PERSECUTION IS NOT GENDER BLIND

END OF THE EWL CAMPAIGN ON WOMEN ASYLUM SEEKERS

Denise FUCHS, President of the EWL

15 December 2001

Last December, the European Women's Lobby (EWL) launched a year long campaign to draw attention to the issue of gender based persecution, to raise awareness of this and ensure that women's experience of persecution constitutes legitimate grounds for seeking and granting asylum in all of the EU Member States.

The Campaign focused specifically on the criteria that would enable women to claim asylum in their own right, based on their own experience of persecution, for example, fleeing because they refuse to have their girl child mutiliated, or because they cannot obtain protection from sexualised violence within their own country since the laws discriminate against them or because they are at risk of being killed because they are deemed to have brought dishonour on their family. If the reasons for which women claim asylum are ignored, overlooked or undervalued, this has serious repercussions on their initial claim which is likely to be rejected with the result that their subsequent experience of the asylum application process, their conditions of reception and their acceptance of and integration into the host countries will be severely undermined.  

In other words, the Campaign aims to highlight the way in which interpretation of the 1951 Geneva Convention on the Status of Refugees discriminates against women by failing to understand that gender-based persecution is a legitimate ground for seeking asylum.  The four examples illustrated on the Campaign postcards are all expressions of the unequal power relations between women and men, which have, in the words of the Beijing Platform for Action (paragraph 118) led to the domination over and discrimination against women by men and to the prevention of women's full advancement.  The traditional harmful practices illustrated on the cards, such as Female Genital Mutilation, Stoning to death for presumed adultery, forced marriages and honour killings are acts that perpetuate the lower status accorded to women in the family, the community and society especially as these acts are carried out with the complicity of those States that do not provide protection due to laws that discriminate against women which prevent them to seek redress in their own countries. The systematic rape of women in armed conflict, used as a tool of war, a deliberate means of humiliating the enemy for which women pay the price, is carried out with impunity and we await the implementation of the International Criminal Court to bring to justice those who have been responsible for this crime against humanity.  All of these acts represent persecution through sexual violence; it is gender-based persecution, aimed at women, exactly because they are women.

Throughout the year long Campaign we have highlighted a numer of concerns, namely:

• On the political level, the issue of asylum is increasingly dealt with as a matter of security and policing, hence reinforcing the concept of a "fortress Europe".  Within this approach the Human Rights dimension does not stand out and consequently the issue of gender equality and human rights even less so.

• There is a growing confusion in public discussion about the different forms of movement of peoples in Europe: asylum, immigration, trafficking, smuggling, and since September 11, curtailing terrorism, which leads to a lack of clarity about the nature of these different forms of displacement. It is vital to reaffirm that asylum is about granting protection to those who fear for their lives; it is a life or death situation. All of our Member States have ratified the 1951 Geneva Convention which obliges them to grant protection to those who fear for their lives due to their individual experience of persecution. We have realised that one of the legal means, and sometimes the only means, for a third country national to legally enter practically all of the EU Member States is through the asylum procedure as grounded by the 1951 Geneva Convention, regardless of the reasons. The result is that these procedures are being tightened and it is very likely that those who are seeking protection in terms of the Convention are turned away and this is especially the case for women as gender-based persecution is not officially recognised or assessed within the framework of the criteria in the Convention, as a legitimate reason for seeking asylum. Therefore, we believe that an effective asylum procedure requires immigration policies that recognise that for some, the reasons for migration are different than for others who flee life-threatening situations due to persecution.

• The lack and/or limited scope of a gender dimension by NGOs who directly with and/or on asylum/refugee issues. Therefore, while we did not initially set out to target these organisations, we found ourselves raising the awareness of the gender dimension with some of these organisations.

• The gap in existing mechanisms to address the particular issues relating to women's human rights.

• The lack of gender disaggregated data, particularly statistics. It is impossible to state the actual numbers of women who claim asylum in the EU. The latest figures we possess, established by the UNHCR for the period January - October 2001, give the country of origin of asylum seekers in that period and the countries (also outside of the EU) that have recorded an increase in claims over the same period. These figures are not broken down according to sex. 

• The lack of or limited data on documented testimonies of and by women, gender analysis and research, gender sensitive training of officials and specific guidelines to assist in the assessment of asylum claims on the basis of gender related persecution.

• On the structural level, the missing link of associating asylum with gender and gender with asylum as part of the equality and interior ministries services competencies, in other words, mainstreaming. This gap creates a vacuum within which women's voices are rarely, if ever, heard.

Against this backdrop, what impact has the Campaign had?

While it is difficult to fully assess the long term impact of the Campaign at this stage, we can nevertheless, say that the Campaign was instrumental in the following areas:

• Placing the issue of gender-based persecution on the political agenda of the EU. One year ago, at the launch of the Campaign we were encouraged by Commissioner Vitorino, the Commission responsible for Justice and Home Affairs. We contributed to some of the policy discussions that were on the table during the period of the Campaign.

• Raising awareness among the public and decision-makers on the issue of asylum but also on the examples of gender-based persecution that were illustrated on the postcards.  The issue of FGM, for example, sparked a number of different reactions varying from astonishment on learning that this practice still exists today to a debate on when does culture become harmful as well as a tangible understanding of how the particular issue of women's human rights can be addressed.

• Mobilising individual women and men as well as organisations both from with the EU Member States and beyond around the issues of the Campaign. The sign up rate of the petition is a testimony to this mobilisation.

• Linking with refugee women living in Europe with the aim in the future of supporting these women to take over the issues and pursue the combat to ensure the human rights of refugee women are guaranteed in the host countries.

The Campaign also led to a rise in expectations of the EWL to respond to all the complexities of the asylum debate, which made us aware of the need to increase women's voices and input by women's NGOs in particular. Therefore, we invite those of you here today, members of women's organisations, and human rights organisations to put this issue on your own agenda to find ways of pursuing this issues with your own governments and political decision-makers.

Placing gender-based persecution on the political agenda was the initial objective of our Campaign and we can say that the Campaign was successful. However, throughout the year, we became increasingly aware that recognising gender-based persecution as legitimate grounds for seeking and granting asylum is only the first step. We are aware that taking this first step does not remove the continuous exposure of women to sexualised violence. Refugee women and asylum seekers continue to be discriminated against, exploited and abused in the host countries. We know that women are detained in closed centres; in camps (of which there are none in the EU Member States), they often have to provide sexual favours in exchange for food. The conditions of reception centres do not always take women’s specific needs into consideration by providing adequate living conditions and a safe space in which they can begin to recover from the traumatic experiences of displacement. They are not systematically offered counselling nor in many countries have they the right to work while awaiting the outcome of their asylum claim, which places them in particular vulnerable situations. They are not always offered language courses, which prevents and/or delays their integration into host country. Above all the skills that they bring are undervalued if not ignored and therefore, paradoxically they find themselves in a similar situation to that of their countries of origin with regards to their status as women and human beings in their own right. 

While the Campaign provided a platform to call for the recognition of gender-based persecution, these are the issues and the challenges that must be addressed. The end of the Campaign, here today, can mark the beginning of addressing the human rights of refugee women and asylum seekers in our host countries.