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Preliminary survey on the root causes of attacks and discrimination against persons with albinism 2016, para. 7
- Paragraph text
- Myths about albinism include the belief that a child with albinism is a curse meted out on the mother or family of the child. It is also sometimes believed that children with albinism are the result of their family's or parent's evildoing and they are therefore considered a punishment to the whole family and community. In most cases, the blame for having a child with albinism is often attributed to the mother because the curse is believed to be matrilineal, transmitted by the mother's side of the family. There are also beliefs that women who give birth to children with albinism are unclean, or even in some cases witches. A similar myth is that the mother of a child with albinism stepped onto something evil, leading to a curse on the whole family.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Independent Expert on the enjoyment of human rights by persons with albinism
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Families
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Preliminary survey on the root causes of attacks and discrimination against persons with albinism 2016, para. 11
- Paragraph text
- The lack of understanding of the condition is also illustrated by myths that persons with albinism cannot have children who do not have albinism, or that they are sterile. Furthermore, it is often believed that persons with albinism can only be found within one`s proximate race; consequently, the worldwide status of the condition is often not generally known. This narrow understanding of the frequency of albinism feeds into myths which present the condition as a particular problem supernaturally aimed at specific women and families.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Independent Expert on the enjoyment of human rights by persons with albinism
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Harmful Practices
- Health
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Families
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Eliminating discrimination against women in the area of health and safety, with a focus on the instrumentalization of women's bodies 2016, para. 34
- Paragraph text
- Many girls are exposed to a wide variety of practices which are harmful to their health and well-being, such as female genital mutilation, discrimination in food allocation resulting in malnutrition and discrimination in access to professional health care. Furthermore, early marriage and adolescent pregnancy have a long-lasting impact on girls' physical integrity and mental health. Pregnancy and childbirth are together the second leading cause of death among 15- to 19-year-old girls globally, putting them at the highest risk of dying or suffering serious lifelong injuries as a result of pregnancy. For example, up to 65 per cent of women with obstetric fistula, which is a severely disabling condition and often results in social exclusion, develop this condition as adolescents.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Working Group on the issue of discrimination against women in law and practice
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Harmful Practices
- Health
- Person(s) affected
- Adolescents
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Gender perspectives on torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment 2016, para. 60
- Paragraph text
- Women and girls tend to be at risk of honour violence or killing for engaging in sexual relations outside of marriage, choosing partners without their family's approval or behaving in other ways that are considered immoral; Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex persons are also targeted (A/HRC/29/23). Honour killings have been documented in South-East Asia, Europe, North America and the Middle East and affect 5,000-12,000 women each year. States' failure to prevent honour-based violence contravenes their obligations to combat and prevent torture and ill-treatment. This includes failure to grant asylum to persons facing the risk of honour violence in their countries of origin.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Girls
- LGBTQI+
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Rights of indigenous women and girls 2015, para. 54
- Paragraph text
- As discussed by the Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences in her 2007 thematic report, culture-based identity politics can be used to justify violence against women in the name of traditional practices and/or values. Practices commonly carried out in the name of tradition, such as female gender mutilation and child marriage, impact some but not all indigenous communities. The fact that those traditional practices cut across religious, geographical and ethnic characteristics demonstrate that there are multidimensional causal factors and that no one factor attributed to the identity of women makes them vulnerable. Violations suffered by indigenous women and girls must be viewed within the context of the broad spectrum of violations experienced and their specific vulnerabilities as members of indigenous communities.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Ethnic minorities
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2015
Paragraph
Servile marriage 2012, para. 34
- Paragraph text
- In 2005, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe adopted resolution 1468 on forced marriages and child marriage. The Assembly defined forced marriage as "the union of two persons at least one of whom has not given their full consent to the marriage". It defined child marriage as "the union of two persons at least one of whom is under 18 years of age". Among other things, it urged the national parliaments of the Council of Europe member States to fix at or raise to 18 years the minimum statutory age of marriage for women and men, to make it compulsory for every marriage to be declared and entered by the competent authority in an official register, and to consider the possibility of dealing with acts of forced marriage as an independent criminal offence.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Harmful Practices
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Gender-related killings of women 2012, para. 45
- Paragraph text
- Honour killings take many forms, including direct murder; stoning; women and young girls being forced to commit suicide after public denunciations of their behaviour; and women being disfigured by acid burns, leading to death. Honour crimes are also linked to other forms of family violence, and are usually committed by male family members as a means of controlling women's sexual choices and limiting their freedom of movement. Punishment usually has a collective dimension, with the family as a whole believing it to be injured by a woman's actual or perceived behaviour, and is often public in character. The visibility of the issue and the punishment also serves a social objective, namely, influencing the conduct of other women.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Families
- Girls
- Women
- Youth
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Violence against women as a barrier to the effective realization of all human rights 2014, para. 30
- Paragraph text
- Violence against women impairs and nullifies the right of women and girls to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health. Gender-based violence, such as intimate partner violence, sexual violence, female genital mutilation or other harmful traditional practices, forced and child marriage or cohabitation, gender-related killings, trafficking, infanticide and deliberate neglect of girls, have a severe impact on women's and girls' physical, mental, sexual and reproductive health. As stated by the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women, violence against women puts women's health and lives at risk. The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights notes that the right to health includes both freedoms and entitlements, including the right to control one's health and body, inclusive of sexual and reproductive freedom, and the right to be free from interference, such as the right to be free from non-consensual medical treatment and experimentation (E/C.12/2000/4, para. 8).
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Harmful Practices
- Health
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2014
Paragraph
Sexual and reproductive health and rights of girls and young women with disabilities 2017, para. 29
- Paragraph text
- The forced sterilization of girls and young women with disabilities represents a widespread human rights violation across the globe. Girls and young women with disabilities are disproportionately subjected to forced and involuntary sterilization for different reasons, including eugenics, menstrual management and pregnancy prevention. Women with intellectual and psychosocial disabilities, as well as those placed in institutions, are particularly vulnerable to forced sterilization. Despite the limited data on current practices, studies show that the sterilization of women and girls with disabilities continues to be prevalent, and up to three times higher than the rate for the general population.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the rights of persons with disabilities
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Harmful Practices
- Health
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Girls
- Persons with disabilities
- Women
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Sexual and reproductive health and rights of girls and young women with disabilities 2017, para. 34
- Paragraph text
- Girls and young women with disabilities are disproportionately affected by different forms of gender-based violence, including physical, sexual, psychological and emotional abuse; bullying; coercion; arbitrary deprivation of liberty; institutionalization; female infanticide; trafficking; neglect; domestic violence; and harmful practices such as child and forced marriage, female genital mutilation, forced sterilization and invasive and irreversible involuntary treatments (see A/HRC/20/5, paras. 12-27). Many of those forms of violence are a consequence of the intersection between disability and gender, and might happen while a girl or young woman with disabilities performs daily hygiene, receives treatment or is overmedicated. Gender-based violence occurs at home, in institutions, in schools, in health centres and in other public and private facilities, and perpetrators are frequently relatives, caregivers and professionals on whom the girl or young woman may depend.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the rights of persons with disabilities
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Gender
- Harmful Practices
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Girls
- Persons with disabilities
- Women
- Youth
- Year
- 2017
Paragraph
Eliminating discrimination against women in cultural and family life, with a focus on the family as a cultural space 2015, para. 18
- Paragraph text
- The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women and the Committee on the Rights of the Child have noted that harmful practices affecting women and girls are deeply rooted in social attitudes according to which women and girls are regarded as inferior to men and boys based on stereotyped roles. They highlight the gender dimension to violence and indicate that sex- and gender-based attitudes and stereotypes, power imbalances, inequalities and discrimination perpetuate the widespread existence of practices that often involve violence or coercion. They maintain that the nature and prevalence of these practices vary according to region and culture. These practices cause serious harm to every aspect of the lives of the women and girls who fall victim to them and include incest, female genital mutilation, early and/or forced marriage, so-called "honour crimes", dowry-related violence, neglect of girls, extreme dietary restrictions, virginity tests, servitude, stoning, violent initiation rites, widowhood practices and female infanticide. The obligations set out in the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and the Convention on the Rights of the Child form the basis for the elaboration of a global strategy to eliminate harmful practices, which should be well defined, rights-based, have local relevance and comprise legal, economic and social support measures combined with proportional political engagement and State responsibility at all levels.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Working Group on the issue of discrimination against women in law and practice
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- Boys
- Children
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2015
Paragraph
Servile marriage 2012, para. 35
- Paragraph text
- In its general recommendation No. 24, the Committee on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women specifically recommends that States parties enact and effectively enforce laws that prohibit the marriage of girls. In its general recommendation No. 21, the Committee recognizes that forced marriage may exist as a result of cultural or religious beliefs, but maintains that a woman's right to choose a spouse and enter freely into marriage is central to her life and to her dignity and equality as a human being and that this must be protected and enforced by law.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Harmful Practices
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Gender-related killings of women 2012, para. 22
- Paragraph text
- The term femicide has been used in the context of killings of women in the private and public spheres. In some European contexts, such killings are described as "crimes of passion". In South Asia the term femicide has been adopted to encompass cultural practices in the region such as female infanticide, preadolescent mortality of girls and dowry-related deaths. The phenomena of so-called "honour killings" in the Middle East are rarely specifically labelled as acts of femicide, but some scholars have highlighted the femicidal nature of such acts and the impunity that accompanies such killings.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Health
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Work of the mandate and priorities of the SR 2015, para. 105
- Paragraph text
- The human rights approach, together with the modern understanding of public health, warns against typifying violence into severe forms and those forms which are considered to be "milder" and thus perceived as not harmful. That can lead to the proliferation of practices which are justified as being "mild" forms of violence and thus tolerated or even recommended, such as domestic violence against women, female genital mutilation or the institutional care of young children.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Health
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Women
- Youth
- Year
- 2015
Paragraph
Gender perspectives on torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment 2016, para. 23
- Paragraph text
- Body searches, in particular strip and invasive body searches, are common practices and can constitute ill-treatment when conducted in a disproportionate, humiliating or discriminatory manner. Inappropriate touching and handling amounting to sexual harassment during searches is common, as are routine vaginal examinations of women charged with drug offences. These practices have a disproportionate impact on women, particularly when conducted by male guards. The punishment of women who refuse to undergo strip and invasive searches, for instance by placing them in isolation or revoking visitation privileges, is also common. When conducted for a prohibited purpose or for any reason based on discrimination and leading to severe pain or suffering, strip and invasive body searches amount to torture.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Harmful Practices
- Health
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Integrating a gender perspective in the right to food 2016, para. 24
- Paragraph text
- Inheritance is often the main avenue for women's land acquisition, yet women are still less likely to inherit land than men. Inheritance is often determined through marriage practices. Through patri-linearism, which is the most common societal system, sons, rather than daughters, inherit land from their fathers. Even where bilateral inheritance practices exist, communities may favor customary patrilineal practices. This is so in the case of the Mossi community in Burkina Faso "where despite the fact that the majority of families are Muslim, meaning that in theory daughters inherit land, this practice is not observed."
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right to food
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- Families
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Reflection on a 6-year tenure as Special Rapporteur on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography 2014, para. 27
- Paragraph text
- In total, some 158 countries have adopted laws prohibiting marriage before the age of 18, although in 146 of them, marriage under the age of 18 can be performed with parental consent. In spite of these measures, early marriage continues to take place worldwide. Although a few countries have made progress, the available data shows that globally, the incidence of early marriage was stable between 2001 and 2010. As many as 61 countries still have a prevalence rate of child marriage of over 20 per cent. According to UNICEF data from 2012, one third of women aged 20 to 24 years old - that is, some 70 million women - were married before the age of 18.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the sale and sexual exploitation of children, including child prostitution, child pornography and other child sexual abuse material
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Women
- Year
- 2014
Paragraph
Criminalisation of sexual and reproductive health 2011, para. 35
- Paragraph text
- The stigma resulting from criminalization creates a vicious cycle. Criminalization of abortion results in women seeking clandestine, and likely unsafe, abortions. The stigma resulting from procuring an illegal abortion and thereby breaking the law perpetuates the notion that abortion is an immoral practice and that the procedure is inherently unsafe, which then reinforces continuing criminalization of the practice.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on the right of everyone to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Harmful Practices
- Health
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Year
- 2011
Paragraph
Manifestations and causes of domestic servitude 2010, para. 45
- Paragraph text
- Child marriages, unions that involve at least one partner below the minimum legal age of marriage, constitute a form of forced marriage since the child is not in a position to consent. Article 16 of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women specifies that "the betrothal and the marriage of a child shall have no legal effect, and all necessary action, including legislation, shall be taken to specify a minimum age for marriage". The Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women considers that the minimum age for marriage should be 18 years for both man and woman. This age limit, which is in line with the definition of the child provided by the Convention on the Rights of the Child, is also reflected in the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (art. 21).
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Harmful Practices
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Women
- Year
- 2010
Paragraph
Servile marriage 2012, para. 27
- Paragraph text
- The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women contains specific provisions in relation to forced marriage (article 16 (1) (b)) and early marriage (article 16 (2)). Child marriages, which are unions that involve at least one partner below the minimum legal age of marriage, constitute a form of forced marriage as the child is not in a position to consent. Article 16 of the Convention specifies that the betrothal and the marriage of a child are to have no legal effect, and all necessary action, including legislation, is to be taken to specify a minimum age for marriage.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Harmful Practices
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Women
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Servile marriage 2012, para. 31
- Paragraph text
- Article 21 (2) of the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child states that child marriage and the betrothal of girls and boys are to be prohibited and effective action, including legislation, is to be taken to specify the minimum age of marriage to be 18 years. Article 6 of the 2003 Protocol to the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights on the Rights of Women in Africa states that no marriage is to take place without the free and full consent of both parties, and requires States to enact appropriate national legislative measures to guarantee that the minimum age of marriage for women is to be 18 years.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Harmful Practices
- Person(s) affected
- Boys
- Children
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Servile marriage 2012, para. 45
- Paragraph text
- In some communities, honour is connected with virtue, good works, righteous behaviour and obligations to one's parents, older persons and the community. Honour-related killings have often been associated with religious beliefs. These, however, are traditional or cultural practices. Among some Asian tribes, honour (or izzat) is associated with the female body and therefore women and girls must be guarded, protected and passed on to another member of the tribe. A girl or woman dishonours her family and tribe if her body is violated, even by force, and the shame can be cleansed only through her death.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Families
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Servile marriage 2012, para. 46
- Paragraph text
- Family status depends on honour. In patriarchal and patrilineal societies, maintaining the honour of the family is a woman's responsibility. The concept of women as commodities and not as human beings endowed with dignity and rights equal to those of men is deeply embedded in these societies. Women are seen as the property of men and must be obedient and passive, rather than assertive and active. Any assertive behaviour is considered to be an element that would result in an imbalance of power relations within the parameters of the family unit (E/CN.4/2002/83, para. 27). UNICEF reports that in some countries, early marriages are regarded by families as a means of protecting girls from premarital sex that would undermine their honour and that of their families.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Harmful Practices
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- Families
- Girls
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Servile marriage 2012, para. 86
- Paragraph text
- Girls and women who seek to leave servile marriage may be victims of acid attacks or honour-related killings. Acid attacks, which involve the use of sulphuric acid to disfigure or kill, have been reported in Asia, Europe and North and Latin America.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Health
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Violence against women as a barrier to the effective realization of all human rights 2014, para. 39
- Paragraph text
- Gender-based violence impedes sustainable development by obstructing women's participation and undermining many of the goals of development. Millennium Development Goal 5 on improving maternal health is one example. When violence against women is manifested in the form of early or forced marriage and childbearing, women are likely to suffer from medical conditions such as haemorrhage, obstructed labour, sepsis and eclampsia, as well as unsafe abortions. Coupled with inadequate access to health services, these conditions may lead to the death of the mother, thus depriving women of their development right to maternal health. Numerous manifestations of violence against women, including forced sterilizations, forced abortions, lack of effective access to safe abortions, lack of informed consent and choice over contraceptive methods, harmful practices such as honour killings, female genital mutilation, early and forced marriage, and sexual violence, contribute to the violation of a number of rights, including the right to participate in and contribute to sustainable development.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Gender
- Harmful Practices
- Health
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Children
- Women
- Year
- 2014
Paragraph
Violence against women: Twenty years of developments to combat violence against women 2014, para. 74
- Paragraph text
- One strategy associated with the engagement of men and boys is to appeal to the idea that women deserve respect as mothers, sisters, wives and so on. Emphasizing personal relationships is said to make it easier to understand the consequences of violence against women. This is also seen as an effective strategy in overtly patriarchal societies, in which calls to consider women as rights-bearing individuals, irrespective of their marital status, are considered too radical to attract support, even among women themselves. This implicit suggestion thus distorts the issue of women as autonomous individuals deserving of respect, and renders regard for the rights of women contingent on their status in the private sphere, which further reinforces the public/private dichotomy.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Gender
- Harmful Practices
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Boys
- Girls
- Men
- Women
- Year
- 2014
Paragraph
Gender perspectives on torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment 2016, para. 45
- Paragraph text
- Forced sterilization is an act of violence and a form of social control, and violates a person's right to be free from torture and ill-treatment. Full, free and informed consent of the patient herself is critical and can never be excused on the basis of medical necessity or emergency when obtaining consent is still possible (A/HRC/22/53). Gender often intersects with other characteristics such as race, nationality, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, age and HIV status to render women and girls at risk of torture and other ill-treatment in the context of sterilization (CAT/C/CZE/CO/4-5, A/HRC/29/40/Add.2) The European Court of Human Rights found that the sterilization of a Roma woman who consented to the procedure only during delivery by caesarean section violated the prohibition of torture and ill-treatment. Documented practices that may violate the prohibition of torture and ill-treatment include Government-sponsored family planning initiatives targeting economically disadvantaged and uneducated women that shortcut the process of obtaining consent, sterilization certificates required by employers and coerced sterilization of HIV-positive women in some States. Despite the fundamental rights enshrined in the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, women and girls with disabilities are also particularly vulnerable to forced sterilization and other procedures such as imposed forms of contraception and abortion, especially when they are labelled "incompetent" and placed under guardianship (A/67/227).
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Equality & Inclusion
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Harmful Practices
- Health
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2016
Paragraph
Continuum of violence against women from the home to the transnational sphere: the challenges of effective redress 2011, para. 25
- Paragraph text
- The mandate has identified two main categories of violence against women in the family sphere: domestic violence and harmful and degrading practices that are violent to and/or subordinate women, whether justified on the basis of religious, customary or other societal laws and practices. The mandate has adopted a broad definition of the family that encompasses intimate-partner and interpersonal relationships, including non-cohabitating partners, previous partners and domestic workers.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Families
- Women
- Year
- 2011
Paragraph
Servile marriage 2012, para. 60
- Paragraph text
- As a result of cultural beliefs, girls and women with dual nationality are sometimes abducted by their families from one country and forced to marry men from their parents' country of origin. This has happened in the United Kingdom to women from Asian diaspora communities. The Governments involved have worked through consular assistance and judicial proceedings to provide victims with effective remedies. In 2005, the United Kingdom set up a forced marriage unit under the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Home Office to tackle the issue.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Families
- Girls
- Women
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph
Gender-related killings of women 2012, para. 59
- Paragraph text
- Statistics for the period 2007 to 2009 show that there have been between 8,093 and 8,383 reported cases of dowry deaths in India. As noted by experts, the numbers of reported cases do not add up to conviction rates. The National Crime Records Bureau of India reports that for 2008 there were 1,948 convictions, as against 3,876 acquittals. Acid attacks are also becoming a growing phenomenon in India, with young women being targeted for spurning suitors and for rejecting proposals of marriage, as well as in connection with contestation over dowry.
- Legal status
- Non-negotiated soft law
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on violence against women, its causes and consequences
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Harmful Practices
- Violence
- Person(s) affected
- Women
- Youth
- Year
- 2012
Paragraph