Reaching Our Main Goal:
Banning FGM Effectively

Since its beginning in 2005, the campaign »Stop FGM in Kurdistan« can already report remarkable success in documentation, public mobilization, launching a legal reform and awareness programs.

Iraqi-Kurdish Media Reports on FGM

The facts on the practice of FGM have been reported in local media, covered by newspapers, debated upon in magazines, radio stations and talk shows. This is an unprecedented appearance of FGM in the public sphere anywhere in the Middle East. This is a major achievement – the secrecy and pretence that FGM does not happen have been an important source of power for the continuation of this practice.

Mobile Teams across the Region

To raise awareness, provide information and practical medical, social and psychological assistance the relief organization WADI runs women-lead local mobile teams. They visit villages and schools, especially in the rural areas of the region, where services are hardly available and the formal education of women is low.

These Mobile Teams visit women and children in remote areas of the regions of Suleymaniyah, Halabja, Pishder, Qandil and Garmyan. The teams consist of either of a physician or a medical assistant and either a social worker or a psychologist. The underlying idea, to deal with the women where they live, is simple and striking.

Documentary for Women in the Villages

The teams provide practical help (medical treatment, medicaments and sanitary goods), life coaching and concrete help for women in distress on the one hand while discussing matters of sexuality and especially FGM on the other. All teams work in close collaboration with local women centers and shelters.

Since 2005, the Mobile Teams are generally focused on FGM. The teams also show a documentary film that has been produced for the (mostly illiterate) women in the villages. The film shows experts like physicians, but also an Islamic cleric who condemns the practice of FGM. It serves as a source of information and as an occasion to get into a discussion with the women at place. Speaking about FGM and their own suffering is only a first but an important step.

Through their long term work, the teams have come to be accepted and trusted in the communities in which they work, and can therefore help brining about change. The teams’ experience has shown that many women are willing and hoping to stop this practice, and do not wish to put their own daughters through this. But they lack the support and organization to resist the strong social pressures to conform. The mobile teams help fulfilling this important need.

Petition and Bill before the Parliament

On the occasion of the International Women’s Day, in March 2007, the campaign »Stop FGM in Kurdistan« published a petition in various local newspapers demanding to legally ban FGM. In only few days, more than 14,000 people signed the petition, among them prominent journalists, artists and writers.

Legal reform

Following the public support to the demand to ban FGM, an experts conference met in April 2007, including lawyers, physicians, women’s right and human rights activists to draft an anti-FGM law. The bill was submitted to the Regional Parliament and is and is hopefully coming to force by 2009.

Study Indicates Alarming Situation

In 2007 we began a data-collection research in all three Governorates of Iraqi-Kurdistan, interviewing more than 1,800 women. Analysis of the data has not been finalized yet, but preliminary findings show that FGM is indeed widespread across the region – ranging from 60% to virtually 100% affected women in different areas.

The operation is done in secret to girls aged 4-12. It is carried out by a women member of the family, a neighbor or a midwife. No anesthetics are used, and instruments are usually not sterile. The girl’s clitoris is being cut and sometimes part of the labia. To stop the bleeding the wound is covered with ash or icy water.