The Impact of Human Rights Violations on Refugee Women Essay Example for Free

The Impact of Human Rights Violations on Refugee Women EssayThe global concern about the up estimables of women has been rapidly gaining attention from graduate(prenominal)er authorities. Since the end of the World struggle II, the issue pertaining to this has received significant development until the millennium era. The head start among the organization that concentrated on the protagonism of the womens rights was the Commission of the Status of Women, which was established in 1948 in order to promote womens right and equality followed by the International Womens Decade in 1976 to 1985 (Beyani, p. 29) dedicated to the promotion of womens right as human rights..In the same way, the coupled Nations had conducted several conferences to verbalise the problem of human rights encroachments perpetrate on women worldwide as well as to outline legal trends that could help minimize abandon on women and to advance the cause of women special(prenominal) aloney the refugee women . Spearheaded by the United Nation, the conferences composed of loose coalition of groups and undivideds worldwide, they launched a petition in 1991 calling on the Vienna to comprehensively address womens human rights.These campaigns were so successful that womens right gained recognition in both the UN documents and treatises including the adoption of a UN declaration of on the Elimination of Violence against women. Cases of human rights violations among refugee women argon ubiquitous because these people ar exposed to numerous threats during all phases of the dislocation or dis interjectment period Displacement period among women simply refers to their loss of jobs by either war or domestic violence. Their experiences while at the camp leave horny and physical affect on them, which in many cases combat injurytic that cause major changes in their lives. Likewise, those organizations have identified specific exploitations done on women including refugee women, which have the worst cases of human rights violations all over the world. Among the recognized forms of abuses atomic number 18 disgrace, inner abuse, familiar extortion, and physical injury as outlined by the United Nation.These abuses are rampant regardless of their geographical limitation abuses are inflicted to many women in refugee camps around the globe most particularly in countries like Yugoslavia, Rwanda, Somalia, and many Asian nations. The human rights of these refugee women receive less considerable attention unlike their virile counterpart or the human rights abuses among men., because in the first place, their interests have not sufficiently represented in the outside(a)ist body.Stedman and Tanner cited the definition of refugee from African Unity Refugee Convention in 1974, which he stated as,every person who, owing to external aggression, occupation, foreign domination or events seriously move public order in either part or whole of his country of origin or nationality, is compelled to leave his place of habitual residence in order to seek refugee in anformer(a) place outside his country of origin or nationality (p. 139). Refugees are people who seek international aegis for business organisation of persecution, civil war, or strife, abuses of human rights, and another(prenominal) reasons in their own country because their own country failed to leave that for them (Tarner, 139). Nowadays, the process of seeking refuge or asylum is under an obligation and/or activity of United Nations with the assistance from United States of America and other participating countries. The reported cases of refugee prepared by United States direction for Refugees in 2003 are approximately less than ten million (Martin, p. 3) and the majority of these people are from the least developed countries such as Bangladish, which are mostly women and tiddlerren.However, the irony here is that, the refugees who are after for tax shelter have stumbled upon worst exploitat ions in the country they chose to settle. Refugee women are defenseless in terms of abuse by people in the government and sometimes by rebellious groups. There are situationors that can farm the relationship of refugee flows with tender, cultural, and political chaos in the decree. Doreen Marie Indra stated that it becomes clear that in many cases these experiences are grounded in politics (p. 326). Women become the subject of persecution at some occasion because they refuse to oblige with or they better social mores. Indra explained that because these women oppose the dictates of a political or religious system they are gendered punishment for violation of particular social norms (p. 326).In other words, even the prevailing social and religious system was oppressive in nature to the womens right and they punished for disobeying even the simplest dress code (Indra, p. 328). Michael Penn and Rahel Nardos saw the angle of discrepancy of society to women as another ground for hum an rights violation of refugee women. Violence against women according to him is a manifestation of historically unequal power relations between men and womenand that it is one of the crucial social mechanisms by which women are forced into a subordinate position compared with men (p. 182). Likewise, those women in refugee camps and minority groups are under fire(predicate) to violence according to him. This concept prompts men to take advantage of women in refugee camps because of the idea that women are property of men. On the other hand, Erin Baines believed that problem pertaining to refugee crisis has something to do with the cultural differences among individual groups (p. 32). Stedman and Tanner (2003) described the nexus of refugee flows asThe result of the failure of the international system to prevent, deter, or terminate gross violations from failure to hold governments that are guilty of gross violations responsible for the floods of refugees they unleash from failur e to assume political accountability for refugee situations that threaten international peace and security from failure to assume political responsibility to prevent violations that unleash refugee floods, and collective responsibility to guarantee remedies, including temporary security measure or resettlement (p. 155). Accordingly, refugees continue to contribute from exploitation simply because the international political system fails to recognize its collective responsibility in this issue, at least to place individual rights at the top of the normative deliberation in refugee catastrophes.(yes its mine.) It means that obviously the rights of individual refugee women were someways neglected, although in general, there efforts to combat human rights abuses.The relocation itself causes difficulty to refugees especially in adjusting oneself to current culture, language, and society. nearly of them rely on donation from non-government organization, which does not sufficiently sus tain the needs of the family. Though they wish to endure on their own, they find difficulty gaining access to important services such as income-generating projects and educational programs, Indra famed that women in many countries Are denied education, access to profession, or paid work (p. 326) which are important elements to expect the need of the family especially in the absence of the husband.Due to this problem, many of them suffer financial complexity and emotional focusing. Meyer and Prugl noted that refugee women cannot enjoy the social services or art opportunities or be protected in accordance with the UN High Commissioner for refugee UNHCR policies since most of them rely on their husbands document and this resulted to great stress among them as they seek help from the authorities such as the United Nations (p. 250). These people are liable(predicate) to experience poverty, illiteracy, encounter conflicts within refugee population, domestic violence, and intimate to rture.Poverty is one major problem of the refugees. They are need of adequate food and safe drinking water that lead to high rates of child mortality and relatively poor health. Cole, Espin, and Rothblum reported that most refugees live in unsanitary conditions where epidemics and disease are common, water supplies are contaminated, and food resources are insufficient (p. 65). In a report made by the United States familiar Accounting Office (GAO) narrated that women are often reduced to exchanging sex for otherwise untouchable food and nonfood items such as clothing, shelter materials, and cooking items (p. 25).Girls in the refugee camps have little opportunity to come education because families do not have funds for school fees, uniform, books, and others. Lack of education worsens their condition because this limits the employment chances of women and youth in the future.Many refugees encounter conflicts within the refugee population because of major ethnic groups or political factions. Martin noted that the conflicts among the refugees affect the participation in decision making of the representatives of different groups that hinder possible effect to their problem (p. 18).Domestic violence on women in the refugee camp occurs because male family members are away, or sometimes killed. According to the report of Human Rights Watch Staff, the levels of domestic violence could also be high in refugee setting. For instance, in the Human Rights Watchs report of the Burundian refugee camps in 1998, they had recorded relatively high incidence of domestic violence committed on women, which occurred inside or outside refugee camps by hiatus workers (p. 487). This group acknowledged this problem as something largely unrecognised and the perpetrators enjoyed free movement in the camps (p. 487). cozy torture somehow is different from domestic violence. Martin specifically identified these tortures as something inflicted on the victims in an brute(prenominal) man ner. informal torture is in form of either heterosexual or homosexual break the rape of women by the use of specially trained dogs or forced witnessing of unnatural sexual relations, and many other forms (Martin, p. 33). Basically, torture causes much severe emotional impact on its victims both physically and psychologically, because of the nature it is existence carried out.which Martin describe as inhumane, cruel and degrading punishment or discourse (p. 33)Aside from health and protection problems, women in the refugee camps are likely to suffer additional problems due to their gender. According to Cole, Espin and Rothblum, women and girls are vulnerable to sexual violence in which rape is a common experience for them (p. 65). Rape is the most frightening and mortify experience for the refugee women this is the most traumatic actually that many of them already committed suicide. (Espin and Rothlblum, p. 69) The raping of refugee women is unusually brutal they are gang raped or raped repeatedly often for days at a time. Refugee womens experience while at camp produces both physical and emotional impact on them. First, they suffer from emotional trauma leaving them alone to confront the issue. Cole, et.al., explained that for Asian and African women, being a rape victim is considered ruined because their culture values virginity is synonymous with purity (p. 69). As a result, they feel they fall asleep all value in society and are rejected by their families. Rape for Islam, Buddhist, and Taoist is associated with karma or punishment for the sin they have committed. then, most of these women are unwilling to disclose the issue to others, in turn, their port show psychosomatic symptoms of these experiences.Theilade LD. Explained that sexual dysfunction is possible to occur if a person has experienced sexual torture or non-sexual, physical, or non-physical torture. He further stated that this problem is seen in up to 51 percent of torture victims (par. 1). However, the development of sexual dysfunction may occur largely to people who suffered from sexual torture. Sexual dysfunction could also be attributed to post traumatic stress disorder.(This info. came from Pubmed.www.pubmed.govKemp and Rasbridge mentioned about Post traumatic Stress Disorder by refugee women as a result of stress, physical or sexual torture, and trauma (p. 74). Women who had been in this traumatic experience said that they avoided going out yet, due to their family responsibility, they had to force themselves to continue with nonchalant activities. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder could be obtained if the person has previous anxiety disorder and other factor such as early childhood trauma or head injuries that may elicitation the problem. Generally, refugees suffer from mental health problem like flash backs and dreams and intense guilt or peevishness and the percentage is almost sixty-five percent, which lasted for many years especially when they do not rec eive treatment and support from family members. Moreover, these women are likely to sustain physical injuries. Others contract venereal disease or sexually transmitted diseases. Some became pregnant after the rape. Indeed, women are not only victims of general violence and the lack of health care, they also contending issues unambiguous to their biology and social status. However, despite of predicaments faces by refugee women, Florence Howe (1996) noted that refuge and displaced migrant women are likely to endure any situation.Howe Asserted, Refugee, displaced and migrant women in most cases display strength, endurance and resource and can contribute positively to countries of resettlement or to their origin on their return (Howe, p. 213). Howe pointed out these women should be appropriately involved in decisions that affect them and their future, since it cannot be denied that women make significant but frequently unrecognized role as educators both in their families and their so cieties as Anthony Redmond noted (2006) women will often be the first to deny themselves in favor of others, particularly children or male partners (Redmond, p. 21)Conclusion As some authors pointed out, the international human rights and the United Nations has done enough to protect human rights particularly of the refugee women. But is a fact that abuses on women continues to dominate in many countries in the world particularly in refugee centers. Perhaps this social stigma can be attributed to the two of the most pressing problems of the society ever since, Poverty and discrimination. Thus no matter how many laws are legislated to protect women from abuses, or no matter how far is the international effort or even the United Nations effort to provide necessary protection for womens right, these abuses on women will continue to persist unless the fundamental sources of the problems are addressed, although this problem maybe is as old as human civilization it self. Authorities there fore must not only present at the crime or run after the offenders but they should also consider the situations involve and touch evidences relating the crimes to the problems mentioned and suggest possible solution to the problems to law making body.The United Nations and all international effort on combating abuses on women must also pay attention to this problem, and try to realign some of their resources to help address the two problems mentioned earlier, along with intensified efforts of the law enforcement to run after the criminal offenders to put them behind bars. increase efforts of both the international body and law enforcements agencies against the offenders and social problems may not completely erased this disease of the society but it certainly will help curb the problem.Work CitedBaines, E.K. Vulnerable Bodies Gender, the Un and the Global Refugee Crisis. ground forcesAshgate Publishing, Ltd., 2004.Beyani, Chaloka. The take of Refugee Women A Human Rights Perspe ctive.Women and Rights. Ed. Sweetman, Caroline. UK Oxfam, 1995.Cole, E., Espin, O., Rothblum, E. Refugee Women and their Mental Health Shattered Societies, Shattered Lives. USA Haworth Press, 1992.Howe, F. Beijing and Beyond Toward the 20 First-First Century of Women Includes the Complete Text of the Plattform for Action. USA Florence Howe Graduate School and University Center, 1996.Human Rights Watch World overcompensate 1999. New York Human Rights Watch, 1998.Humanitarian Assistance Protecting Refugee Women and Girls Remains a SignificantChallenge. United States General Accounting Office. May 2003. http//books.google.com/books?id=WHZdHdprBWgCprintsec=frontcoversource=gbs_summary_rPPP1,M1Indra, D.M. Engendering Forced Migration Theory and Practice. USA BerghahnBooks.Kemp, C. Rasbridge, L.A. Refugee and Immigrant Health A Handbook for Health Professionals, UK Cambridge University Press, 2004.Martin, S. F. Refugee Women. USA Lexington Books, 2004.Meyer, M.K. Prugl, E. Gender Pol itics in Global Governance. USA Rowman Littlefield Publishing, Inc., 1999.Penn, M.L. Nardos, R. Overcoming Violence Against Women and Girls The International Campaign to Eradicate a Worldwide Problem. USA Rowman Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2003.Redmond, A. ABC of Conflict and Disaster. UK Blackwell Publishing, 2006.Stedman, S. J. Tanner, F. Refugee Manipulation War, Politics, and the Abuse of Human Suffering. USA Brookings Institution Press, 2003.Theilade, LD. Sexual Dysfunction in Torture Victims. PubMed. 2002 Oct. http//www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12407879?ordinalpos=1itool=EntrezSystem2.PEntrez.Pubmed.Pubmed_ResultsPanel.Pubmed_RVAbstractPlusDrugs1