Human Rights
Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB) and women’s rights are both human rights set out in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) adopted by the UN General Assembly in 1948.
Human rights are rights that we have simply because we exist as human beings. They are inherent to all of us, regardless of nationality, gender, ethnic origin, color, religion, language, or any other identity. They range from the most foundational– the right to life and freedom from violence, slavery, and discrimination– to the rights that make life valuable, such as the right to food, education, work, health, and freedom.
Human rights are universal, inalienable, indivisible, and interdependent. This means that every human being is equally entitled to human rights. They should not be taken away except under specific circumstances and in accordance with due process. No set of rights can be enjoyed fully without the others.
Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB)
FoRB is the right to explore who we are, to believe or not believe and express our thoughts and practice our faith publicly without coercion.[1] This right gives us the freedom to think for ourselves, to make decisions about our own lives, and to help us become more independent and happier, enriching our lives and the world around us.
FoRB protects individuals from discrimination who have, or wish to have, different beliefs, and it prohibits the use of coercion to make someone hold or change their religion or belief. It also protects the individual from being compelled to state an affiliation with any particular religion or belief.
Religious freedom benefits everyone. It treats all people: Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, agnostics, atheists, etc., equally. Uplifting FoRB elevates people’s rights by empowering those who particularly need it: those who live in societies where practicing a different religion is not accepted and the majority religion is often imposed on them.
When people of different groups, world views, and beliefs can peacefully coexist without fear of being punished, it benefits both individuals and communities. It teaches us all to be able to live together with our differences by learning from them and becoming better people. In a changing society in which people are constantly interacting with new people and in which most of us practice a religion, it is crucial that the beliefs that are core to us are respected so that we can learn from one another, live peacefully, and develop together as a society.
FoRB is enshrined and defined in Article 18 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 18 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Importantly, the international community has gathered to elaborate on the content of FoRB in the Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of Intolerance and Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief.
Women’s Rights, Equality and Empowerment
Women’s rights are the rights that women and girls have as human beings, and to be free from all forms of discrimination. They are essential for achieving the full range of other human rights, sustainable development, and lasting peace. Women’s rights cover all aspects of life: their right to health; to access and receive education; to political participation and economic well-being; to be free from violence, slavery, or discrimination; to own property and receive fair and equal wages as well as many more.
Women’s equality means that men and women have equal rights and equal opportunities in education, economic independence, and personal development. Gender equality is a key aspect of achieving Women’s rights and women’s empowerment, which can be defined as the promotion of a woman’s sense of self-worth, her ability to determine her own choices both inside and outside the family, and her right and ability to influence societal change.
Women and girls are key agents of development and change. Achieving gender equality and empowering women and girls is vital to building fair, inclusive, prosperous, and peaceful societies everywhere.
Double Vulnerability
Also referred to as compounded or intersecting vulnerability, women of religious minority face discrimination through structural inequalities or outright violence due to both their gender and their faith. Such discrimination almost always occurs in a wider context of both patriarchy and the unequal power relationships between people of different faiths: the lower the status of women in their society, the worse violence against women in persecuted religious minority groups will be. In Iraq, for example, the suffering of women from religious minorities has reached great proportions simply because of their double vulnerability. This persecution is based on the intersection of gender with religious identity.
Sexual and Gender-based Violence (SGBV)
According to the United Nations, SGBV refers to any harmful act of sexual, physical, psychological, mental, and emotional abuse that is perpetrated against a person’s will and is directed at an individual or a group of individuals based on their gender. Such violence results in physical, sexual, or mental harm or suffering to women and girls. It is rooted in gender inequality, the abuse of power, and harmful societal expectations of women such as “purity”, meekness, or obedience. In conflicts, such as those seen in Syria and Iraq, SGBV increases dramatically because it is used as a systematic form of warfare carried out on the female body for strategic ends - by both rebel groups and state forces alike. Women from minority religious communities have been victims and survivors of rape, sexual assault, and sexual slavery, particularly in the midst of the Syrian and Iraqi conflicts - but also as the world is currently witnessing in Ukraine - in far greater proportions and severity than that of the general female population in such countries. The motivation for such attacks by perpetrator groups such as ISIS lies in destroying the most important pillar of the family - its women and girls - in order to undermine and ultimately destroy the entire minority religious community.
Cultural Stigma, Practices, & Beliefs
Cultural stigma, practices, and beliefs are a set of rules that society traditionally has followed. They range in examples from dress codes and restricted movement to more permanent practices, including female genital mutilation, sexual abuse and harassment, and early, forced marriages and honor killings.
Societal & Communal Stigma
Stigma is the disapproval of, or discrimination against, a person based on perceivable social characteristics that serve to distinguish them from other members of society. Women have traditionally been perceived as inferior and unable to meet standards of societal, community, religious, and family obligations. This creates a low stature for women of religious minority communities in their respective countries because society blames their faith for their inability to meet these shifting standards. Due to this, these women and girls find themselves at the very bottom of social hierarchy, under crippling pressure to comply with dress codes, wade through employment discrimination, and face physical threats of kidnappings, sexual assault, and murder.
Silencing
There is a strict regulation of women and girls’ activities, rendering them progressively invisible, their voices silenced, and their ability to contribute equally to society effectively denied, creating severe vulnerability. Such silence is exacerbated following SGBV in conflict. Namely, to remain in their family and community, female survivors may be forced to remain silent about their experience and trauma, leading to an insurmountable emotional and psychological toll, as well as a lack of proper medical, emotional, and legal support, furthering impunity for such acts. This reality stops many women from reporting violence, discrimination, or persecution, including to (largely male) religious leaders or to even judicial institutions, such that even religious leaders may not hear about persecution’s effects on women in their own communities.
Hindered Opportunities
Women in religious minority communities are not given equal access to education, employment, healthcare, or allowed equal participation in religious, political, and social life.
Female Genital Mutilation
FGM entails the partial or total removal of the female external genitalia or other injuries to female genital organs for non-medical reasons and is normally carried out between infancy and age 15. It has no health benefits, but immediate and long-term health consequences are numerous, including infections and abnormal scarring, debilitating pain, or death. For an in-depth look at the practice, statistics, and communal reasons behind the practice, take a look at the World Health Organization (WHO) FGM Fact Sheet.
Honor Killings
Honor killings are the murder of women and girls, most often by male relatives who claim the women “dishonored” their family and community, typically by engaging in activities ranging from rejecting a family-approved suitor, engaging in consensual romantic or sexual relationships, or even surviving SGBV such as rape.
Persecuted religious and ethnic minorities
A religious or ethnic minority is any group of individuals which constitutes less than half of the population in the territory of a State and whose members share common characteristics of culture, religion or language, or a combination of these. The persecution against religious and ethnic minorities is the violence or discrimination they suffer because of their religious affiliation or belonging to an ethnic group.
Yazidis (referred to as Êzîdi or Êzdî in Kurdish) are members of a distinct Kurdish religious community whose beliefs and practices span thousands of years found primarily in northern Iraq, southeastern Turkey, north of Syria, the Caucasus region, and parts of Iran. After decades of discrimination by Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Iran, in August 2014, the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) began its genocide against the group with its horrific attack on the Sinjar region of northern Iraq, home to the majority of the world’s Yazidis. With the genocide perpetrated by ISIS, Yazidis have experienced an estimated 72 genocides since their existence.
Christians are members of the main religion derived from Jesus of Nazareth in the first century AD. It has become the largest religion in the world with more than 2 billion believers, and geographically it is the most widespread of all beliefs. The Roman Catholic Church, the Orthodox Church, and the Protestant Church are its largest groups. The largest Christian minority in the Middle East is in Egypt, comprising around 10 million people. There is clear evidence that Christians constitute the most widely persecuted religion in the world. Persecution of Christians is especially severe in the Middle East, where its number has decreased by more than half in the last decades, with some countries like Iraq experiencing a decline of one million since the 1990s.
