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Yearly Archives: 2014

Orchid Project: FGC in Iraqi Kurdistan

22.12.2014. by Orchid. On November 13th 2014, the Kurdish and Middle Eastern Women Organisation (KMEWO) held an event to promote their campaign titled ‘The Campaign: Stop FGM in Iraqi Kurdistan’. The event was held in correspondence with their annual general meeting, as KMEWO  sought to bring together an array of people to discuss FGC in […]

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Iranian Film tackles Female Genital Mutilation

15.12.2014. By Stop FGM Middle East. The short film “Almond” tells the story of Awat a young Kurdish woman in Iran who is struggling with the consequences of female genital mutilation (FGM). When she has to marry, she stops talking entirely which soon becomes the main subject of the village talk. The director Mokhtar Masoumian […]

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FGM in Iran: Blade of Islam or patriarchal custom – an interview with scholars, activists and survivors

4.12.2014. by Stop FGM Middle East. The Iranian “Radio Farda” aired a 30-minutes special on female genital mutilation (FGM) happening in Iran on November 25th. It is the first time, that a radio in Iran tackles this topic and the journalist Roja Karimi Majd does so with great insight and her interviewees answer in remarkable openness. […]

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Kurdish FGM-Free Village invited to Talkshow

3.12.14. By Haje Keli. Kurdistan’s first FGM-free village as talk show guests on ‘Binewshe” (KurdSat TV) to discuss the village’s commitment to ending FGM. As a part of WADI’s Stop FGM campaign, the village of Tutaqal vowed to end FGM among their inhabitants. This week WADI was invited to appear on the very popular TV-show […]

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Egypt’s first female genital mutilation trial ends in not guilty verdict

The Guadian, 20.11.2014. The first doctor to be brought to trial in Egypt on charges of female genital mutilation (FGM) has been acquitted, crushing hopes that the landmark verdict would discourage Egyptian doctors from conducting the endemic practice. Raslan Fadl, a doctor and Islamic preacher in the village of Agga, northern Egypt, was acquitted of […]

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Revisiting Reza Aslan’s response to Bill Maher about female genital mutilation

21.10.2014. After Reza Aslan called FGM an African Problem, Stop FGM Middle East contacted PunditFact to set things straight. Here is their clarification: “Hannah Wettig, who manages the Stop FGM Middle East campaign for Germany-based nonprofit WADI and Hivos, pushes back on the notion of FGM as an “African problem” and criticized UNICEF’s reliance on […]

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A Kurdish girl’s story of Female genital mutilation FGM in Iraqi Kurdistan

October 18, 2014. SLÊMANÎ, Kurdistan region ‘Iraq’,— As we all know from news reports from the region, the people of Iraqi Kurdistan have been facing great threats and hardships for many years and are currently on the frontline of the fight against ISIS (also known as the Islamic State). However there is another, covert threat […]

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Elimination of FGM in one generation possible – After 9 years campaigning 70% oppose practice in Iraqi Kurdistan

15.9,2014. By Stop FGM Middle East. Only ten years ago, female genital mutilation (FGM) in Iraq was a non-topic. Outside Iraq hardly anybody had heard of it, in the country itself it was well hidden within communities. Nine years ago, WADI started a comprehensive campaign against the practice in the Kurdish region of Iraq with […]

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Iraq Business-News: First-Ever Survey of FGM in Northern Iraq

9.9.2014. The Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) High Council of Women’s Affairs (HCWA) together with UNICEF, Heartland Alliance International, and Wadi, and in collaboration with UN Women and UNFPA, released this week results of a first-ever ‘knowledge, attitudes and practices’ (KAP) survey on the root causes of female genital mutilation (FGM) in the Kurdistan Region of […]

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Popular Saudi Sheikh Alarefe warns of the way FGM is done

6.8.2014. By Stop FGM Middle East. Responding to a question by a caller on his Youtube program, the Saudi Sheikh Mohammad Al Arefe warned of female genital mutilation saying: “Today it’s chaos, women who do it are not experts and they ruin the girls’ vagina and impact her adult life… if we need to do […]

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Iraqi Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani issues Fatwa against FGM

By Rayehe Mozafarian, 06.08.2014 In 2010, the sentences of Shi’ite religious leaders were collected and published in “Razor and Tradition” book. Gand Ayatollah Ali al-Husayni al-Sistani, the highest-ranking Shia (Marja’) in Iraq and the leader of the Hawza of Najaf said then: “Female Genital Cutting is not Haram” (Haram is used to refer to any act that is forbidden by Allah). In recent years, […]

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Tackling FGM in Iran: Education about FGM during life skill classes for housewives

5.8.2014. By Osman Mahmoudi The Hamraz Consulting Center, Training Provider in Javanrood is offering classes for housewives to teach them life skills. During these classes Mahmoudi Osman manager of the center talked about physical, psychological and sexual symptoms of FGM. Increased knowledge and awareness about actions such as circumcision is helpful and beneficial in preventing […]

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New report: Female Genital Mutilation and Child Marriage in Iran

By Stop FGM Mideast, 30.07.2014 For the first time ever Iranian activists published a report based on interviews and data collections proving that Female Genital Mutilation is much more widespread in Iran than previously assumed. According to interviews done in several provinces in Northern Iran far more than 50% of females in these regions are […]

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India: Ban this barbarous practice!

29.7.2014. Hindu Businessline. By RASHEEDA BHAGAT Why condemn the ISIS alone? India’s prosperous Dawoodi Bohra community also practises female genital mutilation There has been worldwide furore on the ISIS — which has declared an Islamic state in parts of Syria and Northern Iraq — supposedly issuing a fatwa on female genital mutilation in the areas […]

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FGM in Iraq: The hoax of a hoax?

29.7.1014. By Stop FGM Middle East Last week a statement by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) was circulating in Arab Social media calling female genital mutilation sunnah (the right path in Islam) and called on all Muslim women to have it done. A number of Western media outlets and international organizations reported […]

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