshift clinic in an old school hall, tables dressed with sheets and pillows serve as hospital beds. This isn’t a blood donation centre, or the latest round of vaccinations for schoolchildren. It’s a clinic in Indonesia where girls are taken to be circumcised. The coming-of-age practice is performed in many countries across the world. For some, it’s perceived as tradition, for others beautification, and many believe it’s intertwined with religious beliefs. According to official bodies such as the United Nations and the World Health Organisation, it’s a human rights violation broadly described as female genital mutilation (FGM), or cutting. (more…)
Al Monitor: KRG looks to enhance protection of women, children
20.4.2015. by Mohammed Salih
ERBIL — Activists and government agencies in Iraqi Kurdistan have drafted amendments over the past few months to the autonomous region’s existing law combating domestic violence, introducing measures aimed at better protection of women’s and children’s rights. (more…)
Global Post: The custom of female circumcision remains good business in Indonesia
15.4.2015. by Marie Dhumieres
JAKARTA, Indonesia — Komariah says she’ll show us how female circumcision is done. She grabs a tangerine on the kitchen table, peels it and takes out a segment. She picks up a huge knife from a shelf. Then she bursts out laughing.
“I’m just kidding,” she says, before taking a much smaller pair of scissors. She sits at the table, holds the tangerine segment up, and carefully makes a small incision at the top. “That’s it!” She laughs again. Her daughter watches, shyly smiling. She was “circumcised” three days after she was born, 13 years ago. (more…)
The Quint: India’s Well Kept Secret
10.4.2015. By Manoj Mohanka
“When I was around seven, my grandmother took me on an outing. We went to a dingy building. The women there told me to take my panties off. Then all the women, including my grandmother, pinned my arms and legs down. One of the women took a blade and began cutting me down there. I screamed in terror and pain.”
Those may be the words of only one woman, but they convey the anguish faced by many. (more…)
Guardian: In Thailand’s Muslim south, authorities turn a blind eye to FGM
1.4.2015. By Gabrielle Paluch.
Eight-week-old baby Amiyah grimaces when sunlight falls on her face as though she isn’t used to the idea of having been born yet. On a Saturday afternoon, in Thailand’s southern Pattani province, her Muslim mother has brought her to a small clinic so midwife Dah can slice her clitoris for sunat. The practice, a form of female genital mutilation (FGM), has been banned by the World Health Organisation. (more…)
The diversity of Kurdish women’s perspectives of female genital mutilation
6.2.2015. By Nazar Shabila. The 6th February is marked by the United Nations sponsored awareness day, International Day of Zero Tolerance for Female Genital Mutilation. To commemorate this day, Nazar Shabila reveals women’s perspectives in Iraq.
Female genital mutilation (FGM) is widely practiced in Iraqi Kurdistan Region (IKR) with a prevalence of around 40%. The prevalence, in fact, varies by geographical locations ranging from 4% in Duhok governorate to 58% in Erbil governorate and 70% in some specific rural areas of Sulaymania governorate. (more…)
Saudi Fatwa: A practice that leads to women losing their sexual desire is bad
6.3.2015. On the Saudi Arabian TV show “Yastaftunak” (asking you for a Fatwa) Abdulrahim called Dr. Al Sheikh Abdul Aziz Fawzan for a Fatwa on FGM. Fawzan is a Saudi Professor of Islamic Law at Imam Muhammad ibn Saud Islamic University and a member of the Teacher’s Board at al-Imam University. (more…)
VOA: UN, Malaysia Groups Seek to Repeal Fatwa Requiring FGM
March 02, 2015. By Gabrielle Paluch
In 2009, Malaysia’s National Fatwa Committee, the nation’s top Islamic council, required all Muslim women in the country to undergo female genital mutilation, otherwise known as female circumcision.
A recent study indicated that nearly all Muslim women in the country have had the procedure. But now the United Nations is working with the Committee to repeal ruling that made it mandatory. (more…)
Vice: Female Circumcision Is Becoming More Popular in Malaysia
I meet 19-year-old Syahiera Atika at the mall. She spends most Sundays prowling Kuala Lumpur’s mega malls like other women her age, but as she eagerly points out she’s also different. Syahiera is a modern incarnation of Malay culture: She happily embraces Western-style capitalism, while at the same time strictly following the local interpretation of Islam. And as she proudly informs me, that also means she’s circumcised.
“I’m circumcised because it is required by Islam,” she says. The Malay word she uses is wajib, meaning any religious duty commanded by Allah. Syahiera is aware of how female circumcision is perceived in the West, but rejects any notion that it’s inhumane. “I don’t think the way we do it here is harmful,” she says. “It protects young girls from premarital sex as it is supposed to lower their sex drive. But I am not sure it always works.” She giggles at this thought.
Deutsche Welle Persia: Cutting of female genitals
19.2.2015. The Persian program of the German Deutsche Welle recently aired a program about FGM in Iran. In the following we document parts of it (we did not translate some of the general explanations about FGM worldwide):
„The results of a survey show that 83% of women on the island Qeschm and 50% of women in Iranian Kurdistan are mutilated. The researchers are convinced that such practices are also prevalent in other parts of the country. (more…)