AFGHANISTAN: “Differentiate rape from adultery” – rights groups

Photo: Masoomi/IRIN

The mother of a raped girl talks about her daughter’s predicament at a press conference in Kandahar Province in August

KABUL,  – Human rights groups are calling on the Afghan government to adopt a new law which would more clearly differentiate rape, a criminal offence, from consensual adultery, considered a serious crime in the country.

“Rape and adultery are two different issues and should be separate in law. Rape is an act of violence and coercion and the inflicting of suffering on a victim, and is not consensual, whereas adultery is consensual, freely chosen,” Sonya Merkova, a researcher at London-based Amnesty International, told IRIN.

Parwin Rahimi, an official of the Afghanistan Independent Human Rights Commission (AIHRC), and Ajmal Samadi from the Afghanistan Rights Monitor (ARM) echoed this standpoint.

“Rape needs to be legally recognized as a heinous crime and must be dealt with separately from Islamic adultery penal codes,” Samadi told IRIN.

Many Afghan judges confuse rape with adultery which, rights activists say, adds insult to injury for the victims.

Mawlawi Mohammad Qasim, a member of the Penal Bureau in the Supreme Court, for instance, describes rape as “an illicit sexual relationship between a man and a woman who are not married to each other”.

Judicial officials and the police are unaware – or not convinced – that rape is a serious crime, according to a report by the UN Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA).

“The reality for most female victims is that state institutions fail them,” says the report entitled Silence is Violence.

Legal ambiguity

Courts prosecute cases of adultery and rape according to Articles 422-433 of the 1976 Penal Code which, according to rights groups, do not explicitly criminalize rape.

The Code prescribes 7-15 years jail for adulterers and rapists depending on their marital status, age and other circumstances.

“Women in Afghanistan, victims of rape, are often at risk of being convicted of `zina’ [fornication outside marriage] under Article 427 of the Afghan Penal Code, and are denied justice. Indeed, the crime of rape committed against them, through no fault of their own, is compounded by further victimization in being prosecuted by the state for `zina’,” said Amnesty’s Merkova.

“In instances of forced sexual intercourse, law enforcement and judicial authorities overwhelmingly resort to the concept of `zina’, which does not adequately address the issue of consent, one of the core elements of the crime of rape,” UNAMA said in its report.

The issue of the criminalization of rape is further complicated by the fact that judges rely extensively on their own interpretation of Islamic law and its jurisprudence when adjudicating `zina’ cases, according to UNAMA.

Another problem with the existing Penal Code is its lack of support for the victims of rape. “There should be legal and psychological support as well as protection services for the victims of rape,” Fawzia Amini, a top official in the Ministry of Women’s Affairs, told IRIN.

Marital rape

Rape needs to be legally recognized as a heinous crime and must be dealt with separately from Islamic adultery penal codes

Supreme Court judges Bahauddin Baha and Mohammad Qasim affirmed the husband’s prerogative in sexual affairs with his wife/wives. An Afghan man is allowed to have up to four wives at a time but an Afghan woman cannot have more than one husband, according to the country’s Islamic laws and strong patriarchal traditions.

Even if a husband forces his wife to have sex with him, this is not considered rape, according to many judges.

“The issue of marital rape is never considered or reported, since women have no choice in terms of consenting to sexual intercourse with their spouse,” says UNAMA’s report.

However, women’s rights activists say marital rape is a reality and should be dealt with through appropriate legal mechanisms. “It is nothing but rape when a husband forcefully copulates with his wife despite her objections,” Rahimi of AIHRC said.

“Amnesty International considers acts of marital rape violence against women and a criminal offence,” said Merkova.

The issue of marital rape is relevant as both child and forced marriages are prevalent in Afghanistan, particularly in rural areas, say analysts. “A forced marriage is in fact a kind of rape, and so is child marriage,” said Rahimi.

New law for Shias

On 27 July the government published in the Official Gazette a controversial law for the country’s Shia minority which, according to Human Rights Watch (HRW), deprives women of many basic rights.

“It also effectively allows a rapist to avoid prosecution by paying ‘blood money’ to a girl who is injured when raped,” said the US-based HRW in a statement on 13 August.

The government has repudiated such criticism, saying the Shia Personal Affairs Law was promulgated in accordance with Shia religious jurisprudence and is strongly supported by most Shia people.

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SOMALIA: Government adds voice to drought appeal

Photo: Mohamed Amin Jibril/IRIN

Livestock deaths have added to the suffering of thousands of drought-affected people in Somalia’s central and southern regions (file photo)

NAIROBI, – Thousands of drought-affected people in Somalia’s central and southern regions need urgent help after losing most of their livestock, the economy’s mainstay, Sheikh Abdulkadir Ali Omar, the Interior Minister, told IRIN.

“I have been in touch with people throughout the regions and the reports we are getting is that the drought is widespread and the situation of the people is very grave, with water shortages the biggest problem for both animals and people,” Omar said on 3 September.

He said almost all the regions were affected. “Livestock are dying in their thousands, with families losing everything.”

He said the drought was forcing many families into towns that had no way of coping. “On the outskirts of most small towns from Gedo [southwest] to Galkayo [northeast], you will now find nomadic families in flimsy shelters looking for help.”

Omar said the transitional government could not address the situation alone and appealed to the international community for assistance. “This is bigger than anything we have seen in a long time. I hope our partners will do their utmost to mitigate the suffering of the people.”

Ahmed Ali Hilowle, president of the self-declared state of Galmudug, in Central region, told IRIN by telephone from Galkayo that most of the area was suffering from prolonged drought: “Even camels are dying. It is a disaster.”

He said: “We had two years of dismal rains and the people are on the verge of dying.” The area is dependent on barkads (water catchments) for water “and almost all are dry. We are now trucking water sometimes over 100km,” he said, adding that one water tanker, with 200 drums [each 200l], costs US$200. “Few, if any, can afford that.”

“Catastrophe” looms

An aid worker in Dusa Mareb, Galgadud’s capital, said the town was already hosting many people displaced from war-torn Mogadishu and that the arrival of pastoralists was overwhelming the host community. He warned: “if the coming Deyr [short] rains fail, we will be facing a major catastrophe”.

Photo: Manoocher Deghati/IRIN

A Somali refugee woman with her child as she waits to be admitted to Dadaab refugee camp, Kenya in 2008: Thousands of Somalis are now trapped in horrifically overcrowded camps in Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia itself , says Oxfam

The Food Security and Nutrition Analysis Unit (FSNAU of the UN Food and Agricultural Organization) said in a recent statement the country was facing the worst humanitarian crisis of the past 18 years, with an estimated 3.76 million people – half the population – needing aid.

Omar said the transitional government was prepared to do whatever it could to help the agencies obtain the access they need.

“We will also help them identify reliable local partners who will deliver the aid to those people the foreign agencies cannot reach.”

Meanwhile, the international aid agency Oxfam said the country was suffering the worst drought in a decade and a major increase in conflict.

In a statement issued on 3 September the agency said: “A total failure of the international community to deal effectively with the Somalia crisis and help end the war is resulting in a spiral of human suffering and exodus to neighbouring countries.”

It said hundreds of thousands of Somalis who fled the violence were now trapped in horrifically overcrowded or poorly managed camps in Kenya, Ethiopia and Somalia itself.

“Somalis flee one of the world’s most brutal conflicts and a desperate drought, only to end up in unimaginable conditions in camps that are barely fit for humans. Hundreds of thousands of children are affected, and the world is abandoning the next generation of Somalis when they most need our help. Why does it seem like you matter less in this world if you are from Somalia?” asked Robert van den Berg, Oxfam International’s spokesman for the Horn of Africa.

He called on the international community to “put Somalia top of their list and do more than simply keeping the country on life-support”.

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SUDAN: Women, children increasingly targeted in Southern clashes

Photo: Peter Martell/IRIN

A southern Sudanese woman recovers from a gunshot wound after surviving a recent massacre (file photo): Officials say women and children are now being deliberately targeted in escalating attacks

NAIROBI,  – Women and children are being increasingly targeted in the escalating attacks against communities in Southern Sudanese states, exacerbating the dire humanitarian situation, say officials.

“We have seen a drastic escalation in violence across Southern Sudan this year – from the Equatorial States besieged by LRA [rebel Ugandan Lord’s Resistance Army] attacks, to the brutal clashes in Jonglei, Upper Nile and Lake States,” Jonathan Whittall, head of Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) in Southern Sudan, said.

“The violent clashes are different to the traditional ‘cattle rustling’ that normally occurs each year,” he said in a 3 September statement. “Women and children, usually spared in this fighting, are now deliberately targeted and the number of deaths [is] higher than the number of wounded.”

On 1 September, Archbishop Daniel Deng Bul Yak of the Episcopal Church said the church no longer viewed the clashes as “tribal conflicts”, but rather as “deliberately organized attack[s] on civilians by those that are against the peace in Southern Sudan”.

At least 140,000 people have been displaced by clashes between communities in Jonglei, Upper Nile and Lake States. Separate attacks by the LRA in the Equatorial states have also reportedly forced 65,000 Sudanese from their homes this year.

“This combination of violent attacks across the region aggravates an already dire humanitarian situation for the people of Southern Sudan,” MSF warned.

In the latest attack, 42 people were reported killed in a 29 August clash between communities in Twic East County, Jonglei State. More than 60 were wounded and 24,000 displaced from 17 villages, mainly in Panyangor and Kongor.

“In the last six violent incidents that MSF responded to in Jonglei and Upper Nile States over the last six months… 1,057 people were killed in contrast to 259 wounded, with more than 60,000 displaced,” the medical charity said. “This is new – the intention is to attack a village and to kill. The result is a population living in total fear, with significant humanitarian and medical needs.”

Undermining CPA

Continuing violence, the Archbishop warned, could damage the smooth implementation of the 2005 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), under whose auspices elections are being planned for 2010 and a referendum on possible Southern autonomy in 2011.

Photo: youtube

Airdropping food aid (file photo): Poor rainfall, insecurity and high cereal and low livestock prices have created an urgent food security situation in Southern Sudan

“The timeframe given for the elections and referendum is already too short for the democratic processes to be effectively organized, and by the provisional dates chosen for voting… much of the South will already be suffering from logistics problems caused by the onset of the wet season,” he warned in a statement.

“This is an indication to the citizens of the Sudan that the people on the ground are not being regarded or included in the politics of peace and that we are vulnerable to future violations of the CPA and an uncertain future for peace in the Sudan.”

Food shortages

Separately, the UN World Food Programme warned that an urgent food security situation had been created in the region by poor rainfall, continued high levels of insecurity and high cereal and low livestock prices.

According to the recently released Annual Needs and Livelihood Assessment Mid-Year Review, about 1.5 million people in Southern Sudan face severe food insecurity, while aid delivery has been complicated by insecurity and poor roads.

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Kenya: Kidero death threat case kicks off

BY JEFF OTIENO

A case in which two people have been charged in Butere court over claims that they threatened to kill and also extort money from Mumias Sugar Managing Director Dr. Evans Kidero at long last started.

The two Mustafa Juma and Lusule Ole Sangale have been charged that on 12^th December 2008 they threatened to kill the C.E.O and further demanded Kshs. 200,000 from him in order to avert everything.

Mustafa Juma who is the first accused stunned the court once again when he demanded for an adjournment for the third time on grounds that he was unwell and needed treatment. The second accused Lusule Ole Sangale however remained mute during the entire proceedings.

He has been in police custody for almost six months after he had jumped bail. Last month when the case came up for hearing Mustafa demanding that his bail plea be granted but the prosecution stood ground arguing that his papers for the same were dubious to warrant a reprieve.

All the seven witnesses were in attendance and Dr. Evans Kidero the complainant, was the first one to be in the witness box.

Three witnesses testified and the remaining are slated to testify on 25^th Sept 2009 during second hearing.

END

GLOBAL: Climate change and AIDS activists urged to join forces

Photo: Shamsuddin Ahmed/IRIN

Flooding caused by climate change could cause food insecurity and malaria outbreaks

JOHANNESBURG,  – The people of sub-Saharan Africa, already bearing the brunt of the global HIV/AIDS epidemic, are also likely to be worst hit by the effects of climate change, but until now AIDS and climate change experts and activists have largely remained in separate camps.

Now, change might be on the way. A recent working paper published by the UN Environment Programme (UNEP) and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV/AIDS (UNAIDS) seeks to bring players from the two global movements together to collaborate on research into the overlapping impacts of AIDS and climate change and eventually launch a more integrated response.

“AIDS has already killed tens of millions of people, while climate change may dwarf this number,” wrote the authors. “Those concerned to reduce climate change can apply many lessons learned by the AIDS community.”

The paper highlights how climate change is likely to raise the vulnerability of populations with already high rates of HIV, mostly in sub-Saharan Africa, but also in northeast India, the Mekong Delta region in Vietnam, and the highlands of New Guinea.

The biggest threat – already present in many parts of the world – is food insecurity caused by more intense and widespread droughts, and other extreme weather events such as flooding.

Households affected by HIV/AIDS are less able to cope with food shortages and high food prices because they may have lost breadwinners, be caring for sick adults, and children orphaned by the disease. Malnutrition can increase vulnerability to HIV infection and make it difficult for those already infected to adhere to an antiretroviral regimen or other medication for treating opportunistic infections.

The more frequent outbreaks of malaria occurring in parts of Africa as a result of changing temperature and rainfall patterns are a second potentially dangerous interaction between climate change and AIDS.

People with immune systems weakened by HIV are at greater risk of malaria and other infectious diseases sensitive to climate change, such as leishmaniasis, a parasitic disease transmitted by the bite of sand flies. The paper noted that a growing number of AIDS patients in parts of Asia, Europe and Africa are dying from this disease.

The authors also speculate that competition for increasingly scarce resources brought on by climate change, such as water and grazing, may heighten the risk of conflict and migration, and deepen gender and social inequities – all factors with the potential to fuel the spread of HIV.

Read more:

LESOTHO: “We need food”

UGANDA: Hungry HIV-positive patients abandon ARVs

NAMIBIA: Floods interrupted AIDS services – report

MOZAMBIQUE – Rains, pregnancy and AIDS – a recipe for malaria

Despite the lack of data on the links between AIDS and climate change, “We can definitely draw some solid conclusions,” Sari Seppänen, a UNAIDS programme officer in Kenya, told IRIN/PlusNews. “Through our joint venture we’ve understood there’s definitely enough grounds to investigate these main pathways we’ve indentified.”

Seppänen said the aim of the working paper was to generate interest among researchers willing to investigate the links between AIDS and climate change in more depth, and to foster networks in the climate change and AIDS sectors.

“The lack of global political will to deal with the unequal burden of AIDS is a reason why poor populations should fear the implications of climate change,” the authors commented.

“It is not implausible that a future world could evolve in which comparatively comfortable populations find reasons to largely ignore the chaos that could develop from climate change. An alliance between the AIDS and climate change communities is likely to reduce the risk of this scenario.”

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SOUTH AFRICA: Treatment crisis in Free State, again

Photo: Mujahid Safodien/PlusNews

Too few health workers are struggling to cope with high patient numbers

JOHANNESBURG, – South Africa’s Free State Province is again experiencing a crisis in the delivery of antiretroviral (ARV) treatment, with understaffed clinics, erratic drug supplies and long waiting lists preventing many dangerously ill patients from accessing the life-prolonging drugs, according to AIDS activists.

Runaway overspending by the provincial health department in 2008 led to a moratorium on new patients starting ARV treatment that lasted from November until February 2009. The Southern African HIV Clinicians Society estimated that 30 people a day died during this three-month period because they could not access treatment.

Local newspapers reported that national health minister Aaron Motsoaledi told a meeting of the South African National AIDS Council (SANAC) in July: “What happened in the Free State last year should never be allowed to happen again in any province.”

Now, several reports from the Free State suggest that many of the factors leading to last year’s moratorium have not been addressed, and patients are again suffering the consequences.

“There’s definitely a crisis with ARV stocks again,” said Trudie Harrison, director of the Anglican Church’s Mosamaria AIDS Ministry. “They’re not able to initiate new clients at the rate they should be, there are long waiting lists, and one of the clinic staff members told me that people coming now will only be able to start [treatment] next year [2010].”

Harrison told IRIN/PlusNews that the crisis was the result of drug shortages and a dearth of health workers. At one ARV site she recently visited, normally staffed by three doctors, about 200 patients were waiting to see just one doctor. “They can only see so many, and they send the rest home,” she said.

Sello Mokhalipi, of Treatment Action Campaign (TAC), an AIDS lobby group, confirmed that a critical staff shortage was compounding the drug supply problem. He told IRIN/PlusNews that a number of HIV-positive people could get only one of the three ARVs they needed from their local ARV clinic.

Harrison and Mokhalipi cited mismanagement as the main reason for the renewed crisis, but Jabu Mbalula, a spokesperson for the provincial health department, said in an emailed response to questions from IRIN/PlusNews: “The allocated funds for ARVs for this financial year will most certainly not be enough” to keep pace with the number of new patients needing ARVs. A request for additional funding has been lodged with the national health department.

Mbalula said the waiting list for treatment had been reduced to 705 patients, and waiting times differed “in terms of site, patient load and availability of HR [human resources]”.

“Shortage of HR is a challenge,” he admitted, but denied that there had been any drug stock-outs. “Low levels of certain drugs were reported, but the province was able to address this.”

I see it getting worse before it gets better, unless we can have massive intervention from the [national health] minister himself

However, Harrison said a young man had recently died in the back of her car while she was trying to get him medical help, after several months waiting to start ARV treatment, and “We’ve had reports from all over the province of similar things happening.”

Donor-funded NGO programmes that used to assist patients who could not obtain ARVs from the public health sector had reached their limit, she added, and very few patients could afford to buy the drugs from the private sector at a cost of about US$100 a month.

Various NGOs, trade unions and church groups formed the Free State HIV/AIDS Coalition in March to lobby for better services for people living with HIV, but despite numerous requests the group had failed to secure a meeting with the provincial health minister.

The coalition is collecting affidavits from HIV-positive patients who have struggled to get treatment. Coalition chairperson Kabelo Makhetha interviewed three HIV-positive women who recently gave birth at public health facilities.

Only one was offered nevirapine, an ARV that reduces the risk of transmitting the virus to the baby, and none were offered formula milk as an alternative to exclusive breastfeeding, which carries a small HIV transmission risk. One baby who tested positive for HIV had since died.

Harrison had little confidence in the provincial health department’s capacity to deal with the crisis. “I see it getting worse before it gets better, unless we can have massive intervention from the [national health] minister himself,” she said.

The TAC’s Mokhalipi was doubtful. “If the national department of health was really willing to intervene, we wouldn’t be experiencing the shortage of staff right now; they should have fixed it right after the moratorium.”

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KENYA: Family planning and HIV services work well together

Photo: John Nyaga/IRIN

Integrating family planning into PMTCT seems to be the way forward

NAIROBI,  – People living with HIV in Kenya do not have adequate access to family planning services, even though most HIV-infected women do not want children in the immediate future.

A recent study by the reproductive health NGO, Family Health International (FHI), in the Nakuru district of Rift Valley Province, found that 80 percent of HIV-positive women had no intention of having a child in the next two years. However, according to the 2007 Kenya AIDS Indicator Survey, only half the HIV-positive people needing family planning services had access to them.

“Most prevention of mother-to-child transmission [PMTCT] programmes … looked at it only in the context of preventing transmission to an already conceived child, but meeting contraceptive needs of those living with HIV is a sure way of reducing … transmission by avoiding unwanted pregnancies in the first place,” said Maureen Kuyo, a project director at FHI.

Sylvia Mate* said staff at the antenatal clinic she attends in Mukuru, a slum in the capital, Nairobi, have never mentioned contraception, even though they know she and her husband already have three children. She believes condoms are a contraceptive method for unmarried people who have several sexual partners, and is unwilling to use them.

“I know there are other family-planning methods, but we are not even told whether those other contraceptives are safe for somebody like me [HIV-positive] or not,” she said. Mate is determined that her current pregnancy will be her last, even if it means seeking an illegal and possibly dangerous abortion.

About 56 percent of women in the FHI study mentioned a fear of vertical transmission of HIV to their children as one the reasons they would not want another pregnancy, while 50 percent mentioned the risk of lowered immunity during pregnancy.

“It is important to realize that we have a sexually active population, including people living with HIV, and this should be reason enough to strengthen family-planning programmes and integrate them into HIV and AIDS programs, including offering family-planning counselling at voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) centres,” FHI’s Kuyo said.

An earlier FHI study found that offering family planning services during VCT was feasible and acceptable to providers as well as clients, and that integration did not negatively affect VCT quality.

Experts have noted that integration would require additional staff training, and materials for family planning would need to be distributed at VCT and PMTCT centres across the country.

“HIV service providers are beginning, in a small way, to talk to people on their family planning needs,” Kuyo said. “Access is improving, but there is still along way to go.”

* Not her real name

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