News facts
Violence against women (Common latest news)
In January 2009, as part of its Say NO to Violence against Women Campaign, the United Nations Development Fund (UNIFEM) released a compilation of Facts & Figures on Violence Against Women from around the world. Collected data includes:
• Domestic and Intimate Partner Violence,
• Sexual Violence, Harmful Traditional Practices,
• Trafficking in Women and Girls,
• HIV/AIDS and Violence,
• Crimes against Women in Situations of Armed Conflict, and
• Violence against Women as a Human Rights Violation.
Background
According to „Facts & Figures", at least one out of every three women around the world has been beaten, coerced into sex, or otherwise abused in her lifetime - with the abuser usually someone known to her. Based on several surveys from around the world, half of the women who die from homicides are killed by their current or former husbands or partners. Women are killed by people they know and die from gun violence, beatings and burns, among numerous other forms of abuse.
Moreover, several studies have revealed increasing links between violence against women and HIV/AIDS. Women who have experienced violence are at a higher risk of HIV infection: a survey among 1,366 South African women showed that women who were beaten by their partners were 48 percent more likely to be infected with HIV than those who were not. Tragically and most cruelly, in many conflicts, the planned and purposeful infection of women with HIV has been a tool of war, often pitting one ethnic group against another, as occurred during the genocide in Rwanda in 1994
An article reports that more than 130 million girls and women alive today have undergone female genital mutilation or cutting (FGM), mainly in Africa and some Middle Eastern countries, and two million girls a year are at risk of mutilation. Dowry murder, a brutal practice involving a woman being killed by her husband or in-laws because her family is unable to meet their demands for her dowry occurs predominantly in South Asia. According to official crime statistics in India, 6,822 women were killed in 2002 as a result of such violence. The United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) estimates that the annual world-wide number of "honour killing" victims (rape victims, women suspected of engaging in premarital sex, and women accused of adultery murdered by their relatives) may be as high as 5000 women.
The practice of early marriage is prevalent throughout the world, especially in Africa and South Asia. According to a 2006 report by the UN Special Rapporteur on Violence against Women on her mission to Afghanistan, an estimated 57 percent of girls in Afghanistan are married before the age of 16. Economic reasons are said to play a significant role in such marriages. Due to the common practice of "bride money," the girl child becomes an asset exchangeable for money or goods.
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