U.S. should lead fight to stop violence against women

By Alice Dahle

Monday is the annual celebration of International Women's Day. But for too many women around the world, it will be another day to endure violence in the many forms committed primarily against women, including rape, domestic violence, female genital cutting, forced marriage, acid burning, dowry deaths, “honor” killings and femicide.

Although women living in areas of conflict are especially vulnerable to brutal abuse, violence against women occurs everywhere, crossing boundaries of class, age, race, culture, religion and nationality. At least one in every three women around the world will be beaten, coerced into sex or otherwise abused in her lifetime, either by her family, government security forces or armed rebels.

Violence against women has only recently been recognized as a global human rights crisis. For too long, this kind of violence was dismissed as a regrettable, but unpreventable, consequence of war, as a cultural norm or simply as a private matter. Over the past 20 years, violence against women and girls has gradually been recognized as criminal and as an abuse of their human rights.

Congress now has an opportunity to address these abuses globally. On Feb. 4, the International Violence Against Women Act (I-VAWA) was introduced in both the U.S. Senate (S. 2982) and the House of Representatives (H.R. 4594). This legislation will build on international assistance the United States already provides by integrating prevention of violence with U.S. foreign policy. I-VAWA is bipartisan, badly needed and should move quickly through both houses of Congress.

This legislation will coordinate and support innovative programs that have been shown to reduce violence. It will provide education and economic opportunities for women and girls, so they can become more independent and less vulnerable to those who would take advantage of them. I-VAWA will allow for better coordination with non-governmental organizations already working on the ground to combat violence against women and girls.

The legislation will challenge social norms that perpetuate violence, bring the perpetrators to justice and improve the health and legal services available to survivors. It will improve training for military and police forces about how to prevent and respond to gender-based violence.

I-VAWA also will address the violence against women and girls that results from natural disasters, such as the recent earthquake in Haiti, as well as such conflict-related atrocities as those in Darfur and the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

This legislation would enhance U.S. efforts to defuse tensions within communities around the world that could threaten national and international security. By taking action to end violence against women and girls in their homes and local communities, we can interrupt the cycle of conflict before it erupts into violence on a larger scale.

By enacting I-VAWA, our country would send a strong message to the world that ending violence against women and girls everywhere is a national priority. We should lead by example to ensure that women both here at home and around the world can exercise their basic human right to a life free from violence.

Iowa's Sen. Tom Harkin has already signed on as a co-sponsor of I-VAWA. We should send him our thanks and ask Sen. Chuck Grassley to join him by signing on to S. 2982 and Rep. Dave Loebsack to co-sponsor H. R. 4594.

Alice Dahle of Cedar Rapids is Amnesty International Area coordinator for Iowa. Contact her at adahle@fastermac.net