The New York Times marks the UN’s 60th anniversary with a blistering editorial on the sexual abuse of women and girls by UN peacekeepers.
Nothing discredits the United Nations more than the continuing sexual abuse of women and girls by soldiers belonging to its international peacekeeping missions. And yet almost a year after shocking disclosures about such crimes in Congo, far too little has been done to end the culture of impunity, exploitation and sexual chauvinism that permits them to go on.
The whole purpose of these missions is to help countries ravaged by civil or international conflict restore stability, guarantee public security and instill the rule of law. When United Nations peacekeepers rape the people they were sent to protect and coerce women and girls to trade sex for food, as they were found to have done in Congo last winter, they defeat the purpose of their mission and exploit some of the world's most vulnerable people.
This controversy was rightly brought to light in the Democratic Republic of the Congo when, following reports of abuse, Prince Zeid Raad al-Hussein (Jordan) produced a damning report showing signs of systematic abuse of women and girl children and the use of food and resources as blackmail to ensure sex. This, of course, is not localized to UN peacekeeping missions; in fact the problem of sexual abuse by soldiers is endemic in practically every army and conflict situation in the world.
That said, such actions from people wearing the insignia of the United Nations (and protected, by and large, in their operations by the reputation of the United Nations) is certainly more shocking than might be the case in an advancing army (and the reasons for this are complex). Certainly the UN has a responsibility to ensure that there is a greater level of discipline in their peacekeeping corps, but the problem here really lies with the armies and countries that contribute forces and with the underlying feeling or assumption that somehow women and girl children are ‘fair game’ for combatants.
I argue that there are two main reasons why women are targeted in times of violence: as a means of humiliating and weakening male belligerents and as a means of ‘plundering’ the possessions of the defeated. Both of these explanations, however, only stand if we accept that conditions exist within society that allow such ideas as the objectification of women as booty and the concept of women as being inherently weak and in need of male protection. In other words, we must accept that the reality of women’s experiences of times of conflict are a reflection of gender stratifications and gender relations that exist at all times in a given society, though they may be less manifest in times of peace than they are in times of violence.
Article comments
1 - Ben Terrall
I sent the following letter, which wasn't published, in response the NY Times editorial.
Editor,
Regarding UN operations in Congo, Liberia and Haiti, you are correct to write, ‘The clearest possible message needs to be sent at every level that sexual abuse will not be tolerated, [and] that individual offenders will be prosecuted and punished.’
It should be equally unacceptable for UN troops to kill unarmed Haitian civilians.
A March 2005 Harvard Law School report noted: “MINUSTAH [the UN mission in Haiti] has provided cover for abuses committed by the HNP[Haitian Police] during operations in poor, historically tense Port-au-Prince neighborhoods .... Rather than advising and instructing the police in best practices, and monitoring their missteps, MINUSTAH has been the midwife of their abuses. In essence, MINUSTAH has provided to the HNP the very implements of repression.”
As part of a September U.S. human rights delegation to Haiti, I took testimony from eyewitnesses who described “peacekeepers” killing civilians in neighborhoods that oppose the current coup regime. Such atrocities should not be tolerated either.
Sincerely,
Ben Terrall
PO Box 420832
San Francisco, CA 94142
415-861-4116
2 - Joanie
When I first read about the sexual abuse of women and children by U.N. Peacekeepers, I felt sick. What really bothered me, aside from the obvious, is that people continue to point to the U.N. as THE epitome of virtue. We know it's not.
Time has come to hold the U.N. responsible for their actions and for failing to keep the people they're supposed to be protecting from harm.
3 - Fiona de Londras
I wonder though whether it's fair to say that it's really the fault of the UN. When you think about it UN peacekeeping forces are basically made up of contributions of soldiers from member states and it is in the training and practice in their own states and own armies that soldiers learn the attitude that sexual abuse of women and children is somehow acceptable. They then come to the UN with that attitude and I would imagine it's very difficult for it to be abolished in UN missions. Perhaps the lesson of all of this controversy is that there is an attitude in armed forces that says for some reason it's pretty much ok to use women in this way in a conflict situation and that this has to be eradicated at member state level in order for us to have any hope of eradicating it at UN level?
4 - clement
the secretary general of UN and his staff must be held responsible for the sexual misconduct of their indisciplined soldiers.
Why dont they prosecute the perpetrators of this shameful deed?Yesterday on BBC WORLD NEWS man from Ivory coast complained of lack of followup by authorities on sexual abuse complaints.
Why the silence?Please remove your brutes from the area,its better to be raped by a guerilla fighter than by an army man who has been trained to protect the weak.
Away with your hypocricy!
5 - Ruvy
Apparently the Useless Nothings are useful for something - raping women under the cover of "humanitarian" aid. Did they learn this from the Christian pastors who pull the same stunts in the west, or from the rabbis who abuse children while pretending to "holiness"?