Sexual and Gender-Based Violence

The Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (SGBV) theme focuses on the incidence and prevalence of violence against women in conflict and post-conflict settings. Polarisation of gender roles, proliferation of weapons, militarisation, and the breakdown of law influence SGBV.

The risk of SGBV is heightened during conflict by aggravating factors, including the polarization of gender roles, the proliferation of arms, the militarization of society, and the breakdown of law and order. The subsequent long-term and complex impacts of SGBV continue to affect individuals and communities after conflict ends.

SGBV is addressed in all five resolutions on Women, Peace and Security. In SCR 1888, the Security Council expresses its intention to ensure peacekeeping mandate resolutions contain provisions on the prevention of, and response to, sexual violence, with corresponding reporting requirements to the Council (OP11). The resolutions deal with protecting women from violence (1820,OP3, 8-10; 1888,OP3,12); strengthening local and national institutions to assist victims of sexual violence (1820,OP13; 1888,OP13); and including strategies to address sexual violence in post-conflict peacebuilding processes (1820,OP11). SCR 1820 also calls for the participation of women in the development of mechanisms intended to protect women from violence (OP10).

Lastly, SCR 1960 creates institutional tools and teeth to combat impunity and outlines specific steps needed for both the prevention of and protection from conflict-related sexual violence. The new “naming and shaming,” listing mechanism mandated in the Resolution is a step forward in bringing justice for victims and a recognition that sexual violence is a serious violation of human rights and international law.

Addressing SGBV is an integral aspect of the overall Women, Peace and Security agenda. SGBV affects the health and safety of women, and also has significant impact on economic and social stability. The Security Council recognises that sexual violence can threaten international peace and security, and that it is frequently used as a tactic of war to dominate, humiliate, terrorise, and displace.

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UNITED STATES: Peace Corps Volunteers Speak Out on Rape

Jess Smochek arrived in Bangladesh in 2004 as a 23-year-old Peace Corps volunteer with dreams of teaching English and “helping the world.” She left six weeks later a rape victim after being brutalized in an alley by a knife-wielding gang.

ZIMBABWE: Police Beat WOZA Protesters

Members from the Women of Zimbabwe of Zimbabwe Arise (WOZA) were indiscriminately beaten by police in Bulawayo yesterday, 10 May during their demonstration against Zimbabwe Electricity Transmission and Distribution Company (ZETDC), who they claimed are short-changed the public.

DRC: More than 1,100 Rapes Daily in DRCongo: Study

More than 1,100 women are raped every day in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), making sexual violence against women 26 times more common than previously thought, a study concluded Tuesday.

DRC: Curbing DRC's Gender-based Violence

Although the civil war in the Democratic Republic of the Congo ended in 2002, the war on women and girls continues. "Sexual and gender based violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, or DRC," wrote U.S.

DRC: UN Doubts Congo Rape Figures

More than 400 000 women are raped in the Democratic Republic of Congo every year, according to a study by US researchers published last Wednesday, but the United Nations (UN) has expressed doubt over the findings.

IRAN: Dominic Lawson: An 'Eye for an Eye' is Proper Justice

Ameneh Bahrami has been waiting a long time for the justice she seeks. In 2004, while she was returning home from work, a man named Majid Movahedi threw a bucketful of acid into her face, leaving her blinded and also horribly disfigured.

NEPAL: AI report: 'Nepal's Progress on HR Dismal'

The Amnesty International (AI), in its annual report for 2010, said progress made by Nepal in upholding human rights is dismal. Repeated cases of violence and impunity have hoisted the milieu of insecurity in Nepal, it was reported. In the report launched here on Friday by the AI-Nepal, the rights watchdog states powerful governments are blocking advances in international justice by standing above the law on human rights.

PAKISTAN: Christians Remain Fearful of Rape and Forced Conversion of Women to Islam

Farah Hatim 24, D/o Hatim Gill ( Late) is a student nurse at the Sheikh Zaid Medical College in Rahim Yar Khan in the South Punjab region of Pakistan. Employed at the Orthopedic ward,on 8 May 2011 at around 7am, Farah Hatim left to report for duty; she was allegedly kidnapped by Zeehan Iliyas from Jinnah Park near the Sheikh Zahid Medical College.

INTERNATIONAL: UN Women to Focus on Peace, Women and Security

This year, a new international agency came into being that's bolstering the fight for global gender equality, UN Women. It brings under one roof several other UN bodies that for decades had focused on improving living standards, legal rights and health care, including the United Nations Development Fund for Women, the International Research and Training Institute for the Advancement of Women, and the Division for the Advancement of Women.

INTERNATIONAL: Embracing the Forbidden to Drive a Point Home

Poor Michael Sanguinetti - he had no idea he was lighting the slow-burning fuse which set off a squib that's been heard around the world. Sanguinetti is a police constable in Toronto, who, while speaking to some law students at York University in January, demonstrated a common attitude about rape: "I've been told I'm not supposed to say this ...

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