A four-year-old girl undergoing the procedure of Female genital mutilation FGM in Sulaimani, Iraqi Kurdistan, 2009. Photo: AFP
HEWLÊR-Erbil, Iraq’s Kurdistan region,— On the International Day of Zero Tolerance for Female Genital Mutilation, the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA) called on the relevant authorities in Iraq, especially the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, to work together to end FGM through the implementation of the Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) Communication for Behavioural Impact (COMBI) plan: Ending female genital mutilation means empowering women and girls to be healthy, stay in school, make choices and contribute to the economy, as committed by the Government of Iraq at the Nairobi Summit.
The UNFPA said in a statement that “In Iraq, more specifically in the Kurdistan Region, UNFPA estimates that 10 per cent of girls aged under 14 could have been cut in 2018, the average age of cutting being five years old.”
“In addition to being unnecessary and painful, this harmful practice has no health benefits for girls whatsoever. In fact, girls who undergo female genital mutilation face short-term complications such as severe pain, shock, excessive bleeding, infections, and difficulty in passing urine, as well as long-term consequences for their sexual and reproductive and mental health.” the statement added.
More than 200 million women and girls across the world have been forced to undergo the painful practice of Female Genital Mutilation.
In fact, girls who undergo female genital mutilation face short-term complications such as severe pain, shock, excessive bleeding, infections, and difficulty in passing urine, as well as long-term consequences for their sexual and reproductive and mental health.
Girls are still being subjected to female genital mutilation (FGM) in Iraq’s Kurdistan Region despite criminalization of the practice almost a decade ago.
Kurdistan’s Parliament criminalized FGM when it passed the Domestic Violence Law in 2011 which criminalized FGM. Perpetrators face up to three years in prison and a fine of up to $80,000 if found guilty.
Though numbers have dropped since the law was passed, FGM continues to be practiced in the Kurdistan Region. According to the United Nations Fund for Population Activities (UNFPA), around 15,000 girls were circumcised in the Kurdistan Region in 2018 alone.
Parwin is an FGM survivor from the Kurdistan Region capital of Erbil. Though she underwent the circumcision at the hands of her family years ago, she still suffers from its consequences.
“Female genital mutilation is a deadly process, no matter how old you are,” Parwin told Rudaw on Thursday.
“FGM will kill your sexuality,” she said, adding that its effects put a strain so heavy on her marriage that her husband left her.
Sabriyah is an FGM practitioner from Erbil. Once offering her services to the general public, she now limits her practice to relatives.
“I burn the genitals with a piece of coal, then remove it [coal and flesh] with a metal,” Sabriyah said of the process.
Some conduct FGM on the grounds of Sunnah, believing the excision to be a tradition condoned by the Prophet Mohammed.
But Kurdish cleric Omer Mrro dismissed the idea of FGM as condoned in Islam as a misconception and stressed that non-medical professionals are not an authority on the circumcision, a surgical practice.
“Islam does not encourage people to practice FGM,” Mrro told Rudaw on Thursday. “I encourage everyone to visit the doctors to get advice, as FGM is a medical process.”
Shayma was only 5 years old when her mother took her to an FGM practitioner in Erbil. To her, the practice is incomprehensible and akin to torture.
“I can’t understand how people can be so heartless to make their loved ones to experience this torture,” Shayma said. “Cutting a piece of meat from someone’s body is not easy, and should not be easy.”
(With files from iraq.unfpa.org | rudaw.net | nrttv.com)
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