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- -------- Original Message -------- Subject: The UK's cruelest cut Date: Wed, 23 May 2012 07:51:49 -0400 From: Emma Ruby-Sachs - Avaaz.org <[email protected]> To: [email protected] <[email protected]> Dear friends across the UK, Each year, tens of thousands of girls in the UK are forced to have their genitals cut, often with no anesthesia. But there has been never been a conviction for female genital mutilation here -- even though in London alone, police have received 166 complaints in the last four years! Now we have a chance to help. Undercover reporters for the Sunday Times recently caught three medics on film offering to mutilate young girls, massively scaling up the pressure on law enforcement to act. We can use this moment to call on Home Secretary Theresa May for real accountability. She is in charge of every police chief in England and Wales -- if she takes the issue up personally, the entire police system could be shaken into action. Avaaz member Ruth Burnett has created a petition calling on the Home Secretary to start prosecuting people involved with these assaults and already more than 2000 people have signed! If we reach 20,000 signatures, Avaaz will deliver it directly to Home Secretary May and the head of Metropolitan Police Force -- click below to sign and forward to everyone: http://www.avaaz.org/en/petition/Stop_female_genital_mutilation_in_the_UK/?cl=1821616703&v=14523 Female Genital Mutilation is a custom widespread in nearly 30 Middle Eastern and African countries. But FGM has been illegal in the UK since 1985 and in 2003 the law was tightened to stop girls being taken abroad for the operation -- on so-called “FGM holidays”. Still, the practice is widespread here in the UK! When the undercover Sunday Times reporter explained to Mohammed Sahib, an alternative medicine practitioner in East London that he represented a Ghanaian couple who wanted to have their two daughters -- aged 10 and 13 -- circumcised, he said “I can do it here,” confirming that he would both remove the clitoris and sew up the vagina. “This is my work. I know what I’m doing. I’m going to do it. I will tell you how [much] to pay [for one]: £750.” Home Secretary Theresa May -- who oversees women’s issues for David Cameron, and who has the power to hold police chiefs all across England and Wales accountable -- recently admitted people would be “shocked” by the number of young girls in Britain subjected to FGM. Now we can push her to take concrete action to end FGM in the UK -- click below to sign the petition now and share with everyone: http://www.avaaz.org/en/petition/Stop_female_genital_mutilation_in_the_UK/?cl=1821616703&v=14523 >From Iran to Morocco to South Africa, our community has fought back attacks on >women’s fundamental rights. In the world we all want, a woman would never be >forced to suffer the horror, pain and trauma involved with FGM. Today, here in >Britain, we have a chance to take a giant step closer to making that world a >reality. Let’s stand with these women and eliminate this practice from our >country. With hope and determination, Emma, Maria Paz, Ricken, Alex, Rewan, Emily and the whole Avaaz team MORE INFORMATION: Female genital mutilation 'offered by UK medics' (The Guardian) http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/apr/22/female-genital-mutilation-uk-medics Birmingham arrests over female genital mutilation (BBC) http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-birmingham-17955330 Cruel Cuts (Avaaz.org Daily Briefing) https://en.avaaz.org/418/female-circumcision-scandal-uk Genital mutilation in the UK, an investigation (Sunday Times, paywall): http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/comment/leaders/article1021882.ece The Prevalence of Female Genital Mutilation in England and Wales (DoH study, 2007): http://www.forwarduk.org.uk/key-issues/fgm/research This message was sent to [email protected]. To change your email address, language, or other information, contact us here: http://www.avaaz.org/en/contact/?footer Want to leave this list? Send a message to [email protected], or click here: https://secure.avaaz.org/act/?r=unsub&cl=1821616703&[email protected]&b=1831&v=14523&lang=enTo contact Avaaz, please do not reply to this email. Instead, write to us via the form at http://www.avaaz.org/en/contact. You can also call us at +1-888-922-8229 (US). __________________________ -----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE----- Version: GnuPG v1.4.11 (GNU/Linux) Comment: Using GnuPG with Mozilla - http://enigmail.mozdev.org/ iQEcBAEBAgAGBQJPvQRkAAoJEOJpqm7flRExb6gH/1XHIpojd63SuPpQ9lKQFniZ XdOwhVpfZhN93jr1rGrAoWWfKaUEEmqOLUD9NC0+msXQyJ6SAud56/rtZy9f1zd5 nv8TtS7wsuCii+XQJ3wtO5e6p9nC4QSmWStlbXbsqL9+3PM75ZfIGl0sftqeGa7q dv2/ZzMCaxiWL63dcN+m7OfddhL2qtvcNJ3pQ0K4rZ9JRqN8SYg1jMfNLJcsQ457 labiBK1GU6u6DcnVQCoJ+1LM0VPeRBbUtEbOcaB8rvODKRgQ5rTNpBh5YwJReh/N ZhzjCqF/Xn5zKbYWQK/cwIBcmxb/C0Q5LM5Gcb+jxtXaL+8j8WpFWPan//7Acqg= =31C1 -----END PGP SIGNATURE----- _______________________________________________ Gnupg-users mailing list [email protected] http://lists.gnupg.org/mailman/listinfo/gnupg-users
