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Parents in Egypt say ‘no’ to female genital mutilation

A woman holds an FGM-awareness poster during a rally. (Photo/UNICEF)
Updated 06 February 2019
Reuters
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Parents in Egypt say ‘no’ to female genital mutilation

  • Many families see FGM as a religious obligation and a way to preserve their daughter’s virginity
  • Parents will receive the badges — which resemble the Arabic word “no”
Updated 06 February 2019
Reuters

BEIRUT: Doctors at two Cairo hospitals will pin blue ribbon badges to the clothing of newborn baby girls on Wednesday as they launch a campaign to persuade parents in Egypt to “say no to female genital mutilation (FGM).”

The country has the highest number of women affected by FGM in the world, with nearly nine in 10 having been cut, according to UN data.

Parents will receive the badges — which resemble the Arabic word “no” and look like an upside down version of awareness ribbons for HIV/AIDS and breast cancer — after signing a pledge that they will not have their daughters cut.

Activists hope more hospitals will join the campaign, which launches on International Day of Zero Tolerance for FGM.

FGM was banned in Egypt in 2008 and criminalized in 2016, but the practice persists, with most procedures now carried out by health professionals.

Many families see FGM as a religious obligation and a way to preserve their daughter’s virginity.

“It is a wrong and ugly belief. We have to make clear that FGM (does not stop) sexual desire,” said pediatric doctor Amira Edris who works at one of the Cairo hospitals.

“I have a veil on my head and I respect religious rules ... but this is not a religious rule — it is a false belief,” she told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

FGM, which commonly involves the partial or total removal of the external genitalia, is practiced in a swathe of African countries and parts of Asia and the Middle East.

It is often done by traditional cutters with unsterilized blades, but there is an increasing trend for FGM to be carried out by health professionals — particularly in Egypt, Guinea, Kenya, Nigeria and Sudan.

Global anti-FGM group 28 Too Many, which is working with the Egyptian hospitals, said the “medicalization of FGM” was hindering efforts to end the practice.

“By having the backing of hospitals in the campaign, we are showing that FGM is wrong, wherever it is carried out,” said 28 Too Many founder Ann-Marie Wilson.

FGM can cause a host of serious health problems including infections and infertility.

There has been mounting concern over the practice in Egypt following the deaths of several girls during botched procedures.

Edris said she had been particularly affected by the death of a 7-year-old girl from FGM.

“We couldn’t save her ... she bled to death. I remember she started to hallucinate ... and she knew she was going to die — this really traumatized me,” she said.

Amel Fahmy, director of women’s advocacy group Tadwein which is backing the campaign, said doctors were ideally placed to spread awareness of FGM.

“We can’t be shy about this. It’s time to talk about this as a harmful practice, and for doctors to tell parents you shouldn’t do this to your daughter,” she said.

What is female genital mutilation and where does it happen?

World leaders have pledged to eradicate female genital mutilation (FGM) by 2030, but campaigners say the ancient ritual remains deeply entrenched in many places.

International Day of Zero Tolerance for Female Genital Mutilation on Wednesday will highlight efforts to end the widely condemned practice thought to affect at least 200 million girls and women globally. Here are some facts:

• FGM dates back over 2,000 years and is practiced across many cultures and religions.

• It is practiced in at least 30 countries, mostly in Africa but also in pockets of the Middle East and Asia.

• FGM typically involves the partial or total removal of the external genitalia. In some cases the vaginal opening is sewn up. Other procedures, more common in parts of Asia, include nicking or pricking the clitoris.

• FGM can cause longlasting mental and physical health problems including chronic infections, menstrual problems, infertility, pregnancy and childbirth complications.

• Somalia has the world’s highest FGM prevalence (98 percent of women have been cut), followed by Guinea, Djibouti, Mali and Sierra Leone.

• Of the 28 countries in Africa where FGM is endemic, 22 have legislation criminalizing FGM, although enforcement is generally weak and prosecutions rare.

• Half of all girls who have undergone FGM or are at risk live in three countries — Egypt, Ethiopia and Nigeria — all of which have laws against FGM.

• Chad, Liberia, Mali, Sierra Leone, Somalia and Sudan, which are home to 16 million girls, have no law.

• There is an increasing trend for FGM to be carried out by health professionals rather than traditional cutters, particularly in Egypt, Guinea, Kenya, Nigeria and Sudan.

• The ritual, often justified for cultural or religious reasons, is underpinned by the desire to control female sexuality.

• Somalia and Somaliland are drafting laws against FGM.

• Despite not yet having a law, Somalia announced its first FGM prosecution last year after a 10-year-old girl died.

— Compiled by Reuters

Topics: Egypt female Cairo female genital mutilation FGM

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Turkish border region feels economic fallout from Iran

Updated 3 sec ago
AFP
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Turkish border region feels economic fallout from Iran

  • Turkiye shares a 550-kilometer border with Iran, 300km of which flank Van province
  • The city of Van has traditionally offered escape and relaxation for Iranian tourists
Updated 3 sec ago
AFP
VAN, Turkiye: As vice president of the chamber of commerce in the eastern Turkish city of Van, Fevzi Celiktas’s job is to boost the local economy. But he has one major problem: his neighbors.
“We have some of the most feared countries in the world right on our doorstep: Iraq, Syria, and Iran,” he said.
“This greatly complicates our development.”
Celiktas is not indifferent to the fate of Iranians who cross to the Turkish side of the border after the ruthless repression of protests in January.
But the collapse of their economy and currency, which sparked the popular uprising, is being felt acutely in the province.
Turkiye shares a 550-kilometer border with Iran, 300km of which flank Van province, with the main pedestrian border crossing of Kapikoy just a 90-minute drive from the provincial capital, also called Van.
The latest crisis is another blow to the struggling economy in this region of 1.1 million people which lies at the eastern end of Anatolia.
Perched on the eastern shores of Lake Van and surrounded by snow-capped mountains, the city of Van has traditionally offered escape and relaxation for Iranian tourists.
Visitors come to shop, enjoy the local bars or take out boats on Turkiye’s largest lake, which is also the second-largest in the Middle East.
“Iranian tourists are our main clientele,” said Emre Deger, head of Van’s tourism professionals association, whose own hotel has seen occupancy rates decline year after year.
Even though winter is the low season, a third of its rooms are usually occupied, he explained.
“But currently, all the hotels are empty or at 10 percent of capacity at best,” he added.
‘For the Internet’
For eight to 10 days after the crackdown on Iranian protesters when there was an Internet blackout, the flow of visitors “completely dried up,” Deger said.
“Those who came were just here for the Internet,” he added.
Every morning when the Kapikoy crossing opens, a few dozen travelers arrive in the cold, wearily boarding buses or taxis headed for Van.
Apart from a handful of students and the odd few with long-term plans outside of Iran, not many are prepared to speak, quickly scurrying off to discreet hotels where they keep to themselves.
“Most even hesitate to go out to get food,” said Deger, who is waiting for March 21 when Iranians mark Nowruz, Persian New Year, to see if the tourists will return.
One Iranian woman in her 30s from the northwestern city of Tabriz said she understood the decline in visitors.
“There’s no middle class left in Iran. We’re all at the bottom, the very bottom,” she said, without giving her name.
“Everyone is poor.”
Back in Iran, she used to work in insurance, but now has a job at an elegant café in downtown Van.
“In the whole of January, I saw maybe two Iranians here,” she said.
‘Our money is worthless’
“Two years ago, when you came to Turkiye with 5 or 10 million rials ($4-$8), you were fine. Now you need at least 40 or 50 million rials. Hotels, food, everything has become more expensive for us.
“Our money is worthless now.”
The monthly salary she earned in Iran would barely last three days in Van today, she added.
“Our customers used to fill entire suitcases with clothes (to take home). But it’s very quiet now,” said Emre Teker in his clothing store.
Celiktas also blamed US and European sanctions for crippling Iran’s economy — and Van’s.
“The Van bypass still isn’t finished after 18 years of construction,” he said. “It’s become a joke, sometimes written on the back of trucks: ‘May our love be like the Van bypass and never end’.”
If a country faces trade restrictions for decades, it inevitably has consequences, he said.
“In a neighborhood, if your neighbor bothers you, you can move. But you can’t do that with countries: you can’t replace Iran with Germany, Italy, France, or Russia,” he said.
“So you have to reach some sort of agreement.”

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