1. Research. Rethink. Resolve.
Gender-based Violence and Disability in Displaced Settings Monday, January 28, 2013 Emma Pearce (Disability Program Officer)
The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) requires state parties to ensure that persons with disabilities are protected in situations of risk or humanitarian crisis (Article 11), and that international cooperation is accessible to and inclusive of persons with disabilities (Article 32). It also recognizes the preamble that “women and girls with disabilities are often at greater risk, both within and outside the home, of violence, injury or abuse” and requires States to “ensure that protection services are age-, gender- and disability-sensitive” (Article 16).
The World Health Organization reports that rates of violence are 4-10 times greater among persons with disabilities than non-disabled persons in developed countries. Prevalence of sexual violence is also higher among persons with disabilities, particularly for adolescents and intimate partners with disabilities, and for men and women with intellectual impairments living in institutions.
Recent reports to both the Human Rights Council and the United Nations General Assembly highlight the multiple and intersecting forms of discrimination which are experienced by women with disabilities and increase their vulnerability to many different forms of violence. Women and girls with disabilities are at higher risk of violence, due to misconceptions and negative attitudes, isolation and social exclusion.
Research. Rethink. Resolve.

2. UNHCR...
UNHCR Guidance on Working with Persons with Disabilities in Forced Displacement
“Ensure physical security: prevent and respond to sexual and gender based violence and other forms of exploitation and abuse.”
UNHCR Updated GBV Strategy
Six action areas for 2011 – 2016:
Protecting persons of concern with disabilities against GBV
Prevention: recommended actions
• Promote implementation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) with governments and partners, including by reviewing any GBV-related legal and administrative frameworks, services and activities.
• Raise awareness among UNHCR staff, partners, governments and displaced communities, about the particular GBV risks that persons with disabilities may face.
• Ensure the inclusion and participation of persons of concern with disabilities in the development of customized programmers designed to protect them from GBV and respond to GBV where it occurs.
• Design community infrastructure to help reduce and prevent GBV against persons with disabilities, especially women and children.
• Ensure that mentally impaired persons of concern have appropriate care-giving arrangements.
• Build the capacity of persons of concern with disabilities to make free and informed decisions about their lives and ensure their meaningful participation in community life.
• Partner with specialized organizations, including local disabilities organizations where they exist, to improve the quality of programs to prevent and respond to GBV.
• Increase awareness of the specific physical, social and economic risks faced by persons with disabilities that may lead to GBV.
Identification: recommended actions
• Make a special effort to identify disabled survivors and provide them with information about GBV and services that exist to prevent and respond to it.
Response: recommended actions
• Ensure that information and services that are available to survivors of GBV, including health and transportation services, and interpreters for the hearing impaired, are accessible to persons with disabilities and their families.
• Make necessary adaptations to ensure that persons with disabilities have physical access to community meetings and complaint mechanisms, and are included in community consultations.

3. Pilot countries… New Delhi (urban) Uganda (urban & camp)
Bangladesh (camp)
Thailand (camp)
Ethiopia (camp)
Philippines (IDP)
Nepal (camp)
Women’s Refugee Commission (WRC) is currently partnering with UNHCR on the implementation of their operational guidance on persons with disabilities in selected country operations, through consultations with persons with disabilities and their families, and workshops with stakeholders on disability inclusion. To date, we have worked in New Delhi, India; Kampala and Hoima, Uganda; Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh; Mae Hong Son, Thailand; Damak, Nepal; and Jijiga, Ethiopia; Mindanao, Philippines covering both urban and camp based and IDP settings.
Source: Women’s Refugee Commission/Emma Pearce

4. Consultations...
We have consulted with over 210 men and 260 women with disabilities in these different sites, including refugees with hearing, vision, physical, intellectual and psychosocial impairments. Men and women are consulted separately, and we try reach people with all types of impairments, using different approaches and communication methods. We conduct home visits and conduct one-on-one interviews with individuals which are unable to attend group discussions, or wish to share more detailed information about sensitive issues.
Over 340 humanitarian stakeholders have also attended our workshops which has the active participation of refugees with disabilities and their families.
Source: Women’s Refugee Commission/Emma Pearce

5. Findings from the field… Magnitude of the problem
GBV reported as a concern by women and girls with disabilities in every context
UNHCR Nepal’s trend analysis of reported GBV from 2009 – 2011
Main risk factors were either young age or disability
49% of all rape survivors over 18 years were persons with mental and/or physical impairments
Over 75% of attempted rape survivors were persons with disabilities
In all settings, both camp and urban settings, women with disabilities have expressed that that they are at risk of all forms of GBV. Bangladesh is the place where we got least number of reports of GBV - Women with disabilities did, however, report that they are frequently teased and have “other things” happen with their husbands, brothers and community members.
The scale of this protection issue is perhaps best highlighted by data from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) on reported GBV incidents among Bhutanese refugees living in camps in eastern Nepal. From 2009 – 2011, 49% of all rape survivors over the age of 18 years were persons with mental and/or physical impairments. Additionally, over 75% of survivors of attempted rape were persons with disabilities.
“Everywhere in the camp, we don’t feel safe. Even I am an old woman and many times people have tried to rape me.” (Group discussion with women with disabilities in Aw’Barre camp, Ethiopia)

6. Findings from consultations… Vulnerability and risk
“When walking alone, people are tempted to rape her”
(Interpreted report from a young deaf woman living in Kampala, Uganda)
“Violence can happen anywhere because she cannot run and has no means to protect herself”
(Reports from women with disabilities in Shedder Camp, Ethiopia)
“There are cases where they (blind people) have been misguided and faced attempted rape.”
(Young women with disabilities in Sansichare camp, Nepal)

7. Findings from consultations… Exploitation
“If you have a disabled girl, you always worry – a man might come and give her money. She takes the money to get food and he will ask for something back – she will end up pregnant.”
(Mother of a young woman with disabilities in Aw’bare camp, Ethiopia)

8. Findings from consultations… Lack of awareness and education
“Females who have intellectual disability also need education because they have relationships.”
(Deaf man from Sanischare refugee camp, Nepal)
“She wants to go out all the time...She is growing up and not a child anymore...As a mother, you worry what will happen.”
(Mother of young woman with intellectual impairments living in New Delhi)
In New Delhi, there are reports of young women with intellectual impairments being physically assaulted when going to the markets unaccompanied, most commonly perpetrated by men from the host population who are under the influence of alcohol.

9. Isolation and violence in the home…
“To outsiders everything looks fine, but actually they are neglected, beaten and abused by their family.”
(Report from group activity with women with disabilities in Sanischare camp, Nepal)
“She knows a neighbour who can’t dress herself and she has a child – She is very vulnerable to violence” Women with disabilities in Shedder camp.
These are only the cases which are reported, and we need to remember that there are probably large numbers of unreported cases of GBV among persons with disabilities. Isolation and social exclusion contributes to the vulnerability of persons with disabilities, and reduces their access to prevention and response. Sometimes persons with disabilities are unable to communicate what has happened to them, even to their own families. This makes them also a target for violence, as people think that they will not able to identify the perpetrator. Also they are often viewed as incapable of making their own decisions, and so people may not believe them even if they are able to speak out. Some of the deaf women in our consultations explained that “They go to their family, but they don’t take care of what they say.” Many persons with disabilities also lack the education on their own rights and what GBV is.
Source: Hesperian (2007)

10. Findings from consultations… GBV and men with disabilities
“They use bad words and say you don’t have a mind, you are useless. Or they say, this guy is deaf, he is of no use and scold him.”
(Deaf man reporting in a group discussion in Sanischare camp, Nepal)
“Most of these men here, even their wives have left them because of disability ... The wife will say they are suffering because you can’t get water and carry things – things the family needs.”
(Man with disabilities from Shedder Camp, Ethiopia)
Men with disabilities have also described examples of gendered emotional violence in New Delhi, Nepal and Ethiopia, although they do not perceive this as GBV and agency staff remain largely focused on the GBV needs of women and girls.

11. Accessing GBV programs … Capacity of staff
“It is very difficult to provide assistance to PWDs [people with disabilities] through the multi-sectoral system. We can provide assistance to all, but sometimes it is hard for them to get to first point of assistance… They need support throughout the process (to make decisions) and we need more training… When we start referring to services, it gets very difficult to maintain confidentiality.”
(UNHCR Protection Officer, Nepal)
In Thailand, a woman with disabilities was being assaulted by her brother-in-law, and did not access protection services. No disability issues are included in SOPs and a member of the women’s organization shared that they don’t know how to counsel people who cannot speak or move.

12. Accessing GBV programs … Attitudes of response actors
“We normally don’t seek help, because people think we are making up stories for resettlement”
(Woman with disabilities in Shedder Camp, Ethiopia)
“They tell me to go away and to not be violent towards people”
(Woman with psychosocial impairments living in conflict-affected Mindanao when asked about the response of police to her reports of “molestation”)

13. Accessing GBV programs… Inclusion in community activities
“Persons with disabilities are only in the disability centre.”
(Group activity with persons with disabilities in Sanischare Camp, Nepal)
“We are not represented in the Women’s Association, and we don’t go to any of their activities.”
(Women with disabilities in Shedder camp, Ethiopia)
Source: Women’s Refugee Commission/Emma Pearce

14. Outputs from the workshop on GBV and disability in Nepal…
Photo is of participants from a workshop on GBV and disability conducted in Nepal. Participants included UNHCR staff, representatives from Nepali DPOs, NGOs working in the refugee camps, refugee leaders and refugees with disabilities.
As a result of the workshop, UNHCR Nepal is hoping to:
Strengthening communication and interpretation for deaf people in partnership with a local DPO for the deaf;
Partnering with WRC on a more detailed investigation of the SRH needs and capacities of persons with disabilities in 2013;
Promoting the formation of groups of persons with disabilities in the camps in partnership with host country Disabled People’s Organizations (DPOs).
Given the strengths and opportunities identified in this field visit, UNHCR Nepal is considering longer term activities, including the implementation of meaningful disability inclusion in GBV Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs); building detailed guidance on consent and supportive decision making; providing support to families to develop alternative communication methodologies; and finally addressing GBV against men and boys with disabilities.
WRC is providing ongoing technical support to these initiatives, as well as working in partnership with UNHCR Nepal on SRH and disabilities research, and we look forward to sharing the good practices of UNHCR Nepal and their partners with other stakeholders and UNHCR country operations.
Source: Women’s Refugee Commission/Emma Pearce

15. Gaps in the sector…
Piloting and evaluating strategies for inclusion in GBV programs
Capturing, documenting and sharing what field staff are already doing … in detail!
Technical capacity for disability inclusion in needs assessment and design of projects
Inclusivity of human rights mechanisms – who is missed?
Voice of refugees and displaced persons with disabilities in determining what works where and why?

16. THANK YOU! emmap@wrcommission.org
Source: Women’s Refugee Commission/Emma Pearce