A national campaign carrying the symbol of a red triangle is to be rolled out across the UK to mark the International Day of Zero Tolerance for Female Genital Mutilation (FGM).
The British National Police Chiefs’ Council has partnered with the Freedom charity to encourage people to provide the police with information that can help detect and prevent FGM in the UK and abroad.
Commander Mak Chishty, the police national lead on “honor”-based violence, has written to every police force in the country reminding them that while progress has been made, there is yet to be a successful prosecution for FGM.
“This is a particular area of political and public scrutiny and I would urge each force to maximize every opportunity to demonstrate that we as a service are doing everything that is possible to combat FGM,” he wrote.
His letter also cited a prevalence study published in July 2015 by City University and Equality Now, a human rights group, which showed that no local authority in the UK was unaffected by FGM.
“We are raising awareness that FGM is a crime and that anybody involved in the process — from turning a blind eye to the act of cutting — commits a criminal offense. This is form of child abuse and violence against women and girls,” Chishty told reporters.
More than 13,000 posters promoting the red triangle initiative have been distributed to police forces to display inside police buildings and within appropriate community settings.
Police leads have been asked to evaluate the campaign’s impact by monitoring any increased reporting, receipt of intelligence or new engagement opportunities.
Aneeta Prem, an author and the founder of the Freedom charity, has written a novel warning about FGM, called Cut Flowers, that is being distributed to schoolchildren to raise awareness of the illegal practice.
“Over 200 million women and girls have gone through the horrors of FGM and we know that girls are being cut here in the UK. Unofficial figures estimate that 137,000 girls and women in Britain are affected. Through education we can stop FGM in a generation,” she said. “Through teaching we can explain the long-term health dangers and dispel the myths that have kept this barbaric practice alive. The help of boys as well as girls is needed to change opinions.”
“We are asking that people wear the red triangle badge to mark the International Day of Zero Tolerance to FGM,” she added.
A 25-year-old from Somalia who suffered FGM and now lives in London said: “I was cut when I was five years old. I still feel pain and relive that moment every day. I completely support the Red Triangle campaign and hope it will encourage girls to ask for help.”
British Home Secretary Amber Rudd said the government was taking “world-leading action” to tackle FGM by strengthening the law to improve protection for those at risk and by removing barriers to prosecution.
“This government has introduced FGM protection orders, a new offense of failing to protect a girl from FGM, a mandatory reporting duty for frontline professionals, new guidance for the police and lifelong anonymity for victims to encourage them to come forward,” she said.
“We are sending a clear message that FGM will not be tolerated and as part of this I am determined to see the country’s first successful prosecution for FGM,” she added.
PHISHING: The con might appear convincing, as the scam e-mails can coincide with genuine messages from Apple saying you have run out of storage For a while you have been getting messages from Apple saying “your iCloud storage is full.” They say you have exceeded your storage plan, so documents are no longer being backed up, and photos you take are not being uploaded. You have been resisting Apple’s efforts to get you to pay a minimum of ￡0.99 (US$1.33) a month for more storage, but it seems that you cannot keep putting off the inevitable: You have received an e-mail which says your iCloud account has been blocked, and your photos and videos would be deleted very soon. To keep them you need
For two decades, researchers observed members of the Ngogo chimpanzee group of Kibale National Park in Uganda spend their days eating fruits and leaves, resting, traveling and grooming in their tropical rainforest abode, but this stable community then fractured and descended into years of deadly violence. The researchers are now describing the first clearly documented example of a group of wild chimpanzees splitting into two separate factions, with one launching a series of coordinated attacks against the other. Adult males and infants were targeted, with 28 deaths. “Biting, pounding the victim with their hands, dragging them, kicking them — mostly adult males,
The Israeli military has demolished entire villages as part of its invasion of south Lebanon, rigging homes with explosives and razing them to the ground in massive remote detonations. The Guardian reviewed three videos posted by the Israeli military and on social media, which showed Israel carrying out mass detonations in the villages of Taybeh, Naqoura and Deir Seryan along the Israel-Lebanon border. Lebanese media has reported more mass detonations in other border villages, but satellite imagery was not readily available to verify these claims. The demolitions came after Israeli Minister of Defense Israel Katz called for the destruction of
SUPERFAN: The Japanese PM played keyboard in a Deep Purple tribute band in middle school and then switched to drums at university, she told the British rock band Legendary British rock band Deep Purple yesterday made Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s day with a brief visit to their high-profile superfan as they returned to the nation they first toured more than half a century ago. Takaichi’s reputation as an amateur drummer, and a fan of hard rock and heavy metal has been well documented, and she has referred to Deep Purple as one of her favorite bands along with the likes of Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden. “You are my god,” a giddy Takaichi said in English to Deep Purple drummer Ian Paice, presenting him with a set of made-in-Japan
RSS