World solidarity

by Barbara Oudiz, journalist

It is estimated that to date over 130 million young girls and women worldwide have already been the victims of sexual mutilation. Although real progress has been made in some countries in combating these age-old practices, we still have a long way to go.

The appeal could not have been clearer. The declaration published at the end of the International Conference on Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), held in Nairobi (Kenya) in the autumn of 2004, called upon African governments to vote for "full legislation" prohibiting sexual mutilation.

These traditional practices go from excision [1] to more or less total infibulation [2]. Such physical and psychological acts of aggression not only deprive women of any pleasure in sexual relations, but also give rise to a great many medical complications: increased risk of transmission of the Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) in the case of group excision, incontinence, difficult pregnancies and deliveries, haemorrhages, infections... and can even lead to death. An important step in reducing the incidence of sexual mutilation was achieved in July 2003, at the Assembly of the African Union in Maputo (Mozambique), with the adoption of a Protocol on the rights of women in Africa. To date, only three African Union countries have ratified this protocol: the Comoros, Libya and Rwanda. Kenya is promising to do so soon. Yet for the legal and practical provisions to combat excision and infibulation to come into force, the text has to be ratified by the fifteen member countries of the Union.

Attitudes are changing, but slowly. So far twelve African countries - including Senegal, Ghana and Burkina Faso - and seven western countries have passed laws prohibiting or restricting all kinds of FGM. However, these laws are being applied unevenly.

In France, where the legislation is particularly harsh for all kinds of mutilation, the rate of excision appears to be showing a distinct fall. Indeed, the Penal Code provides for fines of 150,000 euros or more and a ten year prison sentence for offenders, and up to a maximum of twenty years if the victim is under the age of fifteen. Moreover, numerous prevention and education campaigns are being conducted by organisations such as the Group for the Abolition of Sexual Mutilation (GAMS), made up of African and French women, or the Commission for the Abolition of Female Genital Mutilation (CAMS), an associate member of Unicef-France. The French section of Amnesty International actively supports International Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) Day, launched in 2003 under the name "Zero tolerance to female genital mutilation" and held on 6 February every year.