Yemen Working to Reduce Female Genital Mutilation 30% by 2012

By Lauren Mellinger
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

SANA’A, Yemen– On December 3, Yemen announced the implementation of a five-year plan to reduce the practice of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) or female circumcision.  The practice of FGM operations occurs most often in coastal areas of the country.

According to Ali Hashim Al-Seraj, an expert on family and reproductive health issues, Yemen remains the last Gulf country where the rate of FGMs remains high.  The rates of FGM are highest in coastal areas of Yemen; in Hodeidah, 97% of girls are forced to undergo the procedure.  The practice is also frequent in Hadramout (96%), Aden (82%), Al-Maharah (96%), and Sana’a (45%).

Al-Seraj claims the rate of FGM operations in Yemen is comparable to Sudan and Egypt, two countries with the highest rate of FGM operations annually.  According to UNICEF Director of the Childhood Protection Program, Nour Al-Kasadi, FGM operations are generally more popular in areas that have high illiteracy rates and where there is a lack of awareness of the negative health effects of the practice.  In addition, coastal areas in Yemen have large numbers of African immigrants who come from countries where the practice is common.

Legislation that bans the procedure without a sufficient public education program regarding the dangerous consequences of FGM has proved to have little deterrent effect.  While the Yemeni government has taken measures in the past to reduce the practice of FGM operations, including banning the procedure from all hospitals and health centers in the country in 2001, this failed to reduce the practice.  Instead, it led to an increase in “back-alley” procedures, involving no sterilized tools and the absence of doctors or other medical experts to perform the procedure.  A study by the US Agency for International Development revealed that only 10% of FGMs carried out in coastal areas of Yemen are performed by trained medical personnel.

The new plan will focus on public education and involves coordination among the government, civil society organizations, and the media.  The goal is to raise public awareness of the negative health effects of the procedure.  In addition, according to Dr. Nafissah Al-Jaifi, Secretary General of the High Council of Motherhood and Childhood, support from religious leaders in the community is vital to the success of the program.

The plan has been well received internationally.  The United Nations Children’s Fund, which regards FGM as “one of the most persistent, pervasive and silently endured human rights violations,” has pledged to assist with both the implementation and assessment stages of the program once it is accredited by the Yemeni government.  According to UNICEF’s Yemen Representative Aboudou Karimou Adjibade, “We cannot let this harmful practice take its toll on the health and development of girls and women.  We are ready to accelerate the abandonment of FGM in one generation.”

For more information, please see:

Yemen Times – Yemen to Reduce the Practice of FGM by 30 Percent by 2012 – 5 December 2008

Yemen Times – Yemen National Plan to Accelerate FGM Eradication – 19 November 2008

Gulf News – Yemen to Fight Female Genital Mutilation – 27 June 2008

US Department of State – Yemen: Report on Female Genital Mutilation or Female Genital Cutting – 1 June 2001

UN and Human Rights Groups Alarmed with Nepal Disappearances

By Pei Hu
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

Kathmandu, Nepal –The UN and human rights groups have been concerned with the high number of disappearances in Nepal.  In August 2004, after Amnesty International reported that more than 378 people disappeared in 2003, the UN issued a warning to Nepal on the International Day of Disappeared. However, the situation did not improve. In December 2004, the UN has sent a fact finding team to Nepal to investigate the large number of political disappearances.

The four-member UN fact finding team will interview families of the disappeared and a detention facility.

Many of these disappearances are politically motivated. Amnesty International reported that most cases are from the Nepalese government who detained suspected Maoists. There are also cases of rebels abductions, extrajudicial killings, and tortures of suspected security forces. Since 1996, 9,500 people, many of them civilians, have reportedly died since the internal fighting between the security forces and Maoist rebels. Brad Adams, Asia Director at Human Rights Watch, said, “Disappearances were perhaps the worst aspect of a dirty and ugly war in Nepal … Yet so far no one has been held accountable.”

Human rights groups say that Nepal has the highest number of disappearances, about 1,400 cases since the conflict began, which surpasses Colombia in the most number of disappearances.  Amnesty International said, “The unprecedented number of ‘disappearances’ is one of the most pressing human rights issues facing Nepal. Only by tackling the culture of abuse, ending the impunity of security forces and putting in place comprehensive legal and institutional reforms can the government halt the slide towards a human rights disaster.”

The Nepalese government denies these allegations. Nepalese officials says about 1,000 people have been released after being held in custody and only 300 people are still currently detained.

Human Rights Watch and Advocacy Forum sent a letter to the Nepalese government that urged the government to pass a bill to hold perpetrators accountable and to provide appropriate compensation to families of the disappeared.

For more information, please see:

Amnesty International – Nepal: Alarming Rise in “Disappearances” Fueling Human Rights Crisis – 31 August 2004

BBC – Alarm over Nepal Disappearances – 31 August 2004

BBC – UN Probing Nepal Disappearances – 6 December2004

HWR – Nepal: Adopt a Bill on ‘Disappearances’ – 25 November 2008

Fiji Commission Sets Strict Rules for Foreign Missions

By Hayley J. Campbell
Impunity Watch Reporter, Oceania

SUVA, Fiji – The Fiji Human Rights Commission has instituted a set of strict conditions that must be met before foreign missions are allowed to review Fiji’s laws.

Establishment of the new policy follows allegations that Fiji’s interim attorney general, Sayed-Khaiyum,  threatened a group of lawyers planning to conduct a review of Fiji’s justice system. Last week, the London-based, International Business Association (IBA) claimed they received a letter from the interim-attorney-general which made clear that the interim government would not welcome the group and would take “appropriate steps” if IBA delegates came to Fiji.

While Mr. Sayed-Khaiyum denied these allegations, the interim government has barred the IBA in the past from reviewing Fiji’s justice system.

Dr. Shaista Shameem, chairperson to the Fiji Human Rights Commission, says that the new policy calls for “advance comprehensive terms of reference and information about the purpose of the visit as well as an opportunity to discuss findings before their publication.”

According to Dr. Shameem, the purpose of this policy is to protect the Commission’s intellectual property rights. Dr. Shameem argued, “While many foreign visitors and missions pontificated about the rule of law and good governance, they did not practice the basic and minimum principles of due process by discussing the findings with the relevant agencies of the State before publishing them or sending them to other international agencies for action.”

Dr. Shameem added that the Commission will no longer stand for, what they consider, are pointless questions.

For more information, please see:
Radio New Zealand International – Fiji interim AG denies claims he threatened IBA group – 26 November 2008

AFP – Fiji blocks International Bar Association visit – 26 November 2008

Fiji Times – FHRC refuses to meet with foreign missions – 03 December 2008

Radio New Zealand Interational – Fiji Human Rights Commission sets new terms to meet foreign teams – 03 December 2008

FijiLive – FHRC gets strict on foreign missions – 03 December 2008

A Brother Strangles his Sister in Honor Killing

By Yasmine S. Hakimian
Impunity Watch Reporter, Middle East

JERASH, Jordan – On December 1, an unidentified Jordanian man was sentenced to seven-and-a-half years in prison for strangling his 16-year-old married sister. Using wire and his sister’s scarf, the 20-year-old man strangled his sister to cleanse his family’s honor. The man testified it took 30 minutes to strangle his sister to death. He killed her in January in the Gaze refugee camp in the town of Jerash after she visited a female friend.

Girls younger than 18 can legally wed in Jordan. The girl was married for six months at the time of her death.

The presiding judge on the case, Judge Hassan Amayreh, reported the man confessed to the killing. He testified to killing his sister to cleanse his family’s honor after her husband complained that she regularly disappeared from home without a reason. Investigations indicated the girl was visiting her female friend when she wasn’t at home.

Judge Amayreh explained he originally sentenced the man to a 15-year prison term on November 30. However, the judge reduced the sentence since the girl’s family gave up their legal rights. In Jordan, prison sentences are reduced if the family drops the charges against the person who committed the honor killing.

Despite continuous campaigns by local and international human rights activists, those who commit honor killings receive reduced sentences because parliament has refused to reform the penal code to ensure harsher sentences.

Between 15 and 20 women are murdered each year in the name of “honor” in Jordan. Last year around 18 honor killings were recorded.

In the past, Jordan has been criticized for giving lenient sentences in so-called honor killing cases. Some honor killings have carried jail sentences of just six months.

According to the United Nations, over 5,000 women and girls are killed every year by family members in honor killings. These crimes occur where cultures believe that a woman’s unsanctioned sexual behavior brings such shame on the family that the female must be murdered. Honor killings have resulted from talking to a man or in suffering rape.

Honor killings are a controversial issue within the Muslim world. Although a tradition in some teachings of Islam, they are increasingly criticized by Westerners and moderate Muslims around the world.

For more information, please see:

Bare Naked Islam – It Took Him 30 Minutes to Strangle his Sister to Death with a Metal Wire and Her Own Scarf – 3 December 2008

International Campaign Against Honour Killings – Girl Strangled Slowly in Sick ‘Honour Killing’ – 2 December 208

WA Today – ‘Honour Killing’: Man Strangles Sister – 2 December 2008

BBC – Jail for Jordan ‘Honour Killing’ – 1 December 2008

Two Journalists Sentenced as Judicial Crackdown in Myanmar Continues

By Ariel Lin
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

YANGON, Myanmar – Myanmar Junta continues its judicial crackdown on political activities.  Two journalists were sentenced for seven years each.  Thet Zin, editor of the local Myanmar-language journal Myanmar Nation, and Sein Win Maung, the paper’s manager, were convicted for undermining the government under the country’s Printing and Publishing Law.  They were also being charge for possessing documents deemed to be subversive, including a UN Special Human Rights Report on Myanmar. The same day, 13 members of the ’88 Generation students group’ were sentenced to six years in jail.

Thet Zin founded the Myanmar Nation in 2006.  He is a former political prisoner and had previously worked as a reporter and editor for several weekly journals, including News Watch and Ah Lin Tan.  Thet Zin and Sein Win Maung were arrested in February in a raid in which military intelligence officers seized the UN Special Human Rights Report on Myanmar, Shan ethnic leader Shwe Ohn’s book on federalism, and a VCD containing footage of the 2007 September uprising.

“In the case of Thet Zin and Sein Win Maung, the judges have imposed the maximum penalty allowed under the press law. What is the most shocking is that none of journalists, bloggers, poets, activists or monks who have recently been sentenced, committed a crime defined as such under Burmese law. Their sole crime is to peacefully oppose the junta”, the worldwide press freedom organization said.

Myanmar courts sentenced more than 100 people, including activists, writers, musicians and Buddhist monks to jail since last month.  Myanmar Junta, which has held power since 1962, frequently arrests artists and entertainers regarded as opposing the regime.

For more information, please see:

AP – Journalists caught in crackdown by Myanmar junta – 01 December 2008

Reporters Without Borders – Two journalists jailed for seven years as wave of sentencing continues – 29 November 2008

The Irrawaddy – Judicial Crackdown in Burma Continues – 28 November 2008