“Working with traditional cutters has met little resistence in Sierra Leone”

Rugiatu Turay is the director of Amazonian Initiative Movement, an organization working to end FGM in Sierra Leone. She shares her experience from AIM’s programme implementing alternative rites of passage with women who used to perform initiation with FGM.

Deconstructing one’s personal view on the link between FGM and religion

Maryam Sheikh Abdi’s is a researcher on FGM. She is the co-author of a report of the Population Council « Delinking Female Genital Mutilation/Cutting from Islam » and the study « A Religious Oriented Approach to Addressing FGM/C among the Somali Community of Wajir, Kenya»….

“Removal of sothieuntes” in Senegal : an unknown type IV FGM

Fatou Kebe is a sociologist and member of the CoP FGM. She has contributed to shed light on an unknown type of female genital cutting, practiced within the Wolof community of Senegal and known as “the removal of sothieutes”.

Through a pilot study, Fatou Kebe shows that this “traditional practice” has no medical justification and should be considered as a form of female genital mutilation.

Burkina Faso

Charlemagne Ouédraogo is a doctor in gynecology at the Department of obstetrical gynecology at the Yalgado Hospital in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso. We had the great pleasure to meet with Dr Ouédraogo when he was in Brussels for our Webinar on Multidisciplinary support to women affected by FGM. We spoke about clitoral reconstruction, the use of new technologies, women’s sexuality and the need for holistic care for women affected by FGM…

Khadia Diallo’s testimony on intergenerational dialogue

“I had to be very clear with my family that I would not allow my daughter to be cut and that I even wanted it to stop for all the other girls in my family”

Khadia Diallo is the founder of the Belgian association against female genital mutilation (GAMS Belgium). She shares with us her experience with intergenerational dialogue on FGM.