Archive for March, 2006
Systematic Rape in Congo Reportedly Continues Despite Peace Agreements
Although there is a peace agreement in place and elections scheduled later this year to end the Democratic Republic of Congo’s seven year civil war, human rights activists who visit the DRC say that the systematic use of rape continues to be used by various forces involved.
At its heart, the DRC civil war has its root in an ethnic conflict between Hutus and Tutsis that led to the 1994 genocide in Rwanda in which an estimated 800,000 Tutsis were murdered in less than 4 months.
In 1997, fearing Hutus were preparing to launch an attack from the DRC, the Tutsi-led government of Rwanda supported Laurent Kabila’s coup against DRC dictator Mobutu Sese Seko. When Kabila won and attempted to expel Rwandan military forces from the Congo, a civil war erupted that at one point included 9 other African nations.
Systematic rape has been a frequent tactic in the civil war. A 2004 Amnesty International report estimated that as many as 40,000 women had been raped by military and paramilitary forces from 1998-2004. The AI report said that sexual assault had been committed by forces on all sides of the conflict.
Human rights activists such as Eric Schiller returning from the DRC claim that although there is a peace in place, the rapes and violence have not abated. Schiller told the Canadian Press,
It [systematic rape] is very extensive, it is ongoing, it seems to have become a modus operandi.
This is hardly surprising giving AI’s report in late 2004 that the transitional government in place in the DRC was indifferent at best to the plight of the victims of sexual violence. According to AI’s report,
Insufficient resources and the fact that the country is still balanced between war and peace are often used as excuses by the government to justify its inaction on these issues. Questioned by Amnesty International on the government?s weak commitment on care for survivors of sexual violence, the deputy health minister claimed that this was due to the lack of resources and the complex configuration of the government. He clearly indicated that his ministry will limit its work to caring for victims if and when it is able to, and that the government “cannot establish a global policy on rape because rape is an isolated phenomenon and is not an epidemic or disease like cholera”(58).
If Schiller is correct, little appears to have changed in the year and a half since the release of the Amnesty International report.
Source:
Democratic Republic of Congo: Mass rape - time for remedies. Amnesty International, 2004.
Congo rape victims seek solace. Jackie Martens, BBC, January 24, 2004.
Report shows DR Congo rape horror. BBC, October 26, 2004.
Systematic rape in eastern Congo continues despite pleas for intervention. Dennis Bueckert, Canadian Press, March 5, 2006.
Tags: Amnesty International, Democratic Republic of Congo, Rape
Japan as Safe Haven for Parental Kidnappers
The Japan Times recently published an excellent article on Japan’s role as a safe haven for parents who kidnap their children in violation of child custody orders in their home countries.
The article leads with the case of Murray Wood whose two children went from Canada with his ex-wife to visit their ailing grandfather in Japan in November 2004. The children have remained in Japan ever since, despite a Canadian court’s ruling months earlier that granted Murray Wood sole custody to the children.
Unfortunately, Wood has few options since Japan is not a signatory to the 1980 Hague Convention on Civil Aspects of International Child Abduction which sought to prevent exactly this sort of cross-border child abduction by parents. Under that convention, children like Wood’s would have to be promptly returned to their country of origin which would have the final say in all custodial matters.
According to the Japan Times,
The Canadian Embassy said it is presently dealing with 21 cases of child abduction, while the figure for the British Embassy was about five. The U.S. Embassy said it is aware of 20 children who have been abducted and taken to Japan.
So why hasn’t Japan signed the convention like most developed countries? A 1996 Los Angeles Times article suggested that cultural norms related to marriage and divorce were the likely reasons. According to the Los Angeles Times,
In Japan’s historically non-litigious society, the family court is designed to provide ways for problems to be resolved amicably, with the help of a court-appointed mediator. Attorneys said there is no legal mechanism to award joint custody of children, but the noncustodial parent may be given visitation rights.
. . .
Kunio Koide, a Japanese Foreign Ministry official, said his government does not see the need for signing the treaty because Japan’s Protection of Personal Liberties Act prevents an individual from being illegally restrained. But Koide acknowledged that it would be difficult to prosecute a parent under that act.
The article further notes that Japan does not treat parental kidnapping as a crime, so even in cases where parents have been convicted of parental kidnapping in the United States and managed to travel to Japan, the United States is not able to extradite those individuals from Japan.
Sources:
Lost in a Loophole: Foreigners Who Are on the Losing End of a Custody Battle in Japan Don’t Have Much Recourse. Evelyn Iritani, Los Angeles Times, September 19, 1996.
Japan remains safe haven for parental abductions. Masami Ito, Japan Times, December 31, 2005.
Tags: Japan
Pakistani Earthquake Used as Opportunity to Steal Property from Widowed Women
According to the United Nations’ Integrated Regional Information Networks, the earthquake in Pakistan at the end of last year was used as an opportunity to steal land and other property from unmarried women.
Typical of such victims is Zumera Bibi. The IRIN report describes how Zumera and her four daughters left their house temporarily after the quake. While she was gone, her dead husband’s nephews seized the property and claimed it as theirs. According to the IRIN story,
Zumera has no sons, and as tradition dictates she and her daughters have no right to the property, which would revert back to the brothers of her husband on his death. Even though, under the law, her daughters should get at least a share in the inheritance, this is frequently denied to women.
Well there’s a shock from a part of the world where women can be raped as a method of tribal revenge.
The IRIN story goes on to say that,
In some cases, the claims of the women to hte property have been challenged, and according to reports received by NGOs active in quake-hit areas of North West Frontier Province (NWFP), women without mail family members have been forced to vacate homes or else hand them over to male relatives in the hope that, in return, they will help care for them and their children.
With apparently no credible system of property rights, it is easy to understand why Pakistan’s per capita GDP sits at a pathetic $2,400. In the process of impoverishing women like Zumera, Pakistan is impoverishing the entire nation.
Source:
Pakistan: Female quake survivors losing property. Integrated Regional Information Networks, January 3, 2006.
Tags: Pakistan