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About Gender-Based Violence
Gender-Based Violence continues to be “The most pervasive yet least recognized human rights abuse in the world.” It is an issue that cuts across all cultures, races, religions, and socio-economic levels. Forms of gender-based violence include rape, domestic violence, sexual assault, trafficking of women and girls, prostitution, female genital mutilation, harassment, and forced marriage. The majority of GBV cases involves women and girls but also affects men and boys.
Gender-Based Violence results in devastating consequences for the victims including physical, sexual, and mental harm and suffering. GBV has become not only a human rights but a major public health issue. The physical risks associated with GBV include higher rates of HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases, damage to reproductive organs, and broken bones. The social and psychological effects are just as traumatizing, leaving many victims feeling isolated and vulnerable. Unfortunately, legal systems and cultural norms often do not treat it as a crime, but rather as a “private” family matter. Thus, women usually do not seek help or report the violence when it happens.
Gender-Based Violence against women and girls is present during times of peace but is the most common during armed conflict. GBV often becomes a strategy of combat by armed state and non-state actors, systematically used to humiliate, terrorize, and displace its victims. Rape is used to torment communities, force women and their families to flee their homes, and is used as a method of ethnic cleansing and genocide. These campaigns have occurred in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Liberia, the Balkans, Sudan, and Uganda.
In spite of the increasing commitment by the international community to address GBV, in particular in the context of armed conflict and post-war environments, effective action continues to be lagging. Citizens for Global Solutions works to build the political will to improve the capacity of international and domestic bodies to address effectively the issue of Gender-Based Violence. Since Gender-Based Violence is sustained by silence, Citizens for Global Solutions works to create awareness and a productive discussion regarding the issue.
External Resources
Official Documents
UN Security Council Resolution 1325
UN Resolution 1325(2000) is the first on women, peace, and security and addresses the disproportionate and unique impact of armed conflict on women. It supports women’s participation in peace negotiations and post-conflict reconstruction.
UN Security Council Resolution 1820
Resolution 1820(2008) is a follow up on 1325 and confronts sexual violence in conflict and post-conflict situations.
UN Security Council Resolution 1888
Resolution 1888(2009) builds upon resolutions 1325 and 1820 and intensifies efforts to stop sexual violence against women and calls on all parties to immediately stop all acts of rape and sexual violence during armed conflict.
UN Security Council Resolution 1889
Resolution 1889(2009) concentrates on the involvement of women during post-conflict and reconstruction periods and emphasizes the importance of an increase in the number of women among peacebuilding and peacekeeping personnel.
External Links
UNIFEM's work on Gender-Based Violence
UN-INSTRAW Gender, Peace, and Security Program
Multimedia
The Global Citizen
A blog by Citizens for Global Solutions
May 16, 2013 - 12:36pm EDT
A guest blog post by Tony Fleming as posted on the Global Memo:
Yesterday was the deadline for nominations for Executive... Continue Reading
March 20, 2013 - 11:32am EDT
After the initial relief of the guilty verdict of the Steubenville rape case, I was horrified to see postings, tweets, and... Continue Reading
March 08, 2013 - 9:16am EST
Today is my favorite holiday. I learned about it in Italian class. In Italian, the holiday is called, La Festa della Donna,... Continue Reading
Against Gender-Based Violence
"Not only is sexual violence a widespread denial of the human rights of girls, but it is also seriously impeding a country's economic performance and our world's attempts - now at a most critical stage - to achieve the ambitions of the Millennium Development Goals."
~Melanne Verveer - Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women's Issues
"If we look at the range of interventions necessary to address sexual violence in conflict and post-conflict situations, it becomes clear how pressing is the need for a concerted and integrated approach."
~UN Under-Secretary General Jean-Marie Guehenno
"The challenge of sexual violence in conflict cannot and should not be separated from the broader security issues confronting this council, it is time for all of us to assume our responsibility to go beyond condemning this behavior, to taking concrete steps to end it, to make it socially unacceptable, to recognize it is not cultural - it is criminal."
~U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
"Sexual violence in armed conflict or, indeed, at any time, should have no place and find no haven in the world."
~ U.N. Secretary- General Ban Ki-Moon
"It is the ultimate mark of criminality and cowardice to condemn women to relentless and systematic rape. We must bear witness to the value of every child in Darfur and the dignity of every woman in the Congo. No faith or culture should condone the outrages against them."
~President Obama speaking to the Ghanaian parliament