UN-backed conference calls for ‘zero tolerance’ for sexual violence in conflict
Delegates from more than 30 countries at a United Nations-backed conference on sexual violence in conflict today
endorsed a programme for action, ranging from ending impunity to developing national preventive plans, after hearing
harrowing accounts of the scourge, including the rape of girls as young as one year old.
“There must be zero tolerance for acts of gender-based violence and zero tolerance for complacency by governments and
other institutions responsible for the safety and well-being of women, men and children affected by conflict,” says the
agreement, adopted at the end of the three-day International Symposium on Sexual Violence in Conflict and Beyond in
Brussels, Belgium.
The meeting, attended by doctors and social service providers from countries affected by conflict, was sponsored by the
UN Population Fund (UNFPA), the Belgian Government and the European Commission.
“We must address this issue with hope, passion and compassion,” UNFPA Executive Director Thoraya Ahmed Obaid said. “We
can talk about this issue until we’re blue in the face, but if the leadership of governments doesn’t insist that this
issue is on the table, we won’t make progress. Governments must live up to their promises to make ending sexual violence
a priority.”
Among the most heart-wrenching testimonies presented was that of doctor from the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC),
Jean Pascal Manga, who told his horrified audience of girls as young as one year-old being raped by foreign objects such
as metal bars, nails and sticks.
“Green wood from the manioc plant had caused a great many problems creating fistulas especially in very young girls,” he
said. Traumatic fistulas occur when tissues are ruptured during violent rape, leaving passages that constantly leak
urine or faeces or both.
“No one knew that you would find a fistula in a small girl under five years old, even as young as one year old,” he
added. “We face new conditions, and we need exchanges with our western colleagues to treat these problems.”
He said there were about 25,000 women and girls who were raped and needed continuing support. “In Africa, once a woman
has been raped, she may be abandoned by her entire family, and when she has a fistula and smells of urine, no one wants
to be around her,” he noted. Among the 226 cases of fistula from rape, about 20 per cent of surgeries were a failure.
Some 90 per cent of women and girls who were raped had some kind of sexually transmitted infection and nearly 10 per
cent were HIV positive, he said.
In another presentation, Feryal Thabet, of the Bureij Women’s Health Centre in Gaza, said the border closure with Israel
and escalating conflict were causing a deterioration of women’s health and an increase in violence against women. “More
than one third of Palestinian pregnant women are anaemic,” she said. “Early marriage is on the rise and so is high-risk
pregnancy.”
She noted that antenatal visits to the centre were decreasing and 80 per cent of women did not receive any post-natal
care in 2005. “There were 61 births at checkpoints with no medical assistance,” she said. Citing rising unemployment and
poverty, she stressed that the increased vulnerability of women and unsafe sex were coupled with a lack of access to
appropriate care and shortages of supplies, including contraceptives.
Representatives from 14 conflict-affected countries presented their national action plans to address sexual and
gender-based violence. Participants called for a longer-term, holistic approach to meet the health, education, legal,
psychosocial and security concerns of affected populations.