Sexual violence in areas of conflict is increasingly recognised as a fundamental violation of human rights, a development issue, and a global public health problem. That was the message given at a symposium in Brussels last week that heard that a growing body of research confirms that sexual violence has “grave consequences for women’s physical, sexual, and mental health, as well as implications for the health and wellbeing of families and communities.”
At the meeting, which was hosted by the Belgian government, the European Commission, and the United Nations Population Fund, representatives from countries affected by conflict discussed plans for addressing sex based violence.
“Everybody in the world knows that sexual violence, especially in war situations, is wrong,” said Thoraya Obaid, executive director of the fund. “But very little effort is being directed either to stop it or to provide support to women who are facing this kind of a crime in their own countries.”
Delegates recounted their experiences and efforts to combat sexual violence and its effects on survivors, families, and communities attempting recovery and reconstruction.
The UN’s secretary general, Kofi Annan, said: “Sexual violence is a human rights violation, a global public health problem, and an impediment to recovery, development, and peace.”
An Amnesty International spokesperson told the BMJ : “This symposium is timely and extremely welcome. Brutal sexual violence against women committed during conflict is too often ignored during efforts to end conflict and peace building initiatives afterwards. This leaves victims without support and without their suffering acknowledged. Many are in fact ostracised and discriminated against exactly because of what has happened to them.”
Jean Pascal Manga, a professor at the Clinique Maternité sans Risque in Kinshasa, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, said girls as young as 1 year old had been sexually assaulted using foreign objects such as metal bars, nails, and sticks. Dr Manga said, “Green wood from the manioc plant had caused a great many problems creating fistulas, especially in very young girls … 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 said that 90% of rape victims contracted some form of sexual disease, and one in 10 became infected with HIV. Treatment of rape and associated conditions had led doctors into a new kind of medicine for which they were unprepared. “No one knew that you would find a fistula in a small girl under 5 years old, even as young as 1 year old. We face new conditions, and we need exchanges with our Western colleagues to treat these problems,” Dr Manga said.
A concluding statement from the meeting outlined 20 specific actions to be taken, from ending impunity for perpetrators to developing national action plans. “There must be zero tolerance for acts of gender based violence and zero tolerance for complacency by governments,” it states.