Rape: UN Owes World A Duty

THE United Nations Security Council has finally come to hear the ‘silent cry’ of women at the frontline of conflicts, international or otherwise. The organ has recognized that rape is a weapon of war, a tactic that aims to “humiliate, dominate, instill fear in, disperse and or forcibly relocate civilian members of a community or ethnic group.”

Member states, which wield the power of running international relations, in June, voted unanimously, the passing of the US sponsored resolution (1820: Women, Peace and Security) classifying rape as a ‘war tactic’. This means that the international community condemns the act, which has been ‘one of history’s greatest silences’.

The main reason behind this abuse is that women are widely considered objects for pleasure and comfort of their male counterparts. The violation is a way of attacking male opponents, who are expected to prove manhood by the way they are able to protect and defend ‘their property’.

One European politician a few years ago uttered that rape was not ‘a serious crime’. In his  argument, Nicholas Eriksen had said it was a myth to think rape was a serious crime. “Rape is simply sex. Women enjoy sex, so rape cannot be such a terrible ordeal,” he was reported to have said.

“To suggest that rape, when conducted without violence, is a serious crime is like suggesting that
force-feeding a woman chocolate cake is a heinous offence. A woman would be more inconvenienced by having her handbag snatched.” Utterances like these are not only injurious to
rape victims, they can also fuel sexual violence by delinquents and perverts.

It means, therefore that it becomes the business of all and sundry, particularly the UN Security Council, to deal with precision, the problem wherever it is. For example, if the clock were to wind back to the Japanese invasion of China, where several women and girls were turned into ‘sex slaves or comfort women’, it would be an obligation of the Council to stop it.

The resolution contextualizes this better. Firstly, it calls on the Council to deem sexual violence as a tactic of war with the maintenance of international peace and security. It, therefore, will no longer be possible to portray rape in war as an issue that does not warrant the Council’s  attention.

Rape would justify a security response (of the international community). The Council now has a clear mandate to intervene in any country and such intervention may include sanctions and force. Additionally, the resolution demands protagonists of a conflict to take all necessary steps to protect potential victims and prevent sexual violence. Such measures would include training troops, enforcing military discipline, upholding command responsibility and vetting past perpetrators.

 The resolution asserts the importance of women’s participation in all processes related to ending sexual violence in conflict, including peace talks. But, sexual violation of women and girls during war and our similar conflicts is still going on even now as the ink on the resolution dries.

And it is not far from the Security Council. It is happening right near some troops of UN  peacekeepers in some countries. Civil societies have reported cases of errant peacekeepers taking advantage of the women, under the very nose of the body mandated to intervene in excesses of the international community.

Rape is the forcible violation of the sexual intimacy of another person. The Church notes that it does injury to justice as well as to charity.

 “Rape deeply wounds the respect, freedom, and physical and moral integrity to which every person has a right. It causes grave damage that can mark the victim for life. It is always an intrinsically evil act. Graver still is the rape of children committed by parents (incest) or those responsible for the education of the children entrusted to them.”

It follows, therefore, a need to be more concerned and practical stopping the incidents of rape, in and out of conflict. But, above all, the UN owes the world a duty to intervene, straight away, in any conflict to prevent rape, which almost always follows discord. Then, perpetrators and their supporters would be isolated and dealt with decisively.