Girls as Young as 3 Undergoing Genital Mutilation in Russia’s Dagestan

    © Kiyoshi Ota / Reuters

Despite being condemned by the UN and many countries across the world, female genital mutilation is common in remote villages of Russia’s Republic of Dagestan, where girls as young as three are subjected to the practice, often in unsanitary conditions, and sometimes without anesthetic.

Speaking exclusively to RT, one woman in the region said the practice is considered obligatory for females in her community, adding that she sees no problem with it.

“According to Islam, it’s necessary to cut. If the girl hasn’t been cut, she can’t be considered a Muslim,” the woman said, adding that “because it’s tradition, we have to do it.”

FGM is not a requirement in Islam. It is very popular in Islam because, I believe, it relieves the man of having to bother with satisfying his wife during intercourse. 

Local gynecologist Hadijat Ajubova also sees nothing wrong with the procedure, saying it “doesn’t harm women’s health.”

“None of the organs or any part of any organ is removed. I’ve never heard of any young woman complaining that her sensitivity has changed,” she said.

What a bunch of garbage. The whole point is to remove part or all of the clitoris so that she is not attracted to sex. I wonder if the trauma of being cut leads to enough anger to want all other girls to be cut as well?

Journalist and investigator Marina Ahmedova, who works closely with human rights activists in Dagestan, told RT that she was told the practice “is done so women do not cheat, to deprive them of sexual desires, and to stop them [from] having sex before marriage.”

“If a woman is 18 and can make her own decisions about her body, that’s her business. But when this procedure is performed on little girls who cannot make such decisions and who are completely dependent on their parents, it is in my opinion a crime...” Ahmedova said.

She went on to share accounts of adult women who had their genitals cut as children with devices used to cut lamb’s wool.

In response to reports on the scale of the problem, Russian lawmakers have proposed a bill making female genital cutting a criminal offense, with a punishment of up to 10 years in prison for those found performing the operation.

There should also be a punishment for parents who expose their daughters to this madness.

United Russia MP Drafts Bill Ordering up to 10 Years in Prison for Female Genital Mutilation

State Duma © Vladimir Fedorenko / Sputnik

A ruling party lawmaker has drafted a bill making female genital mutilation (FGM) a criminal offense in Russia and ordering up to 10 years in prison for those who perform the operation.
“Discrimination of women based on religious motives manifested in full or partial amputation of external sex organs must be punished by a prison sentence between five and seven years,” reads the draft prepared by MP Maria Maksakova-Igenbergs.

“The same crime committed against an underage person must be punished by a prison sentence between seven and 10 years,” it continues.

This is great, however, it should read 'Discrimination of women based on religious or cultural motives...'. FGM is not part of Sharia, nor is it restricted to Muslims, although the majority of victims are Muslim. More often the motivation is to keep a girl pure until she can be sold or bartered to a man for marriage. Virgins fetch a higher price than non-virgins. Also, a girl who has had FGM performed on her has no expectations other than pain from sex. That suits a lot of men who do not have the will or the ability to ensure that their wife enjoys sex as much as he.

In a letter sent to major Russian media outlets and news agencies on Friday, the lawmaker noted that according to the Constitution, Russia is a secular state and no cult can be put by its followers above the country’s basic law, which applies to all citizens regardless of their religious beliefs.

Maksakova-Igenbergs also wrote that there is an article in the Constitution that guarantees equal rights to men and women, but that the medical and psychological consequences of male circumcision cannot be compared to those of female genital mutilation.

“Such interference is nothing other than a form of mutilation because this anachronism is being driven only by the idea that this procedure could physically keep women from having an immoral way of life,” she noted.

The topic of FGM was brought up in the Russian mass media earlier this week after the Rights Initiative NGO released a report claiming the procedure is being practiced in a number of remote villages in the predominantly Muslim south Russian republic of Dagestan. The group said that tens of thousands of women had gone through the procedure, which is usually performed on children before the age of three, since the 1970s.

In comments to the report, the mufti of the Coordination Center of North Caucasus Muslims, Ismail Berdiyev, said that in his view all women should be subject to the operation as this would “bring down sexuality and prevent lechery on Earth.” The statement caused such an outcry in the mass media and on social networks that the mufti had to backtrack the very same day, saying that his words were a joke wrongly interpreted by the press.

Of course, the vast majority of lechery is caused by men, yet it is little girls who are the only ones to suffer for it.

Maksakova-Igenbergs told RT that it was the public reaction on the subject that caused her to draft the bill banning FGM in Russia. “I was paralyzed by some people’s reaction to this report. They said something like ‘Sharia laws allow this but do not insist’ and ‘I personally see nothing bad in it’ and the like. I understood that this is some sort of hurtful superstition that can only be ended by a threat of criminal responsibility,” she said.

Earlier in the week a member of Russian Public Chamber, Diana Gurtskaya, addressed the Prosecutor General’s Office with a request to check the legality of exercising FGM in Russia as well as the facts of this practice described in the Rights Initiative report. Another similar request has been filed by the Russian Presidential Council for Human Rights.

Female Genital Mutilation is ‘Harmless, Helps Tame Desire’, says Senior Russian Mufti

© Reuters

Female genital mutilation does not pose health risks and “does not contradict the dogmas of Islam,” said the head of the North Caucasus Muslim Coordination Center, following a damning report about the outrageous practice in Russia’s southern republic of Dagestan.

“As far as I know it is done in order to tame women’s desire a bit. It is absolutely harmless to health,” mufti Ismail Berdiev claimed in an interview with the “Govorit Moskva” radio, referring to female genital mutilation. He added that it is “purely Dagestan’s tradition,” suggesting that the practice is limited to areas of just one of Russia’s southern regions located in the North Caucasus.


A woman and her daughters stand in their home, in the village of Cambadju in Bafatá Region. © unicef.org

200mn women victims of genital mutilation in 30 countries, cut before age of 5, UN says
Berdiev, who is also a member of the Presidential Council for Coordination with Religious Organizations, commented on a report dedicated to the issue of female genital mutilation in remote communities of Dagestan. It was published by the Russian Justice Initiative, a Russian human rights and legal advice NGO.

According to the report, female genital mutilation is still practiced in some areas of Dagestan and is supported by the community and some religious leaders. The imam of the mosque located in Dagestan’s capital of Makhachkala told Russian Justice Initiative that he considers the procedure obligatory under Islamic norms and stressed that avoiding it means “falling into sin.”

Did God err in His design of girls? Is it up to man to correct God's creation? Does the Mufti actually believe in God? He certainly does not know Him. FGM is an evil practice performed invariably by evil, godless people.

In the meantime, Dagestan’s children rights commissioner said that it already alarmed the regional education ministry and law enforcement in the view of this issue.

Female genital mutilation is widely condemned in the world. It is also condemned by the UN and its various agencies that consider it to be a violation of the right to health and bodily integrity as well as a form of violence and discrimination against women, a form of torture and the violation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

It also considered to be a dangerous and health-impairing practice.

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon called for a change in practices in nations where the ritual marks adulthood in March 2016.

“Never before has it been more urgent, or more possible, to end the practice of female genital mutilation (FGM), preventing immeasurable human suffering and boosting the power of women and girls to have a positive impact on our world,” he said in his speech.

According to the UN data, at least 200 million women and girls have suffered the terrible practice of genital mutilation in 30 countries across the world. In some countries, such as Mali, Somalia and Sudan, the procedure is practically universal. Rates are also high in Egypt, although the procedure was technically outlawed in 2007.