Turkey is set to make another attempt to introduce a bill aimed at giving rapists amnesty by allowing them to marry their victims. The legislation which was first brought to parliament for debate on January 16 would pave the way for amnesty to men convicted of child sex offenses so long as they reach a marriage agreement with their victims and their age difference is less than 10 years.

Critics Slam Bill As Legalizing Child Abuse

Critics of the bill have voiced their concerns on grounds that it could legalize statutory rape and child abuse. The UN has also raised concerns that the law would essentially legalize child rape and leave the victims at the mercy of their tormentors.

Leading campaigns against the bill in the Turkish parliament is the opposition party the Peoples Democratic Party (HDP) which has stated that standing against the legislation is “a duty of humanity.” One of the party officials Mrs. Figen Demirci warned: “This amnesty law could actually lead to the reduction of the legal age of sexual intercourse to under 12 years with the child then forced into marriage.” The party’s spokeswoman complained that the government appeared to be more interested in protecting the rights of child abusers than that of other vulnerable people.

History Of Turkey’s Rape Marriage Law

Turkey’s rape marriage law was in existence until 2005 when the country repealed it as part of the negotiations to join the European Union. However, in 2016 the Erdogan government made an attempt to reintroduce the law by allowing 3,000 men accused of statutory rape to marry their victims. However, because of the public outcry the issued generated both locally and internationally the proposal was dropped.

The matter resurfaced last year with Turkey’s ruling party AKP insisting that the aim of the legislation was not to excuse rape but to rehabilitate those who may not have realized that their sexual relations with young girls was unlawful, and also to protect the young victims from being ostracized. This came against a backdrop of a 2018 report that showed that a total of 482,908 girls under 18 were married since 2008 in Turkey, despite the legal marriage age being 18.

The Colonial Roots Of Rape-Marriage Laws

Rape-marriages are common in many Arab and Asian countries. According to Humans Rights Watch, many originated from colonial laws in the Middle East and North Africa. HR Watch Senior Researcher, Rothna Begum wrote, “They largely stem from or were inspired by the French Napoleonic code of 1810 which allowed a man who kidnapped a girl to escape persecution if he married her.”

These laws were further supported by patriarchal attitudes that linked a family’s honor to a woman’s chastity and virginity. In many countries rape victims were treated like outcasts and marrying them was resented and seen as shameful. However, because of international pressure and campaigns by women, some countries have began to repeal the draconian laws.

Case Studies: Morocco, Bahrain, Tunisia, Jordan And Lebanon

In 2014 Morocco repealed a provision that allowed convicted rapists to evade punishment by marrying their victims. However the repeal was only taken after a 16-year-old girl called Amina Filali committed suicide by swallowing rat poison after she was forced to marry a man she had accused of raping her.

In 2016 Bahrain Parliament voted to repeal a similar law but the cabinet rejected the proposal on grounds that the marriage loophole should be revoked only in cases of gang rape.

In 2017 Tunisia , Jordan and Lebanon also furthered women’s rights protections by repealing legislation that allowed rapists to avoid criminal prosecution if they married their victims. However, Lebanon was criticized for retaining a loophole that allowed sex with children between the ages of 15 to 17 and seducing a minor with the promise of sex. According to women’s rights campaigners, this article also needs to be repealed.

Nevertheless, UN Human Rights Commissioner Zeid Raad Al Hussein welcomed these reforms stating there’s no place for hideous laws that seek to “punish a rape victim by making her marry the perpetrator of a horrible crime against her.”

‘Work Towards The Swift Repeal Of Other Legislation That Condones Sexual Violence Against Women And Girls’

She urged the governments of Jordan, Lebanon and Tunisia and other Arab countries “to build on this positive momentum and to work towards the swift repeal of other legislation that condones sexual violence against women and girls and perpetuates discrimination against them in clear violation of international law.”

For a country like Turkey which is divided between religiously-based laws and secularism, the proposed bill is likely to generate a heated debate in the political and religious spheres. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has never hidden his perception of the role of a woman in the context of Islam. In 2014 he was accused of sexism when he said that “you cannot put women and men on an equal footing.”

But as Fatma the spokeswoman for the PDP said in response to the marry your rapist bill that the attempt to pass it will increase opposition to abuse of women and girls and awareness of their situation: “The struggles of women is spreading in waves, creating a butterfly effect. We will never allow the masculine mentality which wants to dominate the world to win.”

L'articolo Turkey To Introduce ‘Marry Your Rapist’ Bill proviene da InsideOver.

Seven pregnant girls and women on their way to a baby factory in Lagos State, Nigeria, were rescued earlier this month, along with a two-year-old child.

The girls and women, aged between 13 and 27, were stranded at a bus stop, waiting to be picked up and transported to the factory house. When they were unable to get in touch with the man who would pick them up, residents grew suspicious and reported the case to the police.

Lagos State Police Public Relations Officer said: “On October 2, 2019, at about 1:00 am, Isolo Police Station received an Information that seven pregnant young girls were seen stranded at Cele Bus Stop … Lagos.”

The women and girls, all from Southeast Nigeria, were handed to the National Agency for the Prohibition of Trafficking in Persons (NAPTIP).

A week before, nineteen pregnant girls and women aged 15-28 were also rescued in another baby factory in Lagos. Two women, aged forty and fifty-four, suspected of working in the factory, were arrested.

One of the rescued women said: “My friend who left [the Southeast] last year, called me to say that someone was looking for house help. I borrowed money to come to Lagos. One woman came to pick me at the park and brought me here. The next day, I was summoned by our madam, who told me that I would not leave the premises until next year.

“Being a newcomer, my customers only came at night to have sex with me. So far, I have slept with seven different men before I discovered I was pregnant. I was told after delivery, I would be paid handsomely and that if I decided to leave after then, I could. My pregnancy is in its second trimester.”

“My telephone was collected from me and [I was] given a non-android phone,” the rescued woman continued, explaining why she could not contact her family at home.

After delivery, the babies were transported to three different homes in the city and sold for between ₦300,000 ($820) and ₦500,000 ($1,400), with girl babies on the lower end of the spectrum. The two suspects arrested received ₦15,000 ($41) and ₦20,000 ($55) per delivery, while the men who raped the victims were also paid by the factory.

The governor of Lagos vowed to bring to justice the illegal operators of the baby factory.

Human trafficking is the third most prevalent crime in Nigeria, behind financial fraud and drug trafficking. Baby factories and child trafficking are a prevalent practice in Southeast Nigeria. Married women, unable to have children, buy these babies at a high price, sometimes as high as ₦2 million ($5,500). In a country where married women without children are considered failures, baby buyers mimic a pregnant state for nine months, before presenting the trafficked babies as theirs.

Baby factories are an international business, with black women from Europe also travelling to Nigeria to buy babies. NAPTITP said that these baby factories are often disguised as maternity clinics, foster homes, orphanages or shelters for homeless girls and women.

Mr Gbenga Omotosho, the Commissioner for Information for the Lagos State Governor said: “There are rules guiding the setting up of such maternity homes. Of course, the state government is not in support of any illegality. Unregistered homes will not be given any chance to operate and when they are caught they will be taken to court and will never be covered.”

L'articolo Raping Women and Trafficking Babies in Nigeria’s Baby Factories proviene da InsideOver.

When Aida Sooronbaeva was 17, she returned home after a day at school to find her grandfather tied up and their house ransacked. In vain, she attempted to hide but was kidnapped by a family friend for marriage. Despite vehemently protesting, she eventually succumbed to the social standard in Kyrgyzstan, where tradition upholds this bride kidnapping custom.

After 16 years of marriage, her body was a tapestry of scars from domestic violence. One day, after fleeing to the streets to escape the brutality and she was rescued by a passer-by.

“He kept me at home, never letting me out, just in the yard,” Sooronbaeva told Reuters. “I lived with him only for the sake of my children.”

“Now I perceive any man as an enemy. I never even think of getting remarried,” she added.

As per the custom, a man arranges for the kidnapping of a girl, whom he likes, with his friends and family. Whether the girl knows him or not is irrelevant. After some planning amongst his cohorts, the girl may be grabbed from the street and bundled into a car after which, she will be forced to marry him.

In the documentary, Bride Kidnapping in Kyrgyzstan, a would-be-groom is seen plotting with his friends and family to abduct the girl of his interest. His accomplices roar with laughter as he jokes, “You guys should be careful. Don’t make her black and blue.”

The men pile into a car to the blare of loud music as they go in search of the girl. Once they pinpoint her, some exit the car and snatch her – lifting her off the ground and bundling her into the moving vehicle. Screaming and crying, her flaying arms and legs are restrained as she calls out for her mother. When they arrive at her would-be suitor’s home, she is led to a tent where women drape her with wedding garments as she continues to weep. In the end, she agreed to marry the man with the consent of her parents.

In the predominantly Islamic country, the practice was outlawed in 2013 by Kyrgyz law and international law. Yet, in rural areas, it remains widespread and accepted as part of the cultural norm. Thousands of women fall victim to it every year. Tragically, bride kidnappings can also involve rape since it is deemed as a method of coercing the girl to accept the man as her husband. And for the women who attempt to escape, they are susceptible to a catalogue of other pitfalls, which can include suicide attempts and being ostracised from society.

Last year, a 20-year-old medical student, Burulai Turdaaly Kyzy, was detained in a police cell with the man who abducted her. Moments later, she died after he violently attacked and stabbed her. Her murder sparked public outrage calling a nationwide demand for stricter sentences for such cases. The man in question was eventually imprisoned for 20 years.

More women have started to come forward about the bride kidnapping epidemic, as well as the domestic violence and abuse to which they are subjected. Generally speaking, in the former Soviet republic, getting a conviction for abduction proves to be difficult and may only end with a fine.

Often balking under societal and familial pressure, however, most of the bride kidnappings go unreported. Most victims are too fearful to take matters further due to the stigma associated with it or having been raped.

While many locals attest that the tradition must be upheld since it goes back to the ancient times of horsemen, an investigation by retired Professor Russell Kleinbach at Philadelphia University speculated that the custom only began in the 1950s.

In his study, Reducing Non-Consensual Bride Kidnapping In Kyrgyzstan, Professor Kleinback discovered that implementing educational programs in some areas proved to be effective in the reduction of bride kidnapping. Of the 122 Kyrgyz women in Karakol City region who were interviewed, 76% had been married by consent – which was an increase of 55% prior to the project. Meanwhile, those who were married by non-consensual kidnapping were 24% – which was down from 45% before the project. The report concluded that the findings demonstrated that “educational efforts must focus on the potential kidnappers (young men in their early-mid 20’s) as well as younger women”.

L'articolo Thousands Of Girls Abducted In Bride Kidnapping Custom In Kyrgyzstan proviene da InsideOver.

The Yazidi girl – who wished to remain unnamed ­– became pregnant after being brutally raped by an ISIS fighter. Desperate, she tried to force a miscarriage by throwing herself down a flight of stairs. When she attempted to escape from her abductors, she was re-captured and raped by six men. Kept naked in a room, she was repeatedly sold and raped to groups of men. The more times she was sold, the more her monetary value declined. She was told that she had to be raped to become a Muslim and that it ISIS fighters were simply implementing the Prophet Muhammad’s law.

In the Trafficking Terror report, she revealed how girls were raped together in the same room. Islamic State members would touch the chests of captured girls to see whether they had grown breasts. If they had breasts, they could be raped; if not, they would wait three months to check again.

August marked the five-year anniversary of this reign of terror that would forever change the lives of the Yazidi clan from the Sinjar region in the far northwest of Iraq. A minority group whose gnostic religion stemmed from Zoroastrianism, ISIS theologians labelled them as infidels to justify their tyranny.

When ISIS invaded Sinjar in 2014, most of the men were executed and thousands of women and children were transported to ISIS slave markets. The women and girls were doomed to enter into several yearlong odysseys of violence, slavery, and sexual abuse – being sold again and again to different ISIS fighters – often to as many as ten different men. A report from the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) said that some 5,000 Yazidi women have been sold into slavery. To date, almost 3,000 of them still remain missing.

The case management team at YAZDA, a Yazidi global organization established in the aftermath of the Yazidi Genocide in 2014, explained, “The campaign of genocide ISIS began carrying out in 2014 pivots on several major atrocities. One of them was mass executions, which included many men and elderly women who were unable to escape the Sinjar region as ISIS swept through.

“The second is the indoctrination of boys and their training as child soldiers. They were stripped from their families, their traditions and forcibly indoctrinated with extremist ideology before being on the battlefields and elsewhere.

“The third is the sexual slavery of Yazidi women. Thousands of children, teenage girls, and young women were forced into sexual slavery under ISIS.”

In cities such as Mosul and Raqqa – the strongholds of ISIS – there were systemised slave markets where women would be sold off based on their age, virginity, and looks. They were also traded, sold, and rented amongst ISIS members, and sometimes given as gifts from one member to another. The stories of cruelty are unfathomable: stories of women who tried to fight the rape of their young daughters and were then raped themselves in front of their daughters as punishment; stories of forced abortions right after capture so they could be sold off easier; and stories of unyielding circles of violence, exploitation and abuse that left many who survived with severe trauma and high risks of suicide.

“Some girls are believed to have been smuggled out into neighboring countries for human trafficking purposes,” YAZDA added.

“There is also the issue of the al Hol camp in Syria, which houses a significant number of ISIS members. Girls are still there – either brainwashed into staying with ISIS families or potentially held against their will. Given the extremely difficult security situation of the camp, there is not at this stage a pragmatic way to go in and find Yazidi girls until there is some effort to clear out the camps – or the ISIS sections anyway.”

Sexual slavery was frequently used as an incentive for ISIS recruits, with the promise of a conveyor belt of women. In a deeply conformist Muslim culture where casual sex is a taboo, the reward of sex-on-demand became part of ISIS propaganda to entice would-be fighters. Any children born out of the “caliphate” had not only financial merits but were also seen as future ISIS conscripts. Moreover, it has been reported that the ISIS recruitment process became a playing field for rapists, paedophiles, and men with a history of sexual and domestic violence.

Lavan Jalal, a psychotherapist at Jiyan Foundation of Human Rights, has worked since 2015 in Jiyan’s Trauma Clinic – Iraq’s only inpatient psychological clinic. She has treated a large majority of Yazidi women and children who escaped ISIS captivity and remain deeply traumatised. Even more worrisome, are the ones who have not yet been rescued.

“Some girls were killed by ISIS because they tried to escape but no one has reported this,” Jalal said.

“Other women committed suicide. Many still reside in refugee camps in Syria and don’t know if or how they can return to Sinjar. Also, many women had children from their captors as a result of the constant sexual abuse. These children are considered Muslim by Yazidi culture and thus would not be accepted into the Yazidi community. Many women thus face the harrowing choice between returning to their families and leaving their children behind, or staying with their children without returning to their families. In this regard, any attempts to negotiate with the Yazidi community to make exceptions and allow these children into the communities have failed so far.”

The depraved story of the methodical sexual violence towards the Yazidi by ISIS has left a putrid stain. It is one that cannot be washed away until better justice is served for the thousands who are still missing.

“Investigation is needed into unreported deaths and suicides to achieve peace for the families who, until today, remain in the unknown about their relatives,” Jalal insisted.

“Outreach work is needed in the camps in Syria with the women who still live there to try and understand what keeps them from returning. There should be a creation of links between families who are still looking for a relative and women in those camps. And, of course, continue the negotiations with the leaders of the Yazidi community about accepting Yazidi women’s children born in captivity.”

L'articolo The Sex Slave Trade Of The Yazidi Women By Isis proviene da InsideOver.

“I was teaching a girl in 2011. She was 13 years old. I liked her because she was beautiful. I manipulated her grades. If she got a good grade, I tried to lower it. I’d humiliate her in class and she finally agreed to meet me,” the unnamed teacher revealed to Unreported World. He had forced a student into having sex with him – a practice known as “sex for grades” – which remains widespread in many African states. The child in question left school soon after, forgoing her education because of the trauma of sexual abuse.

Despite wishing to remain anonymous, the man, who is still a teacher, spoke candidly about his assault of a minor on camera because he said that the custom is so prevalent that he was not worried about having charges pressed against him. He believed that this kind of exploitation remains rampant since it may be difficult to truly stamp it out of society.

He initially discovered that teachers could wield their authority in this manner when he was a student himself and a teacher asked him to take a girl to his house.

There are little records of how many teachers in African countries engage in the practice, and very rarely do the perpetrators face prosecution. Most of the cases go unreported due to the shame and stigma attached. As a result, innumerable young girls face gender-based violence, which includes sexual abuse, exploitation, and rape by male teachers.

Filmmaker Kiki King, who shot the documentary in Mozambique, told Marie Claire that countless girls are bullied into having sex in exchange for good grades at school. She said that the students are often led to believe that if they do not have sexual relationships with their teacher, they are going to fail the year.

“In terms of people being prosecuted and going to jail, I really struggled to find anyone,” King said.

“What it comes down to is the same problem with sexual violence anywhere in the world under any circumstances; it’s one girl’s word against one man’s word. And unfortunately, women are often blamed for things that happened to them – they’re not believed and they’re not taken seriously.”

Also known as “sexually transmitted grades”, teachers employ various tactics to lure the underage girls into sexual relationships. Apart from the promise of good grades, they may also bribe her with things like mobile phones, clothes, food, and other gifts. The harassment and manipulation generally occurs by the teacher accosting the students either during or after school time. More often than not, girls feel fearful to turn down the lascivious advances out of worry that they may get lower grades or be punished in some other way.

If the sexual assault does become public, the blame is often placed on the girl with the belief that she dressed provocatively or displayed a certain type of demeanour to warrant the unwanted attention from the teacher.

In instances where the girl becomes pregnant, instead of seeking out justice for the sexual assault of a minor, most families prefer to negotiate with the man to provide financial support. Furthermore, in African culture, taboos associated with underage pregnancies mean that the girl will also face the backlash of being a social outcast and her education will come to an abrupt end.

Human Rights Watch believe that the sexual overtones girls experience at school are heavily influenced by gender stereotypes. Some girls told the organisation that teachers had a tendency to use inappropriate language and behaviour – for instance, describing girls’ bodies or clothes in a sexual manner when speaking to students.

While these situations are often nonchalantly characterised as a “relationship” between a teacher and student, Human Rights Watch condemned the practice, stating that it undermines the gravity of the abuse, affects reporting, and blurs the perpetrators’ perception of the severity of these abuses and that cases should be treated, and prosecuted, as sexual exploitation and abuse of children.

L'articolo Teachers Blackmailing Students Into Sex For Good Grades proviene da InsideOver.

Chifuniro Kandiado clutches her baby, who automatically suckles her breast. After having to drop out of school, lately, she spends her days looking after her child. A forlorn look falls across her face as she recounts the night the baby was conceived.

“I was taken at night. I was pushed into a dormitory and they made me wear a mask so I couldn’t see what was happening. But a man came in. He started touching me but I fought back. I screamed. But at that moment, a woman – an elder – told me that I shouldn’t resist. She said, ‘It’s our culture. You have to accept it.’ I feel like I was raped,” she said to France 24.

In rural parts of Malawi, after a girl has her first period, she is forced to have sex with a man, who is then paid for his “services”. The girl’s parents are the ones who choose the usually much older man and he can earn between $4 to $7 for each girl. This ritual rape sees the man, known as a “hyena”, have sex with the young girl for as long as three days. The cultural practice is done as a way of initiating the girl’s entry into adulthood.

The girl is led to believe that she must consent, else diseases or bad luck will befall her family or the village. She is entrenched with such a foreboding sense of fear that she unwillingly concedes to what is required of her. Yet, most of the girls speak of how horrific and distressing they found the experience to be.

Kandiado still remains deeply traumatised by the encounter. She says that she is unhappy and feels that her future is doomed. Yet, according to village elders, it is not rape but a “ritual cleansing” that is an integral part of a young girl’s development. Mtolo village chief, Elena Mtolo, told France 24 that girls who don’t meet the hyenas could develop respiratory illnesses and other skin diseases. “Anybody can fall ill including the parents. As a parent and chief of the village I can also fall ill. It can happen. I have heard of other people falling ill because they didn’t follow our traditions,” she said.

Prior to the girl meeting the hyena, she must attend a sexual induction ceremony held by the elders and other local women. Amidst the hubbub of chants and dance, the women gyrate and re-enact sexual movements, persuading the young girl to follow suit. The idea behind it is to teach her how to satisfy a man in bed. It is believed that this lesson is both imperative and pertinent to ensure that her future husband will be satisfied and not seek pleasures from another woman. If her husband is not fulfilled, then it is likely that he will dump her. Meanwhile, the girl’s own sexual pleasure is never brought up in the ceremony.

The BBC spoke to one “hyena”, Eric Aniva, who claimed to have slept with over 100 girls and women. He admitted to being HIV positive ­but said that he never mentioned it to the girl or her parents. This “sexual cleansing” tradition dictates that condoms must not be used. The local consensus is that the practice has no links to HIV since the hyenas are carefully selected and held in high regard. Yet, HIV continues to be a serious problem in Malawi, with the UN estimating that around 1 in 10 Malawians have the virus. Just a few days after the BBC report, Aniva was arrested as per the orders of President Peter Mutharika. “Harmful cultural and traditional practices cannot be accepted in this country,” Presidential spokesman Mgeme Kalilani said in a released statement. “All people involved in this malpractice should be held accountable for subjecting their children and women to this despicable evil.”

In Nov 2016, Aniya was sentenced on the charge of indulging in harmful practices, contrary to Section 5 of the Gender Equality Act of 2013, and for potentially infecting over 100 women and girls with HIV. In 2017, he was released after his lawyer said that he had served his full sentence.

Yet, the bigger issue is not Aniya – or even the hyenas, themselves. The government and local authorities need to implement more stringent measures to fully address this pernicious and retrograded system. Improved sexual education needs to be enforced in areas where sexual superstition and exploitation is prevalent. Nonchalance in the face of child rape is as unacceptable as the act itself.

L'articolo Parents Paying Men To Rape Their Underage Daughters proviene da InsideOver.

“Sometimes, you see that a little boy goes into the toilet and immediately, an adult detainee goes after them, and when the boy comes out, you don’t need to be told what has happened to him,” a former warder at Nigeria’s Maiduguri Prison told Amnesty International.

Abuse of children is not unusual in those cells. Nor is it kept a secret – so much so that it is sometimes possible to hear the abuse happening, entangled in the muffled sobs of a child.

“The condition there [in the prison] is not good for children and it is difficult to stop what is going on with the boys. The only way is for them to be taken out of there. What do you expect when you keep children with grown-up men?” the man added.

An investigation by Amnesty revealed that children are being unlawfully detained at two notorious prisons in the country – Maiduguri Maximum Security Prison and Giwa Barracks. Such incarceration of children exposes them to violations of the most ineffable kind.

Isa Sanusi, Media and Communications Manager of Amnesty International Nigeria explained: “Our investigation shows rampant cases of sexual abuse of children in Maiduguri Maximum Security Prison in the Borno state of Nigeria. We found that children are kept in the same prison cells as adults. This gave the adults an opportunity to exploit and sexually abuse the children. Officials are aware that this abuse is going on, but they refused to do anything about it. Little boys are frequently sexually abused by other inmates, and women and girls also face similar exploitation.”

Sanusi divulged that Amnesty has repeatedly asked the Nigerian authorities to work towards safeguarding children in a more effectual manner, and to put a ban on the detaining of children in the same facilities as adults.

“We are again and again calling on the Nigerian government to end this situation that allows this abuse to take place. It is illegal and harmful to keep children in the same prison or detention facility as adults. Many children are currently being held in similar situations all across Nigeria,” she said. “We call on Nigerian authorities to investigate these allegations – independently and impartially, to ensure that those found guilty will be held accountable. Nigerian authorities must provide separate detention facilities for children. It is unlawful to keep children in the same detention cell with adults.”

Amnesty also interviewed female inmates in their report, who detailed circumstances of being forced into sexual relationships with security guards to barter for food, soap, clothing, and other basic necessities. Furthermore, the women are commonly led to believe that should they engage in such activities, that they might be released. Since the soldiers are responsible for calling out the names of those due to be released, it is easy for them to read out a favoured name instead.

One former detainee alleged that she had become pregnant by a soldier. When the time was right, the man in question did the necessary documentation so that her name would be called out amongst those who set to be released.

“It is usually a case of security forces who are guarding detention facilities, exploiting women detainees in exchange for food or other things. Some women told us that they witness cases of rape and other forms of exploitation of women by security personnel. And sometimes women are promised freedom if they agree to offer sex,” Sanusi went on to say.

As a result of the Boko Haram conflict, people suspected of having any connections to it were detained in facilities all over the nation. Many of the women were kidnapped, raped, or forced into marriages by Boko Haram, and instead of being liberated, were arrested for being “Boko Haram wives”. The women continue to be imprisoned – despite this going against both Nigerian law and international human rights law.

“There is a need for authorities to ensure that all those detained on suspicion of links to Boko Haram are either freed or prosecuted before a court of law. And all the security personnel accused of sexually abusing women and children must be held responsible,” Sanusi stated.

“Nigeria’s justice system failed to ensure timely prosecution of suspects or release of those found not guilty of any offences. This is the reason why there are many detainees – some spending years in detention without trial. The women and children are being sexually exploited because of the lack of safeguards in the detention facilities, and as such, have been rendered vulnerable.

Since 2016, Amnesty has reported that seven women have given birth inside the cramped and squalid prison, and that several women, children, and babies have died on the Giwa’s compound.

L'articolo Children and Women Being Raped in Nigerian prisons proviene da InsideOver.

Gulnaz, a demure and quiet Afghan woman, gained public attention in 2011. At 16-years-old, a male relative had raped and impregnated her. When she reported the incident, she was promptly arrested and jailed for 12 years for adultery since her attacker was married. When media interest in her case intensified, her sentence was reduced to 3 years.

International uproar ensued, and Gulnaz was eventually released after receiving a pardon by presidential decree. Yet, the harsh reality was that the young woman would trade one prison for another. The law deemed her as a free woman, but society would narrate something different since she had given birth to her rapist’s daughter

The ignominy of having a child out of wedlock in Afghanistan – irrespective of if the child was resultant of rape – provides only one resolution. Gulnaz married her attacker. By 2015, she was pregnant with his third child and living with him, his first wife, and all of their of children.

“If I hadn’t married her, according to our traditions, she couldn’t have lived back in society,” her husband, Asadullah, told CNN. “Her brothers didn’t want to accept her back. Now, she doesn’t have any of those problems.”

“Now she is beside me and knows that it was not as big as they had shown it,” he said.

Gulnaz, who remained expressionless and never made eye contact with her husband, mumbled:

“I didn’t want to ruin the life of my daughter or leave myself helpless so I agreed to marry him. We are traditional people. When we get a bad name, we prefer death to living with that name in society.”

Yet, Gulnaz’s story is far from extraordinary in a country where gender roles are governed by androcentric values. Fleeing violence or abuse, rape, and sex out of wedlock (zina) are just some of the things that are regarded as “moral crimes”.
Human Rights Watch estimated that “moral crimes” account for half of all women (non-juveniles) in Afghanistan’s prisons and virtually all teenage girls in its juvenile detention facilities.

The prisons are cramped and squalid; the women are exposed to a catalogue of sanitation and hygiene issues. Stories of the inmates being beaten by the staff are also not uncommon. Furthermore, the cells are overrun with toddlers who are either born in prison or taken there by their mothers following her arrest.

Those who have called for a change in this conservative and patriarchal society face a huge challenge in a country that was led by the Taliban just eighteen years ago. There have been numerous attacks and assassinations of outspoken female politicians and activists.

Women for Afghan Women (WAW) is an organisation that provides transitional houses for newly released women. After leaving prison, they are often forced to live on the streets or return to their homes where they may face abuse or even death for “shaming their families”. Over the years, WAW has assisted over 1,000 women and their children with homes, legal support, and the skills they need to reintegrate into society.

Citing Human Rights Watch and other reports, WAW affirms that many of the women that they serve in their Transitional Houses were charged and imprisoned for alleged “moral” crimes. Many have fled from rampant abuse including forced and/or underage marriage; domestic violence–including beatings, burnings, and stabbings; rape; forced prostitution; kidnapping; and/or the threat of being the victim of an alleged “honor” killing. Furthermore, once a woman has been charged with a “moral” crime, there is rarely an investigation into the abuse or prosecution of abusers.

“Although laws are in place and the status of women and the protection of their rights have greatly improved in Afghanistan, particularly since the fall of the Taliban, we still have much work to do to secure the sanctity of women’s rights and their protections under the law and under Islam,” said Najia Nasim, Executive Director of WAW.

“Crimes committed against Afghan women, including their incarceration for alleged “moral” crimes or their murder in alleged “honor” killings, are the result of an ingrained mind-set that still permeates even the official judicial system. WAW and the work of many others in the country are all part of the tireless efforts being made to ensure that there is long-term cultural change, so that this mind-set and these conditions will change for the better, for good.”

L'articolo Afghan Women Imprisoned For “Moral Crimes” proviene da InsideOver.