UN calls for ban on ‘grotesque practice’ of female genital mutilation
Daily news | ankakh | December 21, 2012 16:48
In 1970, when Waris Dirie was a 5-year-old in Somalia, her mother held her down on a rock. She gave her a piece of root from an old tree.
“Bite on this,” she said. Her mother leaned over and whispered: “Try to be a good girl. Be brave for Mama, and it will go fast.” Then, an old woman who was with them in the African bush cut off parts of her genitals with a broken razor blade.
With this graphic description, in her 1997 book “Desert Flower” an international bestseller, Dirie became one of the leading activists in a global campaign against female genital mutilation, or FGM — a practice that millions of girls are subjected to each year.
On Thursday, in a major victory for that campaign, the United Nations General Assembly adopted a resolution calling for a global ban on FGM.
The resolution urges the 193 U.N. member states to condemn the practice, and to launch educational campaigns to eliminate it. It urges all countries to enact and enforce legislation to prohibit FGM, to protect women and girls “from this form of violence” and to end impunity for violators. Although not legally binding, UN General Assembly resolutions carry considerable moral and political weight.
The procedure, as detailed in Dirie’s book, is often crude, painful and dangerous — leading to many fatal infections.
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