Issued on: 03/02/2020 – 17:31Modified: 03/02/2020 – 17:31
The arrest of the parents of a 12-year-old Egyptian girl who died after undergoing genital mutilation and the doctor who performed the procedure highlight the difficulty of eradicating the increasingly medicalized felony practice. procedure highlight the difficulty of eradicating the practice.
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A 12-year-old girl died in the Assiut governance of Upper Egypt last week due to complications she suffered after a retired doctor removed part of her genitals, a practice known as female genital mutilation (FGM), also sometimes referred to as female circumcision.
“The doctor tried to save her but she passed away,” the public prosecutors office said in a statement issued late Thursday, vowing “firm action” against anyone carrying out the procedure in the future. The girls aunt was also detained.
FGM was outlawed in Egypt in 2008 and was upgraded to a felony in 2016 after a 17-year-old girl bled to death. The updated law mandates jail sentences of up to seven years for those who carry out the procedure and up to three years for anyone requesting it. Religious leaders have also said genital cutting is forbidden.
The government regularly runs pubic service campaigns to warn of the danger of FGM, but instead of curbing the practice the campaigns have prompted parents to turn to medical personnel to do it, the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) said in November. “About 75 per cent of female genital mutilation in the country is performed by doctors,” FGM expert Dr. Ayman Sadek said in the UNFPA statement.
The medicalization of FGM brings with it a new set of challenges, lending the appearance of legitimacy and safety despite the practice having no medical benefits and significant risks—including haemorrhage, chronic urinary problems and complications in childbirth.
Indeed, the girl in Assiut, whom local news sources identified as Nada Abdul Maksoud, underwent the procedure in a clinic where it was performed by a retired doctor.
Parents and practitioners are often not punished for the crime, activists say, but in Maksouds case womens rights groups expressed outrage and pushed authorities to take action.
FGM generally involves the removal of the labia but can also include sewing up the vaginal opening and cutting or removing the clitoris. Diminishing sexual pleasure, it is viewed as a way to assure that girls remain pure. In rural areas in Egypt, husbands ask that their young brides undergo the procedure before marriage. More than 40 percent of respondents in a 2014 survey said they believed the practice prevents women from committing adultery.
Egypt continues to have one of the highest rates of FGM in the world, with 87 percent of girls and women between the ages of 15 and 49 having been genitally cut, according to a 2016 survey by UNICEF.
Reda Eldanbouki, executive director of the Womens Centre for Guidance and Legal Awareness, said that judges and police often treat thRead More – Source
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