Press Release 8 Mar-Eng

On 8 March 2005 at 13.30 a petition will be presented to the Permanent Parliamentarian Commission for Justice and Integration.

At 14.00 an impressive demonstration will begin at Central Station, with hundreds of women dressed in black with white masks, and end at `Het Plein´. Many prominent women will take part in this demonstration.

On International Women’s Day, hundreds of women will take to the streets in solidarity with the female asylum seekers who have experienced sexual violence in their land of origin. Where Dutch victims are permitted to file a complaint for up to 15 years after the crime, these asylum seekers receive only one chance to talk about how they were sexually abused and sometimes persecuted for it.

While the Dutch victims of sexual violence get the chance to tell their story when they are ready to, in complete calmness and guided by an expert, these asylum seekers are compelled to do so within 48 hours upon their arrival in the Netherlands – not in calmness and not with the guidance of an expert.

Where the Dutch victims are heard by special counselors, no specialists are brought in for asylum seekers.

It is high time that the Dutch asylum policy pays as much attention to the discrimination against female asylum seekers as they do to the other victims of sexual violence in the Netherlands. This is the feeling of hundreds of social and political organizations.

We are asking for the equal treatment of sexually abused women, and thus observation of article 1 of the Constitution, for everyone, including asylum seekers!

This poor IND policy regarding women who have been through sexual violence is but one example of a failing governmental policy. This policy has failed to protect the rights of the asylum seeker women in the Netherlands.

The action on March 8th is the beginning of a project of women who were sexually abused in their land of origin, on the way to the Netherlands and sometimes also in the Netherlands, after they were put on the streets.

Currently lawyers and experts are working on a ´blackbook´ in which this failing policy regarding the sexual abuse of women will be put on the spot.

Sexually abused women are being threatened with deportation and some already have been deported.

Female asylum seekers who have been the victims of sexual violence not be discriminated from Dutch women;
Women be received and guided in a professional way during the asylum procedure;
Women both with, and without, children not be put on the street if their cases are have been closed;
Women who are victims of sexual violence, in their own land and/or in the Netherlands, not be departed;
International agreements on human rights be observed also for female refugees.

Stop the Suppression of Women’s Rights