More Advocacy Needed for Rights of Sexual Violence Victims

During the conference on “BiH’s obligations towards women, who survived war rape, sexual abuse and other types of torture” it was said that women who survived sexual abuse violence during the war, needed material compensation and the existence of minimal law regulations.

The conference participants mentioned that there were still no unified law regulations dealing with the rights of those victims in Bosnia and Herzegovina, BiH.

“There are three separate legal systems in BiH. Each of them regulates the rights of victims of sexual violence in their own specific way… Direct help to victims represents the biggest problem. There is no sufficient information about the existing institutions. There is no co-ordination between health institutions and NGOs, offering support,” said Saliha Djuderija, Advisor to the Minister for Human Rights and Refugees of BiH.

The Conference participants pointed out that it was necessary for women to get more space in the social community, so they could say what bothered them and, by doing it, come out of the isolation and overcome shame.

Tufika Ibrahimefendic, a therapist from “Vive Zene” Association, who works with victims of sexual violence, said that only one part of those women had approached experts for help.

“Many of those women have still not spoken. In most cases they deal with the trauma they survived by keeping silent about them,” Ibrahimefendic said.

The participants pointed out that it was necessary to discuss the wartime violence as violence based on gender, not on ethnic or national affiliations.

Also, it was stressed that it was unacceptable to deal with the women, who survived such traumas, from time to time only, because the victims would lose confidence in the institutions, which helped them in such a way.

The Conference was organized by the Forum of Women from Bratunac, in collaboration with six other organizations, which initiated a “Women’s Court” project.

Prior to the beginning of the Conference the project titled “Women’s Court in BiH – advocacy for the rights of war rape survivors” was presented. Stanojka Tesic, member of the project team, pointed out that 40 women’s courts, which dealt with various types of violence, had been held throughout the world so far.

“The theme we have decided to cover in BiH is rape during wartime. The woman’s court will advocate for the rights of raped women, who are still disempowered now, after the war,” Tesic said.