The International NGO Coalition for a worldwide ban on female genital mutilation has been campaigning since 2010 for the United Nations General Assembly to adopt a Resolution banning the practice. Such a Resolution would provide the highest-level expression of political will and be an essential step towards ending this violation of human rights against millions of women around the world. It would serve to strengthen laws that currently ban FGM and provide new impetus for those nations that currently do not have such laws on the books.
Following the decision by the 56th Session of the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women in March 2012 recommending that the General Assembly consider the issue of female genital mutilation at its 67th session later this year, the African Group at the UN is currently spearheading the effort to draft a Resolution.
In support of the African Group’s effort, the Ban FGM Coalition has launched an appeal to the United Nations for a Resolution that explicitly bans female genital mutilation worldwide, and calling on all States to adopt and implement legislation to ban female genital mutilation and to take all necessary legislative, political and operational measures aimed at ending the practice.
Support this initiative and sign the appeal on www.banfgm.org
First signatories
Among the first prominent signatories of the Appeal are Chantal Compaoré, First Lady of Burkina Faso, Goodwill Ambassador of the Inter-African Committee, Coordinator of the International Campaign to Ban FGM Worldwide; Raymonde Coffie Goudou, Minister of Family, Women and Childhood, Ivory Coast; Sihem Badi, Minister of Women and Family Affairs, Tunisia; Maikibi Kadidiatou Dandobi, Minister of Population, Women’s Promotion and Child Protection, Niger; Olivia Amedjogbe-Kouevi, Minister for the Advancement of Women, Togo; Joëlle Milquet, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Home Affairs and Equal Opportunities, Belgium; Isabelle Durant, Vice-President of European Parliament; Emma Bonino, Vice-president of the Senate, Italy; Sabine de Bethune, President of the Senate, Belgium; Olga Zrihen, Marleen Temmerman, Fauzaya Talhaoui, Fatiha Saïdi, Nele Lijnen, Members of the Senate, Belgium; Gisèle Mandailaand Fatoumata Sidibé, Members of the Parliament of the Brussels-Capital Region, Belgium; Safia Djibril, Member of the Parliament, Djibouti; Mama-Raouf Tchagnao, Minister Counsellor, Permanent Mission of Togo to the United Nations; Ivan Hermans, Senior Policy and External Relations Advisor, UNFPA, Belgium; Mariam Lamizana, President of CI-AF, Burkina Faso; Khady Koita, President of La Palabre, Senegal.
For more information, contact Alvilda Jablonko, Coordinator of the FGM Program, on ajablonko@npwj.org / phone: +32 494 533 915 or Nicola Giovannini on ngiovannini@npwj.org or +32 (0)2 548-39 15.
