ECHR will consider a complaint from Russia about forced ‘circumcision’ of girls

The European Court in Strasbourg is to consider an appeal from the Russian Federation related to the genital surgeries of female minors.  The authors of the appeal refer to the fact that the state is not able to protect girls from interference that is harmful to the physical and mental health of children.

We are talking about the so-called ‘circumcision’ - the practice, which continues to persist in certain regions of the Caucasus and among a part of the Muslim population of the country.

The reason for the appeal was the surgery , which was carried out by medical workers in the city of Magas (Ingushenia), performing a clitorectomy on an 11-year-old girl.  Representative of the ‘Legal Initiative’ (on December 13, 2019, the organization, located in Nazran, was recognized a foreign agent) Tatyana Savvina, who applied to the ECHR, considers this practice to violate a number of provisions of the Convention on Human Rights.

In particular, she notes that it is the responsibility of the state to effectively investigate reports of such operations, which WHO calls ‘mutilation’. 

It is known that the girl underwent surgery at the Aybolit medical institution two years ago, in June 2019.  Since September, the gynecologist Izania Nalgieva, who performed the operation, was suspected by law enforcement agencies of committing a crime under Art.  115 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.  The doctor justifies her actions by the presence of vulvitis (inflammation of the external genital organs) in the then 9-year-old girl.  However, given that the wife of her father, who was not indicated in the birth certificate, was next to the girl at that moment, it was impossible to carry out the operation according to the Russian laws.

According to Karina Bondarenko, a representative of the Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology of the Russian National Research Medical University, such a medical operation is not justified, as the sexual functions of the child who underwent it may be subsequently decreased or changed.

Attempts by human rights defenders to bring to justice not only the doctor, but also the management of the clinic were unsuccessful, as well as their attempts to get investigators to initiate a criminal case under Article 132 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (sexual violence against a child).

According to a human rights organization, about 1,240 such operations are carried out annually in the regions of Dagestan and Ingushetia.

Experts find it difficult to guess whether an appeal to the ECHR by a Russian organization with the status of a foreign agent will induce parliamentarians to come up with an initiative to adopt any bills that would protect children from such violence by adults.  According to Fedot Tumusov, representing the relevant Duma committee, this medical problem is not so urgent compared to laws that should protect doctors from criminal prosecution for possible mistakes.