A/67/227 trafficking in women, sexual exploitation and forced labour, is often linked to poverty and lack of opportunities in rural areas. 24. Women with disabilities who are members of minority groups are subject to multiple forms of discrimination and violence because of their race/ethnicity, gender and disability status combined. They may be subject to discrimination in access to education, employment, and health care; and may be denied reasonable accommodations. 6 Women of colour with disabilities who do seek preventive support or access to justice are subject to discriminatory practices that treat them as not credible or as “contributors” to their own abuse. Some resist seeking justice in formal systems that they see, at best, as unresponsive to their needs and, at worst, as destructive to their peoples as a whole. 7 Furthermore, despite their own efforts to be heard about the violence they experience, they might be effectively silenced both by community social sanctions and ineffective anti-violence laws. 25. Women with disabilities in conflict or post-conflict regions may be at additional risk of violence as members of a targeted race/ethnic, religious or linguistic group and may have greater difficulty in accessing services in the conflict environment. 8 Women with disabilities face additional burdens in refugee camps because the facilities are rarely accessible or designed to meet their specific needs. Serious problems with the physical layout and infrastructure of refugee camps have been noted by some organizations. 9 Such problems mean that services, including toilets, shelters and health facilities will not be accessible to people with disabilities and that no special accommodations are made to ensure accessibility to the food and supplies they need on a daily basis. In addition, because camps and facilities are generally inaccessible, most persons with disabilities are forced to remain in them.9 Furthermore, justice and post-conflict reconciliation activities generally do not include women with disabilities, nor are such programmes made accessible or inclusive. 26. Undocumented women with disabilities may be at higher risk of violence because of the aggressor’s control over immigration status; language barriers; distrust of the police force; and barriers to social and public services. 10 27. Lesbians and other sexual minorities who identify as female and who have disabilities confront social barriers, isolation, exclusion and violence due to both sexual minority status and disability. Lesbians with psychosocial disabilities have been largely excluded or overlooked in research and treatment, despite their usage of mental health-care and other psychosocial services. They sometimes experience a __________________ 6 7 8 9 10 12-45120 Margaret Nosek, and others, “Disability, psychosocial and demographic characteristics of abused women with disabilities”, Violence against Women, vol. 12, No. 9 (Sept. 2006), pp. 838-850. Aarati Kasturirangan, Sandhya Krishnan and Stephanie Riger, “The impact of culture and minority status on women’s experience of domestic violence”, Trauma Violence Abuse, vol. 5, No. 4 (2004), 318-332. Stephanie Ortoleva, “Women with disabilities: the forgotten peacebuilders”, Loyola of Los Angeles International and Comparative Law Review, vol. 33 (2010). Women’s Refugee Commission, Disabilities Among Refugees and Conflict-Affected Populations (New York, 2008). Julissa Reynoso, “Perspectives on intersections of race, ethnicity, gender, and other grounds: Latinas at the margins”, Harvard Latino Law Review, vol. 7 (2004), pp. 64-73. 7