Wartime Rape and its Shunned Victims
Author(s)
Simic, Olivera
Griffith University Author(s)
Year published
2015
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Over the past two decades, sexual violence in war against women ha become a focus of feminist scholarship, policymaking, legal proceeding, and global media coverage. The first international report on rampant sexual abuse of women and girls in armed conflicts emerged in the 1990s. Soon after rape
and sexual violence in war were recognized in gender-neutral terms for the first time m history as crimes against humanity and war crimes. That is the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) acknowledged that such violence was not merely a by-product of war but that it could constitute genocide and that it could be carried ...
View more >Over the past two decades, sexual violence in war against women ha become a focus of feminist scholarship, policymaking, legal proceeding, and global media coverage. The first international report on rampant sexual abuse of women and girls in armed conflicts emerged in the 1990s. Soon after rape and sexual violence in war were recognized in gender-neutral terms for the first time m history as crimes against humanity and war crimes. That is the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) acknowledged that such violence was not merely a by-product of war but that it could constitute genocide and that it could be carried out against women and men.6 Such recognition was unprecedented and represented a legal victory partially won due to the world attention to rape on a mass scale during the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH). Ever since this legal recognition, feminists scholars and activists have been preoccupied with reminding governments around the world that they need to prosecute those accountable for sexual violence. The recent Global Summit to End Sexual Violence in War7 repeated (yet again) that the plethora of United Nations (UN) resolutions promulgated in the past decade with an aim to combat sexual violence in war still need to be acted upon.8 While these efforts are welcomed and long overdue, they have focused almost exclusively on female sexual abuse in warfare, while male experiences of sexual assault have, for the most part been ignored and silenced.9 This form of violence against males, as some scholars argue, is still surrounded by "a wall of silence."10
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View more >Over the past two decades, sexual violence in war against women ha become a focus of feminist scholarship, policymaking, legal proceeding, and global media coverage. The first international report on rampant sexual abuse of women and girls in armed conflicts emerged in the 1990s. Soon after rape and sexual violence in war were recognized in gender-neutral terms for the first time m history as crimes against humanity and war crimes. That is the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR) acknowledged that such violence was not merely a by-product of war but that it could constitute genocide and that it could be carried out against women and men.6 Such recognition was unprecedented and represented a legal victory partially won due to the world attention to rape on a mass scale during the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH). Ever since this legal recognition, feminists scholars and activists have been preoccupied with reminding governments around the world that they need to prosecute those accountable for sexual violence. The recent Global Summit to End Sexual Violence in War7 repeated (yet again) that the plethora of United Nations (UN) resolutions promulgated in the past decade with an aim to combat sexual violence in war still need to be acted upon.8 While these efforts are welcomed and long overdue, they have focused almost exclusively on female sexual abuse in warfare, while male experiences of sexual assault have, for the most part been ignored and silenced.9 This form of violence against males, as some scholars argue, is still surrounded by "a wall of silence."10
View less >
Book Title
Genocide and Gender in the Twentieth Century: A Comparative Survey
Publisher URI
Subject
Human Rights Law