Doctors in Uzbekistan Say Government Forcibly Sterilizing Women
Journalist Natalia Antelava talks with Marco Werman about what she
says is a secret program by the government of Uzbekistan to sterilize
women against their will.
Antelava, who was barred from entering Uzbekistan to report her story
for the BBC, interviewed Uzbek women and doctors who had crossed the
border into Kazakhstan, and she contacted others by telephone and
e-mail. They told her of a government plan to limit the size of
families through sterilization, sometimes without a woman's consent or
even her knowledge.
"After I gave birth to my second child, doctors told me that I
shouldn't have any more," said one Uzbek woman, who asked not to be
identified. "I was under a full anesthetic. They didn't ask me
anything. They just cut out my uterus."
Doctors told Antelava that the Ministry of Health has ruled that they
must perform such surgical sterilizations. "It's ruling number 1098,"
said one doctor, "and it says that after two children, in some areas
after three, a woman should be sterilized."
In a written response to the BBC's request for comment, the government
of Uzbekistan called such allegations slanderous and insisted they
bore no relation to reality.
http://www.theworld.org/2012/04/doctors-in-uzbekistan-say-government-forcibly-sterilizing-women/
------------
Uzbekistan's policy of secretly sterilising women
By Natalia Antelava BBC World Service
The BBC has been told by doctors that Uzbekistan is running a secret
programme to sterilise women - and has talked to women sterilised
without their knowledge or consent.
Adolat has striking looks, a quiet voice and a secret that she finds
deeply shameful.
She knows what happened is not her fault, but she cannot help feeling
guilty about it.Adolat comes from Uzbekistan, where life centres
around children and a big family is the definition of personal
success. Adolat thinks of herself as a failure.
"What am I after what happened to me?" she says as her hand strokes
her daughter's hair - the girl whose birth changed Adolat's life.
"I always dreamed of having four - two daughters and two sons - but
after my second daughter I couldn't get pregnant," she says.Every
doctor is told how many women are to be sterilised - there is a quota"
Uzbek gynaecologist
She went to see a doctor and found out that she had been sterilised
after giving birth to her daughter by Caesarean section."I was
shocked. I cried and asked: 'But why? How could they do this?' The
doctor said, 'That's the law in Uzbekistan.'"Sterilisation is not,
officially, the law in Uzbekistan.
But evidence gathered by the BBC suggests that the Uzbek authorities
have run a programme over the last two years to sterilise women across
the country, often without their knowledge.
Foreign journalists are not welcome in Uzbekistan, and in late
February of this year the authorities deported me from the country. I
met Adolat and many other Uzbek women in the relative safety of
neighbouring Kazakhstan. I also gathered testimony by telephone and
email, and in recordings brought out of the country by courier.
None of the women wanted to give their real names but they come from
different parts of Uzbekistan and their stories are consistent with
those of doctors and medical professionals inside the country.
"Every year we are presented with a plan. Every doctor is told how
many women we are expected to give contraception to; how many women
are to be sterilised," says a gynaecologist from the Uzbek capital,
Tashkent.
Like all doctors I interviewed, she spoke on a condition of anonymity.
Talking to a foreign journalist could result in a prison term, in a
country where torture in detention is the norm."There is a quota. My
quota is four women a month," she says.
Two other medical sources suggest that there is especially strong
pressure on doctors in rural areas of Uzbekistan, where some
gynaecologists are expected to sterilise up to eight women per
week."Once or twice a month, sometimes more often, a nurse from the
local clinic comes to my house trying to get me to the hospital to
have the operation," says a mother of three in the Jizzakh region of
Uzbekistan."Now it's free, but later you will have to pay for it, so
do it now," the nurse tells the mother.
Another mother says she experienced months of mysterious pain and
heavy bleeding following the birth of her son. Then she had an
ultrasound check and discovered that her uterus had been removed."They
just said to me, 'What do you need more children for? You already have
two,'" she says.
The BBC gathered similar testimony from the Ferghana Valley, the
Bukhara region and two villages near the capital Tashkent.
According to a source at the Ministry of Health, the sterilisation
programme is intended to control Uzbekistan's growing population,
which is officially held to be about 28m people. Some demographers are
sceptical, however, pointing to the large numbers of people who have
emigrated since the last census in 1989, when the population stood at
around 20m.On paper, sterilisations should be voluntary, but women
don't really get a choice"
Uzbek doctor
"We are talking about tens of thousands of women being sterilised
throughout the country," says Sukhrob Ismailov, who runs the Expert
Working Group, one of very few non-governmental organisations
operating in Uzbekistan.
In 2010, the Expert Working Group conducted a seven-month-long survey
of medical professionals, and gathered evidence of some 80,000
sterilisations over the period, but there is no way of verifying the
number and some of the procedures were carried out with the patient's
consent.
The first cases of forced sterilisation were reported in 2005, by
Gulbakhor Turaeva - a pathologist working in the city of Andijan who
noticed that uteruses of young, healthy women were being brought to a
mortuary where she worked.
After gathering evidence of 200 forced sterilisations, by tracing
women from whom the uteruses were removed, she went public with her
findings and asked her bosses for an explanation. Instead they sacked
her.
In 2007 Turaeva went to jail, accused of smuggling opposition
literature into the country. Like many others, she refused to be
interviewed for this report because of fears for her and her
children's safety.
Sterilised mother The women who were interviewed did not want to be identified
In 2007, the United Nations Committee Against Torture also reported
forcible sterilisations and hysterectomies in Uzbekistan, and the
number of cases of forced sterilisation appeared to fall.
But according to medical sources, in 2009 and 2010 the Uzbek
government issued directives ordering clinics to be equipped to
perform voluntary surgical contraception. In 2009, doctors from the
capital were also despatched to rural areas to increase the
availability of sterilisation services.
There is evidence that the number of sterilisations then began to rise
again."On paper, sterilisations should be voluntary, but women don't
really get a choice," says a senior doctor from a provincial hospital,
who wished to remain unnamed.
"It's very easy to manipulate a woman, especially if she is poor. You
can say that her health will suffer if she has more children. You can
tell her that sterilisation is best for her. Or you can just do the
operation."
Several doctors I spoke to say that in the last two years there has
been a dramatic increase in Caesarean sections, which provide surgeons
with an easy opportunity to sterilise the mother. These doctors
dispute official statements that only 6.8% of women give birth through
C-sections.
"Rules on Caesareans used to be very strict, but now I believe 80% of
women give birth through C-sections. This makes it very easy to
perform a sterilisation and tie the fallopian tubes," says a chief
surgeon at a hospital near the capital, Tashkent.
Uzbekistan: Infant and maternal deaths
Uzbekistan ranked 140th out of 194 countries in terms of infant
mortality in 2005-2010, according to data from the UN Population
DivisionThis put it just behind Laos, Madagascar and Bolivia, and just
ahead of Bangladesh, Ghana and Papua New Guinea
Figures from the UN Population Fund indicate that Uzbekistan had a
maternal mortality ratio of 30 deaths per 100,000 live births in 2008
- a 44% improvement on 1990.This ratio put it level with Iran, just
ahead of Albania and Malaysia (31) and just behind Armenia (29),
Romania and Uruguay (27)
Several doctors and medical professionals said forced sterilisation is
not only a means of population control but also a bizarre short-cut to
lowering maternal and infant mortality rates.
"It's a simple formula - less women give birth, less of them die,"
said one surgeon.
The result is that his helps the country to improve its ranking in
international league tables for maternal and infant mortality.
"Uzbekistan seems to be obsessed with numbers and international
rankings," says Steve Swerdlow, Central Asia director at Human Rights
Watch.
"I think it's typical of dictatorships that need to construct a
narrative built on something other than the truth."
Swerdlow believes foreign governments could do more. Until recently
Uzbek President Islam Karimov was a pariah in the West, but in recent
years both the US and the EU have lifted sanctions, including a US ban
on arms sales.
This is apparently related to America's worsening relationship with
Pakistan and Nato's increased use of routes through Central Asia,
including Uzbekistan, to get supplies and troops in and out of
Afghanistan.
A number of Western dignitaries have visited Uzbekistan in recent
months, but few have made any public comment on the country's human
rights record."Karimov has managed to get to the point in his
relationship with the West when there are no consequences for his
actions and human rights abuses," says Swerdlow.
"There is a deafening silence when it comes to human rights. Reports
of forced sterilisation add urgency to breaking this silence."
In a written reply to the BBC's request for comment, the Uzbek
government said the allegations of a forced sterilisation programme
were slanderous and bore no relation to reality.
The government also said that surgical contraception was not
widespread and was carried out only on a voluntary basis, after
consultation with a specialist and with the written consent of both
parents.
The Uzbek government stressed that Uzbekistan's record in protecting
mothers and babies is excellent and could be considered a model for
countries around the world.
However, Nigora is among many for whom forced sterilisation is a
reality. She had an emergency C-section. A day later she was told she
had been sterilised. On the same day, her newborn died.Nigora is 24
and will never have children.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17612550
------------------------------------
[Disclaimer: ALOCHONA Management is not liable for information contained in this message. The author takes full responsibility.]
To unsubscribe/subscribe, send request to alochona-owner@egroups.comYahoo! Groups Links
<*> To visit your group on the web, go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/alochona/
<*> Your email settings:
Individual Email | Traditional
<*> To change settings online go to:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/alochona/join
(Yahoo! ID required)
<*> To change settings via email:
alochona-digest@yahoogroups.com
alochona-fullfeatured@yahoogroups.com
<*> To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to:
alochona-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com
<*> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to:
http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/