Somalia: Raising awareness against FGM in Puntland

Halima [not her real name], a mother of five girls, shudders whenever she remembers how she suffered after undergoing female genital mutilation (FGM/Cutting), a practice still widespread in Somalia.

Zeinab Haji, anti-FGM activist and board member of We are Women Activists, an umbrella organisation of 34 women's groups. (Image: Abdi Hassan/IRIN).

"I will not put my daughters through it," Halima told IRIN in Bosasso, the commercial capital of the self-declared autonomous region of Puntland, where an estimated 98 percent of girls still undergo the cut.

Her daughters are aged two to 15 years. "I do not want them to go through that in life," she said. "Every time I get my periods I suffer incredible pain to the point where I cannot work. I have had infections that led to miscarriage and bleedings."

The practice in Somalia involves the cutting of the external genitalia and sewing up the genitalia, leaving a small hole for urine and blood to pass, known as pharaonic circumcision.

FGM is illegal in Puntland, but is a prevalent traditional practice. It is also commonly performed throughout Somalia and in parts of the East African region.

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