September
21, 2000
Dhaka (UNB) - Bangladesh ranks second among a dozen countries having higher percentage of women assaulted by male partners, says a UN report.
It puts Bangladesh’s percentage of adult women reporting physical assault by male partners at 47, second to 67 in Papua New Guinea. The percentage is 45 in Ethiopia, 45 in India and 34 in Egypt.
The State of World Population Report 2000 remarks that gender inequality; discrimination and violence are still the rule rather than the exception in most societies.
The report, released globally by UNFPA yesterday, calls for partnerships between governments and non-government organisations, among governments, civil societies and international bodies to end massive global violation of human rights and ensure equal place for women in the society.
United Nations Population Fund’s representative in Bangladesh Janet E Jackson released the report at a press conference in Jatiya Press Club. Assistant representatives Nurul Ameen and Tahera Ahmed also analysed some aspects of the report.
The report titled “Lives Together, Worlds Apart: Men and Women in a Time of Change” reveals that women are subjected to violence, even in the most developed countries like USA and Canada, and the percentage is quite alarming.
Violence of women in the forms of rape, forced sex and other forms of sexual violence causing murder, abortion and high-risk pregnancies and STDs, trafficking, “honour” killing by family men, physical and psychological tortures are on the rise.
Developed nations like Canada, USA and Switzerland account for 29, 22 and 21 percent respectively of the cases assaulted by male partners.
The report, however, did not give details of how many people were surveyed in Bangladesh to reach the figure of 47.
It also placed Bangladesh’s name among the countries where “honour” killings are reported. Throughout the world, roughly 5,000 women and girls, having been raped, are murdered every year by their families.
Every year, between 25 and 50 women and girls fall victims of “honour” killings in Jordan. Such killings are reported in India, Pakistan, Israel, Egypt, Turkey, Uganda and even in Sweden, UK and Italy.
It cited the case of an 18-year old woman, who was flogged to death for “immoral” behaviour in Bangladesh.
The report said the “honour” killings tend to be more prevalent in, but are not limited to, countries with a majority of Muslim population.
It gave a glimpse of the state of violence against women that cuts across social and economic situation.
At least one in every three women has been beaten, coerced into sex or abused in some other way — most often at the hands of someone she knows.
About a third of all pregnancies, some 80 million a year, are unintended or unwanted. Some 2 million girls between ages 5 and 15 are forced to sex trade each year while trafficking for sexual purposes is the fastest growing area of organised crime.
Some 5000 to 7000 Nepalese girls are trafficked to India for commercial sex every year.
At least 130 million women have been forced to undergo female genital mutilation or cutting while another 2 million are at risk.
Some 500,000 women die each year as a result of pregnancy and many times that number suffered disease or disability.
At least 60 million girls who would otherwise be expected to be alive are “missing” from various population, mostly in Asia, as a result of abortion, infanticide or neglect.
