Monday September 17, 2018
By Harun Maruf
FILE - Teenaged girls attend an after-school discussion of female genital mutilation at the Sheik Nuur Primary School in Hargeisa, Somaliland on Feb. 16, 2014.
WASHINGTON — Despite sustained efforts to stop the
practice, Somali doctors and rights activists say two sisters bled to
death after undergoing female genital mutilation (FGM) last week in
central Somalia.
Doctors and activist confirmed that the
girls died in Bur Salah village about 75km west of Galkayo town, but the
mutilation took place near the town of Galladi across the border in the
Somali region of Ethiopia. Galkayo hospital is the closest main health
facility used by the Somali nomads who live along the border areas
between Somali and Ethiopia.
Dr. Mohamed Hussein Aden, who interviewed
relatives who tried to save the girls, said the mutilation took place
either on September 11 or the day before.
Aden said the victims were aged 10 and 11, adding, "There is no other way to describe it, it's brutal."
Aden says the news of the incident is
"heartbreaking" and said another emergency call came in Sunday for a
young girl who had been circumcised. She was also being brought to
Galkayo hospital.
Rights activists Hawa Aden Mohamed is the
founder and director of the Galkayo Education Center for Peace and
Development, which educates about 400 young girls in Galkayo.
She said she sent staffers to visit the
girl's village but was told it will take days to locate parents. Mohamed
fears the family may be avoiding contact for fear of prosecution.
Aden said Somali society is conservative and even the mother who lost the children may not tell the whole story.
He also said not all incidents are reported.
"It's shocking, this month we heard five
cases including these two deaths," he said. "Sometimes a month passes
without hearing any incident, but it actually happens at homes, we just
don't hear it."
FILE — Amran Mahamood used to circumcise young
girls in Hargeysa, Somalia, but stopped after a religious leader
convinced her the rite was not required by Islamic law.
Mohamed says incidents of female genital
mutilation occur often, but people avoid talking about it because "it's
like a taboo. They often use traditional midwifes, sometimes people who
perform are not midwives at all because they believe it's a tradition
they have to do it. It's a deadly tradition."
Mohamed says some mothers at her center ask
her to give their daughters time off from school in order for them to
be circumcised.
"They ask for a week's holiday saying they
want to circumcise, they (mothers) argue 'If I don't circumcise she is
going to chase men," Mohamed says. "I try to explain to them, 'No', I
shout, but when you push them they threaten to remove girls out of the
school."
Mohamed says in a patriarchal society like
Somalia, the bulk of responsibility to stop this practice rests with
male family members.
"This can be stopped and it should be
stopped," she said. "Mothers have learned this custom from their mothers
and foremothers, or they are in remote areas and they have not heard a
different opinion," she said. "If the father stands up, or the brother,
and uncles, and say 'our daughters cannot be touched' this will change."
FGM involves removing part or all of the
clitoris and labia for non-medical reasons. The World Health
Organization (WHO) says cutting, often performed on girls 15 and
younger, can result in bleeding, infection, problems with urination and
complications with childbearing.
Somalia is in the top three countries in the world for FGM violations, according to the WHO.