WRITTEN QUESTION E-2189/98

by Friedhelm Frischenschlager (ELDR) to the Council

(10 July 1998)

Subject: Human rights and female circumcision

The UN estimates that some 135 million girls and women worldwide undergo ritual circumcision.

1. Is the Council of the opinion that genital mutilation of women and girls, which is principally carried out in many African and Arab countries but also in some Asian countries and, in fact, in Europe, as a rule by immigrants, is a violation of human rights?

2. Does the Council take the view that, in future, the genital mutilation of women and girls should be made a punishable offence uniformly throughout Europe?

3. In the light of the uniform asylum policy envisaged in the Amsterdam Treaty, does the Council share the view that asylum should in any case be granted to women fleeing because they are threatened with or have already suffered mutilation (internationally, Canada is leading the way in this respect)?

4. Further to the Council's announcement in the media (Die Presse, 26 June 1998) that it would be taking more vigorous initiatives in the context of cooperation with the developing countries, will such initiatives include the dissemination of information about and the combating of this degrading and inhuman practice?

Reply

(22 October 1998)

At the 52nd UN General Assembly, a Member State tabled a draft resolution on traditional or customary practices affecting the health of women and girls (52/99). The resolution, which was sponsored by all the Member States of the European Union, was adopted without a vote on 12 December 1997.

The resolution reaffirms that traditional or customary practices affecting the health of women and girls constitute a definite form of violence against women and girls and a serious form of violation of their human rights. The General Assembly emphasises the need for national legislation or other measures prohibiting harmful traditional or customary practices, and calls on all States to implement their international commitments in this field, inter alia, under the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action adopted by the Fourth World Conference on Women, the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development and the Plan of Action for the Elimination of Harmful Traditional Practices Affecting the Health of Women and Children.

With regard to asylum applications, the Member States, in the framework of CIREA (Centre for Information, Discussion and Exchange on Asylum), regularly exchange information on their assessment of asylum applications from countries from which large numbers of applicants originate. The issues of sexual violence and genital mutilation are always on the agenda. Asylum applications based on those grounds were also the subject of an information exchange between CIREA experts and the delegations of Canada and the United States at a meeting organised with those countries in the framework of the Transatlantic Dialogue.

However, the Council has not to date received any proposals to harmonise the Member States' policies in this area. Nor is the issue raised as such in the Council Resolution of 18 December 1997 laying down the priorities for cooperation in the field of justice and home affairs for the period from 1 January 1998 to the date of entry into force of the Treaty of Amsterdam(1), which was adopted after consultation of the European Parliament.

(1) OJ C 11, 15.1.1998, p. 1.