CONTENTS
2
AT-A-GLANCE FINDINGS
HEAR
3
FOREWORD BY MAIRA SHAHBAZ
4
OVERVIEW
12 EGYPT
• Ranya Abd Al-Masih 44 • Marian Kameel Abdo • Magda Mansur Ibrahim
16 IRAQ AND SYRIA
• Rita Habib • Rana • Why the victims won’t talk
20 MOZAMBIQUE • ‘Aana’ *
The kidnapping, forced conversion and sexual victimization of Christian women and girls CRIES
• On the ground
26 NIGERIA
• Rebecca • Ruth Ngladar Pogu • Sadiya Amos
30 PAKISTAN
• Farah Shaheen • Neelam Masih • Maira Shahbaz
35 ENDNOTES
Hear Her Cries by John Pontifex, Dr John Newton and Fionn Shiner. All images © ACN except, p. 4, Ismael Martinez Sanchez/ACN; p. 19, Claire Thomas; p. 18, courtesy of Kurdistan 24; p. 19, Bruno Barata; p. 26 Jaco Klamer/ACN; p. 29, OfÀce of State Governor Babagana Umara Zulum; p. 29, Hausa Christians Foundation (HACFO). Published in Canada by Aid to the Church in Need (Canada). Designed by Helen Anderson. Graphic designer in Canada: François Sybille Printed by Graphiscan.
Aid to the Church in Need
© ACN 2021
AT-A-GLANCE
WIDESPREAD UNDER-REPORTING OF FORCED CONVERSION AND SEXUAL VIOLENCE MEANS THE FULL SCALE OF THE CRISIS IS LARGELY HIDDEN.
IN EGYPT, UNDER-REPORTING AND OFFICIAL DENIALS MAKE THE SCALE OF THE PROBLEM IMPOSSIBLE TO ASSESS, BUT RESEARCH REVEALS NUMEROUS CASES OF:
IN CONFLICT SITUATIONS − SUCH AS THE ISLAMIST INSURGENCIES IN THE MIDDLE EAST AND PARTS OF AFRICA − MINORITY WOMEN SUFFER HIGHER RATES OF SEXUAL EXPLOITATION .
DESPITE INCOMPLETE DATA, SUFFICIENT EVIDENCE SHOWS ATROCITIES AGAINST CHRISTIAN WOMEN AND GIRLS ARE SO SERIOUS AS TO RANK AS A HUMAN RIGHTS CATASTROPHE.
• FORCED KIDNAPPING • WOMEN ENTICED INTO RELATIONSHIPS AND EXPLOITED.
IN PAKISTAN, RESEARCH SUGGESTS CHRISTIANS COULD COMPRISE UP TO
VICTIMS AND THEIR FAMILIES REMAIN SILENT, FEARING: • SOCIAL SHAME • THREATS FROM ABDUCTORS IN OTHER SCENARIOS, AUTHORITIES SILENCE VICTIMS (EX.: POLICE TELL THEM NOT TO TALK). AT ITS MOST EXTREME, THE FORCED CONVERSION OF CHRISTIAN WOMEN AND GIRLS CAN BE CLASSIFIED AS GENOCIDE − JIHADISTS
RESEARCH INDICATES THAT CHRISTIANS MAKE
OF WOMEN AND GIRLS HELD BY ISLAMIST EXTREMISTS IN NIGERIA. 95%
OF WOMEN AND GIRLS FORCIBLY CONVERTED AND MARRIED. 70%
TARGET THEM INTENDING TO DESTROY MINORITY FAITH COMMUNITIES.
FOREWORD BY MAIRA SHAHBAZ
I was walking near my home in Madina Town, in Pakistan’s Punjab Province one afternoon when some suspicious-looking men approached me. As a 14-year-old Christian girl in a country where non-Muslims suffer harassment, I was frightened. The men dragged me into a car and blindfolded me.
I was tortured and raped. It was recorded and a movie was made of it. I was blackmailed. I was forced to sign a certificate to show I had converted and had married my abductor. I was told that if I refused, my family would be killed. When my mother went to the police to get me back, the matter went before Lahore High Court. The court ruled in my abductor’s favour and I was sent back to live with him. Two weeks later, at midnight, I ran away and went to the police. I confirmed that I was a Christian. But the police supported my opponent, the man who had abducted me and who was threatening to kill me. My abductor and his supporters ― which include members of the hard-line Islamic party Tehreek-e- Labbaik Pakistan ― called for me to be killed. My whole family ― my mother, my sisters, my brother and I ― are in hiding, locked in a room. Suspects have been spotted in the area asking about us. I know there are so many other girls and young women, not only Christians but those from other faiths too, who suffer abduction, rape, forced conversion and marriage, not just in Pakistan but in many other countries around the world. Who will help us? Who will speak up for us? Who cares about our situation?
Thanks so much to Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) and the many thousands of people who have done their best to help us and protect us. I am grateful for your prayers. I am also grateful for the release of this report Hear Her Cries: The Kidnapping, Forced Conversion and Sexual Victimization of Christian Women and Girls. Please read the report and listen to the Christian girls and women who are kidnapped and who are forced to change their religion and get married.
For too long, the world has remained silent.
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OVERVIEW
In a country where religious minorities are treated as second-class citizens, following Christ puts girls and women at risk of being targeted for sex by predators who force their victims to marry them and convert.
“
Can you imagine what it is like being a mother and knowing these terrible things are being done to your daughter? What is perhaps even worse is realizing there is absolutely nothing you can do about it − and all because of the faith you profess.
These are the words of a Christian mother speaking to Aid to the Church in Need (ACN) about the kidnapping, forced marriage and forced conversion of her daughter ― a girl barely in her teens. Deeply distressed by the sexual enslavement to which her daughter was subjected, the woman begged us not to reveal their identities or whereabouts for fear of retaliation from extremist groups. This is just one of many reports we at ACN receive Àrst-hand from project partners and other sources in key countries of concern. Week in, week out, cases are reported to us where girls and young women from Christian families are forced into sexual slavery and religious conversion ― often on pain of death.
”
4 | HEAR HER CRIES
investigating the issue. That said, growing awareness of women’s rights suggests the need for research into whether any increase in cases is primarily the result of better reporting, with more victims and their families coming forward, or if there is an underlying rise in the incidence rate itself. To date, evidence points more towards the latter. In April, ACN’s Religious Freedom in the World Report 2021, which assesses the situation for faith groups in 196 countries, concluded in its ‘Main Findings’: “Crimes against girls and women abducted, raped and obliged to change their faith in forced conversions, were recorded in a growing number of countries.” 5 The report also described “the increasing number of these violations.” 6 Incidents of Christian women being forced to marry against their will were reported as present in 90 percent of the 50 countries included in the Open Doors’ persecution World Watch List 2021. Assessing key factors of concern, such as forced marriage and sexual and other physical violence, the organization’s study on gender-speciÀc religious persecution concluded that the situation for women suffering religious and other forms of coercion had demonstrably worsened over the previous year. 7 Evidence suggests that the COVID-19 pandemic has provided the perfect breeding ground for acts of sexual violence. According to the UN: “Since the outbreak of COVID-19, emerging data and reports from those on the front lines have shown that all types of violence against girls, particularly domestic violence, has intensiÀed.” 8 Research showed that vulnerable converts in lockdown with their families are at a greater risk of general abuse, especially in the Middle East and the North African (MENA) region. 9
Hear Her Cries: The Kidnapping, Forced Conversion and Sexual Victimization of Christian Women and Girls also responds to growing awareness among human rights observers and persecution watchdog organisations that this topic is increasingly urgent. While, as Dr. Ewelina Ochab stated, “The problem continues to be neglected,” 1 particularly in many countries with poor human rights records and especially concerning women and religious freedom, the issue is beginning to gain traction in the West. SigniÀcantly, recommendation Àve of the July 2019 Bishop of Truro’s Independent Review for the UK Foreign Secretary of Foreign and Commonwealth OfÀce Support for Persecuted Christians set out the need to: “Bolster research into the critical intersection of [Freedom of Religion or Belief (FoRB)] and minority rights with broader human rights issues (such as people trafÀcking, gender equality, gender-based violence, especially kidnapping, forced conversion and forced marriage).” 2 Hear Her Cries was conceived in response to this proposal, noting that the Truro report stated that its recommendations “should be reviewed independently” 3 in July 2022.The problem, however, is that examining the topic of sexual violence and persecution of faith minorities is far from straightforward. While there is growing consensus about the need for research into the nature and scale of religious and sexual coercion of women, the challenges of setting about the task have been consistently highlighted in studies on the subject. One report described the matter as “complex, violent and hidden.” 4 Social pressure, including the fear of casting shame on the family, and the threat of reprisal from abductors and their accomplices, are among the factors commonly cited in explaining the difÀculties of
The research for this report suggested that in the countries under review, among minority faith groups as a whole, Christian girls and young women
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OVERVIEW
Institutional ambivalence and pressure from extremists mean that many women in Pakistan are helpless when their daughters are abducted and forced to marry their kidnappers.
6 | HEAR HER CRIES
“
are particularly susceptible to attack. According to the Christian Association of Nigeria, Christians make up 95 percent of women and girls being held by Islamists. 10 In Pakistan, the Movement for Solidarity and Peace calculated in 2014 that Christians could comprise up to 70 percent of minority faith girls and young women forcibly converted and married every year. 11 Another key Ànding, frequently emerging in research on the topic, is that there is a higher incidence rate of sexual and religious persecution of women in situations of conÁict. This was evident especially during the Daesh (ISIS) military takeover of parts of Syria and Iraq where there was “an organized system of sexual enslavement of minorities.” 12 There are reports of this elsewhere, too, such as in Mozambique and in other countries where religious militancy has thrown whole communities into disarray. The violence has also caused an upsurge in trafÀcking. 13 The Daesh example also points to perhaps the most signiÀcant long-term factor of concern regarding forced marriage and conversion of Christian girls and women, namely evidence that the perpetrators’ motive is to limit the growth, and sometimes the very survival, of that particular faith group. Forcing a woman to abandon her Christian faith not only wins a convert to the predator’s religion; it also ensures that any children born, including through forced marriage, ” Boko Haram We are going to put into action new efforts to strike fear into Christians of the power of Islam by kidnapping women.
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OVERVIEW
out for this report demonstrates widespread under- reporting. In Nigeria, for instance, the government documented 210 cases of conÁict-related sexual violence in 2020, including rape and forced marriage, “noting that such crimes continue to be chronically under-reported.” 19 And, demonstrating the struggle to assess the scale of the problem in Pakistan, one piece of research suggests that nationwide up to 1,000 Christian and Hindu girls are forcibly married and converted every year, 20 while other evidence gives the same Àgure for just one province ― Sindh. 21 That there should be such widespread under- reporting of cases is largely self-evident. The main reason, and one that became increasingly apparent as research for this report continued, is fear of casting shame on the victim, their families and sometimes their community. In Nigeria, the UN highlighted under-reporting “owing to stigma and harmful social norms.” 22 Speaking from Iraq, Syriac Catholic Archbishop Nizar Nathaniel Semaan highlighted difÀculties Ànding out what happened to minority faith women and girls who had been abducted by Daesh, adding: “What did they do? Did they get married? They won’t say anything because they are ashamed and don’t want to talk about it.” 23 Low reporting levels are also associated with fear of reprisal from perpetrators. This factor is a recurring theme in a signiÀcant proportion of the cases examined in this study. When two 18-year-old Coptic girls went missing in Egypt in summer 2021, no details were released about the incident, prompting speculation that families had agreed to say nothing as the price to be paid for their return. A third key reason for under-reporting is institutional resistance from police and courts in following up cases of missing girls and women. This affects the incidence rate as perpetrators know their chances of punishment are reduced if they conÀne their attacks to minority faith communities. In Egypt, for
are claimed for that new faith as well. Referring to Daesh Àghters, Christian persecution expert Marta Petrosillo stated: “Forced pregnancies and conversions are... a means to secure ‘the next generation of jihadists’.” This applies to many others engaged in sexual violence and religious persecution. 14 Evidence has emerged showing that religious coercion and sexual violence have been carried out in an effort to trigger a mass movement of an unwanted faith community. This could be said to apply to northern Nigeria, where a spokesman for Boko Haram stated that the aim of the militant extremist group was to drive Christians into leaving en masse, before adding: “We are going to put into action new efforts to strike fear into Christians of the power of Islam by kidnapping women.” 15 According to Amnesty International’s Makmid Kamara, those seized by Boko Haram suffered “horriÀc abuses” 16 including rape. Such evidence indicates that instances of systemic abduction, sexual violence, forced marriage and conversion of Christian women in countries such as Nigeria, Iraq and Syria, can be categorized as genocidal by nature. The fourth “Element” of the “1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide” is the presence of “measures intended to prevent births within the group.”17 There is thus a link between the girls and young women who are the focus of this study and the convention, which categorizes genocide as “acts committed with intent to destroy in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group.” 18 Although in some countries the targeting of Christian girls can be deÀned as genocidal in nature, in many others it is impossible to draw the same conclusion, not necessarily because the problem is less severe but in large part because of a paucity of evidence. Indeed, in almost every instance, research carried
8 | HEAR HER CRIES
Institutional ambivalence and pressure from extremists mean that many women in Pakistan are helpless when their daughters are abducted and forced to marry their kidnappers.
| 9
OVERVIEW
is permissible after a girl’s Àrst period. Evidence of pressure from Islamist mobs, known to pack court rooms, is also reported to have swayed justices, especially in lower courts. Against a backdrop of widespread corruption, governments’ willingness to do justice for victims and take preventative steps to tackle sexual violence and religious persecution of faith minorities has repeatedly been called into question by observers. While the UK government recognized that “Coptic Christian women in Egypt face difÀculties additional to other women in the form of... disappearances, forced abductions and forced conversions” 28 the Egyptian government has by contrast been described as dismissive of the problem. Regime spokespersons have claimed that the majority of cases do not relate to human rights violations and are to be seen only as involving young women eloping with someone from another religion. 29 There are signs, however, in countries where Christian women and girls suffer endemic sexual violence and religious persecution, that governments are starting to take steps to address the problem. In March 2021, the government in Nigeria announced specialist courts and judicial divisions to deal with acts of sexual violence, in particular those committed by extremists. 30 The previous November, Prime Minister Imran Khan’s government in Pakistan launched an investigation into forced marriage and conversion of girls and young women, looking at reports of injustice on a “case by case” 31 bases. However, it is doubtful whether such initiatives will meaningfully address a problem that, as this report has sought to show, is so institutionalized, affecting the courts and the police, and one that is so deeply rooted in society. The concern is that such measures are window-dressing for the West, designed to assuage the concerns of governments anxious about the moral
example, a former gang member reportedly described how SalaÀst militants had funded kidnappers’ targeting of Coptic girls and young women, a process he said was aided and abetted by police ofÀcers. It was alleged that the police had conspired by reporting the female Christians as missing rather than abducted. In Pakistan, the police and court system are frequently accused of colluding with perpetrators. Reporting on a series of abductions, forced marriages and conversions of Christian girls as young as six, a report from the Gatestone Institute concluded that “everyone, including local police, court ofÀcials and Islamic clerics seem bent on facilitating this human rights tragedy.” 24 The courts and judicial system are also blamed for being biased against Christians, frequently delivering justice skewed to protecting the interests of perpetrators and preventing them being successfully prosecuted. The essence of this problem is a clash of cultures and corresponding legal systems, with ofÀcial state legislation, allegedly secular in outlook, frequently being trumped by other codes of practice, informed by religious precepts and weighted to favour the non-Christian party. Central to this are tribal, cultural and religious norms, including traditional Shari‘a interpretations which protect child marriage. In Nigeria, for example, the federal Child Rights Act bans marriage or betrothal for those under the age of 18 but critically it has not been enacted in 11 of the country’s 36 states where local state law or other legislation takes precedence. 25 In Pakistan, the Child Marriage Restraint Act of 1929, as amended by the Muslim Family Laws Ordinance of 1961, imposes a minimum age of 16 for would-be brides. 26 Calls to raise the bar to 18 were met with opposition by Islamist political parties. 27 However, this belies the degree to which courts set aside state legislation in favour of Islamic law, often on the pretext that the bride has converted to Islam, in wich marriage
10 | HEAR HER CRIES
“
We need to act for the sake of the girls, the women, persecuted for their faith and sexually targeted because of their gender. We need to champion their cause; we need to hear their cries.
vulnerable often because of economic deprivation, personal hardship, harsh family circumstances and social rejection.” 33 “It is very difÀcult being a Christian girl in our country. So often our girls are abducted and the depraved things they suffer are too awful to imagine. It is so frightening. Who is there to help us?” With these words, one of the victims interviewed for this report, who asked to remain anonymous, articulated the urgency of freeing Christian girls from the bondage of religious and sexual enslavement. She wanted justice. The very nature and extent of the suffering described in this report mean that in producing it ACN is not only concerned with raising awareness but also with creating an appetite for change ― and change that happens without delay. The research summarized here is aimed at inÁuencers at all levels, be they people of faith committed to building up their community, be they Church leaders, be they politicians, be they government or others in public service. We need to act for the sake of the girls, the women, persecuted for their faith and sexually targeted because of their gender. We need to champion their cause; we need to hear their cries.
”
implications of trade and aid involving countries with a dubious record on key human rights issues. It is likely that only a more fundamental and strategic approach to tackling systemic religious and gender discrimination will deliver the changes that are so sorely needed to enable Christian and other minority faith women and girls to be freed from the threat of sexual and religious persecution. Some faith groups interpret FoRB in ways that “necessarily and inevitably clash” with the human rights of women. Oxford University’s Dr Nazila Ghanea has written: “There is frequent invocation of religious norms as defence in order to oppose gender equality claims… [Grave] violations of the human rights of women and girls are carried out in the name of (religious) tradition. Often the state then endorses violations or neglects to act effectively on them.” 32 An understanding of underlying nuances is also necessary. It would be a fundamental misreading of religiously motivated sexual coercion and violence to suggest that faith is the single, or even necessarily, the prevailing factor involved. Rather, religion is often part of the mix of indicators denoting vulnerability, perceived as giving culprits a passport to impunity. As Professor Mariz Tadros has stated, ideologically motivated sexual abuse involves “predators targeting girls and women who are
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EGYPT
A Coptic cross atop a church in Luxor at sunset.
For decades Coptic Christian women have been kidnapped and subjected to physical and psychological abuse, including rape, imprisonment, violence and forced servitude ― often under the cover of marriage. Perpetrators are rarely pursued by authorities. 34 Although the international community recognizes this phenomenon ― indeed UK Home OfÀce guidance makes it clear that “Coptic Christian women in Egypt… face difÀculties additional to other women, in the form of sometimes being the target of disappearances, forced abduction and forced conversion” 35 ― Egyptian authorities are highly dismissive of these cases. The usual narrative from government spokespersons is that the vast majority concern young women eloping with someone from another religion. 36 Egypt’s reluctance to acknowledge these abductions comes despite two signiÀcant studies. The Àrst of these, published more than a decade ago, provides
Àrst-hand evidence from women who were kidnapped, or otherwise lured into marriage, and abused. The research by Prof Michele Clark and Nadia Ghaly showed:
i) Numerous cases involving forced kidnappings.
ii) A repeated pattern of women enticed into relationships only to encounter exploitation.
The latter category often involves young women being lured into a coercive relationship under the guise of romance. 37 Cases like R.’s, who, feeling trapped in an unhappy marriage, left to live with Ahmed, who offered to marry her. But she was locked up and told that if she tried to escape she would be killed. 38 After eloping, girls often discover they have been tricked, but by then they are powerless. Captors have even taken videos of them being sexually abused to induce shame and deter girls from trying to return to their families. 39
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“
One former member of a kidnapping gang that targeted Coptic girls spoke about how these
abductions are meticulously orchestrated. He said: “They weave a spider’s web around [the girls].”
”
18-year-old girls who went missing recently, Injy Rizk Farouq from MenouÀa (June 2021) and Marina Reda Zachari from Giza (July 2021), were both eventually returned to their parents. 42 No details were released about their abductions, and it has been speculated that families agree to keep quiet as part of the price they pay for their return. Many others are still missing, like Hanan Isaac Wanees Ghabrial, a married mother of two from Shubra Al-Khaymah ― even though her family was able to name the suspects they believed were holding her. 43 For numerous Coptic Christian women the hell of being abducted and abused remains an ongoing reality.
Such crimes violate UN conventions and protocol for human trafÀcking ― indeed the forced disappearance of girls under 18 years of age also contravenes the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. 40 One former member of a kidnapping gang that targeted Coptic girls spoke about how these abductions are meticulously orchestrated. He said: “They weave a spider’s web around [the girls].” Most of them are passed to SalaÀst groups who force them to convert. “And once they reach the legal age, a specially arranged Islamic representative comes in to make the conversion ofÀcial.” The former gang member also stated that kidnappers are paid handsomely by these groups, and that police ofÀcers have conspired to report these young women as missing rather than abducted. 41
The problem is compounded by under-reporting in the media, partly because of the wall of silence that often descends when young women are returned. Two
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EGYPT CASE STUDIES
RANYA ABD AL-MASIH 44
Thirty-nine-year-old Ranya vanished from Mina village in Menoufia Governorate on April 22, 2020. The following day, the family reported the disappearance of the English teacher and mother of three to the police. 45
A few days later a video was released on social media. In it, Ranya, a devout Christian who was active in her local Coptic Orthodox church, appeared wearing a Muslim Al-Amira headscarf, saying she had converted to Islam nine years previously. She stated that she had left her home of her own free will, taking her jewellery with her. She recited the shahada (Islamic profession of faith) and asked her husband and family to stop searching for her. The family was extremely suspicious as, contrary to what was said in the video, none of her jewellery was missing. Her brother Remon, said: “She was deÀnitely kidnapped and forced to make that video.” He added that he believed she had been “threatened and coerced.” 46
Al-Aila aims to overcome sectarianism and promote national unity between those of different faiths. The Assembly of Priests denounced Beit Al-Aila for its “utter passivity” in Ranya’s case. 47 The Church kept the pressure on. In June, ofÀcers arrested 15 Copts participating in a peaceful sit-in in Mina village, which was organized to protest against police inaction. They were released the following day. 48 On July 15 th , Ranya was Ànally set free. Pictures of her, back home with her family, went viral on social media, as did her declaration that she had never converted to Islam. Although no details of her disappearance were made public, Al-Azhar , the Islamic authority which registers conversions to Islam, backed her up by saying she had not converted, as in Islam there can be “no compulsion in religion.” Bishop Binjiman later conÀrmed that Ranya had indeed been kidnapped, having been forced into a car by two women. He said that police had told the family not to talk publicly about the case, adding that he was aware of 15 similar cases of kidnappings.
Ranya’s family also claimed that police knew where she was being held.
No progress was made until the local diocese led by Coptic Orthodox Bishop Binjiman of MenouÀa took up her case. In early May, the MenouÀa Assembly of Priests released a statement asking authorities to take action. Three weeks later, with no sign of any signiÀcant movement in Ranya’s case, the Assembly stated that until steps were taken to secure her return they would be withdrawing from Beit Al-Aila ― a government backed interfaith initiative. Established in 2011, Beit
The bishop said that, during the almost three months that she was held, Ranya had been sexually and psychologically abused by her captors. 49
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MARIAN KAMEEL ABDO
At the time she went missing, she was preparing to join her husband in the US, and he was sorting out her immigration papers so that she could join him. In late July, the man accused of abducting her posted photographs on social media which appeared to show that he and Marian were a couple. There has been speculation that these images had been manipulated with Photoshop or another similar program. In March 2021, married 21-year- old university student Marian went missing from El-Marg, north-east Cairo Governorate. She was two months pregnant when she disappeared.
There is still a lot of activity regarding Marian on social media, and her family is still lobbying the authorities to take action. At the time of going to press Marian’s case is still ongoing. 50
MAGDA MANSUR IBRAHIM
Three days later, a video was posted on social media in which Magda appeared wearing a hijab, declaring she had converted to Islam six years previously. She stated that she was either engaged or married to a Muslim man ― she was not clear on this point and appeared to give inconsistent information. At the end of the video, Madga asked to be left alone. Her family rejected the claims in the video. 51 Her father said it was unreasonable to believe that a 14-year-old girl had clandestinely converted and had been living On Saturday, October 3, 2020, 20-year-old Magda was abducted as she was travelling from her home in Al-Badari to college in Assiut. Despite her family reporting the case to police, authorities took no action.
as a Muslim for six years in a Christian family. They also pointed to the contradictions in what she said, such as Magda’s remarks about being married. 52 Just under a week later, Magda was returned. The family released no further information about her ordeal. One commentator speculated that the girl’s return appeared to be conditional on the family not speaking to the media anymore, pressing charges, or seeking to Ànd out who had kidnapped her. 53
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IRAQ AND SYRIA
A Daesh (ISIS) price list, showing the going rates for Yazidi and Christian women.
When Pope Francis travelled to Iraq in March 2021, a journalist on the papal Áight gave him a Daesh (ISIS) slave pricelist for Christian and Yazidi women .
The lowest price ― US$43 ― was for women between the age of 40 and 50. The most expensive ― US$172 ― was for girls aged between one and nine. 54 Under Daesh’s caliphate, the kidnapping, rape, forced marriage and conversion to Islam of Christian and Yazidi women became a commonplace occurrence. 55 Even with the military defeat of Daesh in Iraq in 2017 56 and their territorial defeat in Syria in 2019, 57 the effects of these atrocities are still felt today. Many women are still missing and those who have returned are reluctant to speak out, making it difÀcult to quantify how many were subjected to this crime. In Qaraqosh, a Christian town in northern Iraq on the Nineveh Plains, it is estimated that Daesh took between 45 and more than 100 Christian women when they seized the town in August 2014. By 2019, only seven of these women had returned to Qaraqosh. 58 Syriac Catholic Archbishop Semaan of Adiabene, which includes Qaraqosh, told ACN that the returned women were scared of being judged by the community and two or three returned women left Iraq for France. He said: “It became a social scandal. No one who I spoke to told me what they experienced under Daesh.” In neighbouring Syria, there are fears that in Idlib, a jihadist stronghold, Christian women are still suffering this abuse. Father Firas LutÀ, Custodian of the Province of Saint Paul for the Franciscans of Syria, Lebanon and Jordan, told ACN: “I think this is still occurring, I think so. Unfortunately, Idlib is still occupied by different jihadist groups and I imagine it is still happening.”
He added: “This deÀnitely happened to one Christian woman. She was a teacher and was subjected to sexual violence and then they killed her. Several men abused her sexually, and then they killed her.” Father Firas highlighted the scale of the problem to ACN, saying: “Forced conversions would’ve happened to maybe more than hundreds of women. The jihadists controlled a huge area for years and years.” For now, the focus is on rehabilitating these women and consoling the family members whose wives, sisters, nieces and mothers have not been returned. It will take time for the scars to heal. The Christian women can only hope that widespread fears that Daesh ― or another militant group ― will return prove unfounded. 59
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IRAQ AND SYRIA CASE STUDIES
RITA HABIB
Rita went to Turkey to try to register herself and her widowed father for asylum as Daesh (ISIS) swept across Iraq in 2014. 60 On August 6 th , she returned to Qaraqosh with the approvals she needed. 61
She tried to reach her father, who is partially sighted, and fought her way through refugees going in the opposite direction. The same night she arrived in Qaraqosh, the Peshmerga Àghters protecting the town withdrew. She awoke to the sight of Daesh’s black Áags in the streets. 62 She, and others, were ordered, on the pain of death, to gather in the square. The Daesh Àghters separated them into older people, young men, young women and children. Rita’s group was taken to Mosul and told they were going to be part of a prisoner exchange. “You are the spoils of war, you and the Yazidis alike,” Daesh members told Rita. She thought that as a Christian she would be afforded protection as “people of the book” are supposedly treated better under Daesh’s ideology. 63 Rita was Àrst bought by an Iraqi from Mosul and stayed with him for a year and a half. 64 Rita said: “In the hospital in Mosul, we women were subjected to the most degrading abuse. Three children from my people were with me, and I witnessed them being sold to emirs in Mosul. I was sold to [Emir] Abu Mus’ab al-Iraqi. In his home, there was also a Yazidi girl from Sinjar named Shata…she was only 14 years old. He raped the both of us over and over again.” 65 Rita added: “We were raped and tortured.” 66
Rita and the young Yazidi girl, Shata, were also tortured psychologically by the emir. She said: “He made us watch videos with terrorists slaughtering non-Muslims. In one of them, they were beheading Shata’s brother.” 67 Rita was moved to Raqqa before being sold to a Saudi Arabian named Abu Khalid al-Saudi. She explained: “Abu Khalid was married to a woman from Morocco. I was beaten and tortured by her every day. She would not give up until I was bleeding, from my head, for example. They made me read the Qur’an and threatened to kill me if I did not convert to Islam.” 68
Forced to clean and tidy the house, Rita said: “The wife would just shout, abed [slave] or kaÀr to summon me.” 69
Next, Rita lived with a Syrian in Abu Kamal on the Iraqi- Syrian border. She was there for a year and four months until she was moved to a village outside of Deir ez-Zur. It was there that members of the Shlama Foundation, a group funded by the Assyrian and Chaldean diaspora, posed as jihadists and bought her freedom. She said: “I am very happy that after three years I reunited with my father. It is a joyous moment because he is the only family I have left.” 70
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RANA
For more than two years, she was transferred between owners in Iraq and Syria. She was sold to her abusive “owners” for up to £19,000. She was forced to cook for Àghters’ children and clean their homes. Rana said: “The streets were full of mines. The family said, ‘If you go outside that door we will kill you.’” 73 Rana, then 31, and her husband didn’t escape in time when Daesh took Qaraqosh on August 7, 2014. 71 She was taken to Mosul. Rana said: “I wanted to escape, but there was no way to run away or leave.” 72
Mary. She said: “There were so many times where I could have committed suicide, but I decided I did not want to lose my soul. I still had one bit of hope.” Rana was eventually rescued and returned home. Father Duraid Barbar, a local priest said: “The women tell me, ‘I’m sorry because I left Jesus.’ I tell them, ‘There’s no problem, because Jesus loves you, he never left you’.”
She pretended to convert to Islam, but, at night she prayed to Jesus, and asked for the intercession of
WHY THE VICTIMS WON’T TALK
It is unknown precisely how many Christian women in Iraq and Syria were kidnapped and forced to convert and marry their abductor.
At the least, it is likely to be in the hundreds. Many of them are still in captivity somewhere. Their families don’t want to talk about the missing women, and nor do the few returned women do not wish to talk either.
Father Firas told ACN why so many are reluctant to share their story: “For anyone who experiences a tragedy in the past, the Àrst thing they want to do is to erase the memory.
“The second reason is a fear of interrogation and to have go into the centre of intelligence and endure many hours of interrogation. They want to avoid this.”He added: “It is really hard to come into contact with someone who will tell you what happened, because this topic is taboo.”
Archbishop Semaan emphasized that shame and fear of judgment play a part. He said: “It is a matter of social scandal or fear that people will talk about them… They won’t say anything because they are ashamed and don’t want to talk about it.”
Father Firas Lutfi (left), who ministers across Syria, Lebanon and Jordan.
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MOZAMBIQUE
OMR researcher João Feijó explained to ACN what happens to abducted Christian women who don’t convert to Islam. He said: “They have to do anything they are told to do.” Interviewees in the report explained that they had to attend forced “education” sessions, which included ideological lectures and Qur’anic instructions. 79 The women are taught how to become “a good Islamic mother.” 80 A religious Sister in Mozambique spent more than three weeks as a captive of jihadists and upon her release she raised the alarm about the hundreds of children who were being abducted, many of them forced to become either child soldiers or child brides. 81 Father Kwiriwi Fonseca, a priest ministering to families displaced by Islamist violence, told ACN about the Sister’s ordeal ― and relayed her stark warning that young people are being coerced by militant extremists.
The Islamist group Ansar Al-Sunna began a violent insurgency in the Cabo Delgado province of Mozambique in 2017. 74 They have links to Daesh (ISIS). 75 According to the UN, since October 2017 the conÁict has killed more than 2,600 people and displaced upwards of 700,000. The extremists have frequently kidnapped young girls, including Christians, to be used as sex slaves and forced to marry the Àghters. 76 According to a report released by Rural Environment Observatory (OMR), a think tank based in Mozambique, abducted Christian girls are put under pressure to convert to Islam and told if they refuse they will be used as slaves. 77 The report states insurgents have abducted more than 1,000 women and girls and forced many into sexual relations with their Àghters. 78
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“
The terrorists use these children and forcibly train them to fight in their ranks, whereas the girls are raped and forced to become their ‘brides’. In some cases, when they have grown bored with
them, these girls are simply thrown out.
” Father Kwiriwi Fonseca
Displaced women in Cabo Delgado province.
Father Fonseca said: “Sister Eliane herself was held for 24 days by the terrorists in the mountains, and she begged me, ‘Padre Fonseca, please don’t forget the people who have been abducted, above all the children and adolescents, who are being trained to become terrorists’.” 82 He added: “The terrorists use these children and forcibly train them to Àght in their ranks, whereas the girls are raped and forced to become their ‘brides’. In some cases, when they have grown bored with them, these girls are simply thrown out.” 83
forced into early marriage. 84 The charity ― which also reported that a child perhaps as young as 11 was beheaded during the conÁict 85 ― said this number was likely to be much higher due to under-reporting of the problem. Between September 2020 and April 2021, the International Committee of the Red Cross said it had registered more than 2,600 appeals in Mozambique from people who had lost family members, most of whom are young adults and children. 86
The priest said: “We can speak of hundreds [of cases].”
In June 2021, the charity Save the Children released a report stating that “at least 51 children, most of them girls” were seized by non-state armed groups and that the girls were at risk of sexual violence and being
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MOZAMBIQUE CASE STUDY
Aana said the Christian girls were given a “choice”: convert to Islam and marry a Àghter, or become slaves. She said: “For the girls and women they had three options: to be chosen by one of the soldiers to be a future wife; or to be chosen by some of the men, not for marriage, but to follow the more radical norms of Islam.” “[They prepare] the young woman to become true Islamic, to become a good Islamic mother. Because they believe that the woman is the one who educates the family to follow Islam in the right way. The third option was for those who were Christians and who didn’t want to convert, who would be chosen by the soldiers to be slaves.” 88
‘AANA’ *
For security reasons, the circumstances of Aana’s abduction have not been revealed. The only details given are those she has provided. 87 Yet, her testimony sheds precious light on what happens to Christian girls who fall into the hands of the jihadists.
*Not her real name
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Women in Mozambique are at risk of abduction.
The jihadists abducted the girls in large groups and immediately started indoctrinating them. According to the OMR, “converted Christians” are either used in military missions or marry an insurgent. Those who refuse to convert, as well as being forced into slavery, are also at risk of being trafÀcked. 89 Aana explained that the indoctrination began as soon as she was taken hostage, stating: “The day we arrived they did a reading from the Qur’an , they brought up the whole issue of injustice in the country, of social abuse, of corruption…” “One of the things that they said the most was that democracy was demonic, because in Mozambique it allowed the politicians to steal and the people to continue to starve and die without any kind of care.
And they indoctrinated those women so that they would end up accepting their proposal.” 90
After a while, the pressure eventually leads to the girls “changing sides.” She explained: “One lady said: ‘After a week you get used to it. You cry, you don’t eat for a while. But then you found out there is no way out.’ They begin to come to terms with reality and begin to change sides. And some very young wives of these people, they start to think that this is true.” 91 Speaking of the treatment of one of the other girls, she said: “I believe it was a rape situation, because when she told us about it she cried a lot.” 92
Aana is no longer in captivity.
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MOZAMBIQUE INTERVIEW
Father Fonseca of Pemba Diocese.
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ON THE GROUND
Father, what can you tell us about the kidnapping of Christian women in Mozambique?
Father Kwiriwi Fonseca of Pemba Diocese has been ministering to kidnapping victims in Mozambique. He spoke with ACN about the growing crisis in his homeland. He told the charity that Christian girls face a real risk of abduction, rape and forced conversion and marriage because “they [the Àghters] are able to do anything. They can do what they want.”
Christian women are being kidnapped, not all alone but with other women. It is a phenomenon taking place where the terrorists are, where the Àghting is taking place. We talk about the issue in general in places such as Mocimboa da Praia or in Palma, where the attacks are.
You’ve previously talked about underage girls and boys being taken. Can you tell us more about that?
When we went to the camps where the displaced people are, some women told us that their children are now in the hands of terrorists. The way they talked about it and the way they were crying convinced us it is happening. In the terrorists’ hands, there are some children ― Save the Children has conÀrmed it. In the last week, the military went to destroy a camp of the terrorists and rescued some children.
What fate befalls these young girls?
When they are in the hands of the terrorists, they are involved in the military services so they become their soldiers. They are also taught the Islamic doctrine and they are taught the military terrorist activities. The women, some of them, are forced to marry with the terrorists.
What is motivating this spate of kidnapping? What are the Àghters hoping to achieve?
The group is not clear with what they want. But, so far, from the way they do things we can understand it is an economic issue. Further, some of them are involved in drug trafÀcking and they are an international and national group involved in these problems. They are motivated by their Islamic beliefs even though we know they have other motivations on top of that as well. They use religion but, behind that, there are many other issues they care about.
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NIGERIA
Women who fled to St. James’s Church, Yola, when Boko Haram attacked their village.
is accompanied by coercion to convert to Islam and to enter into sexual relations. While forced marriage is by no means restricted to Christian females, they have been extensively targeted 95 and, according to the Christian Association of Nigeria, Christians make up 95 percent of those being held by the Islamic extremists. 96 Indeed, Boko Haram began its abduction campaign by speciÀcally seizing Christian women and children in 2013 in retaliation for the long-term detention of Boko Haram family members by authorities. 97 It has been suggested that such practices, which reÁect the behaviour of rebel groups in other sub-Saharan conÁict zones, have two drivers. Firstly, women are seen as assets, productive as well as reproductive, providing services such as cooking and cleaning. Indeed, not all those seized are forced into marriage: UN nurse Alice Ngaddeh has been described as a “slave” by the
Most of the women and girls who are abducted and abused are seized by extremist groups like Boko Haram; however there is a smaller but signiÀcant number of Christian girls taken in what are sometimes referred to as ‘community kidnappings’. The Boko Haram insurgency in northern Nigeria has involved innumerable atrocities including mass abductions, as it attempts to seize territory with the goal of founding an Islamist state. In 2020, there were 210 documented cases of conÁict-related sexual violence, including rape and forced marriage, affecting 94 girls, 86 women and 30 boys. The UN noted such crimes are chronically under-reported because of social stigma . 93 Both factions of Boko Haram 94 have abducted girls and young women, often forcing them to marry their members. The forced marriage of Christians
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In March 2021, Nigeria announced it would be setting up specialized courts and judicial divisions to deal with sexual violence, particularly that committed by extremists.
These factors may also give some indication as to why the kidnapping and forced marriage of minors occurs in the community ― although it infracts the country’s criminal law. Even when girls are liberated, there have been delays in the judicial process. In 2015, 13-year-old Christian girl Ese Rita Oruru was abducted by Yunusa Dahiru, who forced her to convert to Islam and marry him. She was rescued the following year, by which time she was pregnant. Dahiru was arrested, but the case was not heard until 2020. He was convicted. 102 In March 2021, Nigeria announced it would be setting up specialized courts and judicial divisions to deal with sexual violence, particularly that committed by extremists. 103
extremists who took her. 98 Secondly, the sexual abuse of women can have a “punitive dimension,” as seen in the systematic rape of female students during the 2013 attack on university accommodation in Maiduguri. 99 However, the forced abduction and marriage of girls by extremists should be contextualized within broader trends within Nigeria, including discrimination against indigenous Christian communities in at least 16 out of the 19 northern states 100 and Nigeria’s high rates of child marriage. Tribal, cultural and religious norms, including traditional Shari‘a interpretations, protect child marriage ― and although the federal Child Rights Act bans marriage or betrothal for those under 18 years of age, at the time of writing it has not been enacted in 11 of Nigeria’s 36 states where state or other law takes precedence. 101
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NIGERIA CASE STUDIES
REBECCA
“They flogged me ― 98 strokes every day. I took ill for two weeks. They took my youngest son Jonathan and threw him into Lake Chad alive, and he was drowned.”
Today Rebecca is receiving trauma counselling ― supported by ACN ― to help heal her memories. Speaking in Hausa, via local priest Fr Gideon Obasogie, she described her two years as a Boko Haram “wife.” Rebecca and her family Áed Baga, near Maiduguri, during an extremist attack in August 2014. She was pregnant and her husband was carrying little Jonathan and leading three-year-old Zachariah by the hand. As Boko Haram gained on them Rebecca begged her husband to leave them, saying they only kidnapped women and children, but killed men. Reluctantly he left. The Àghters arrived soon after and randomly Àred into the bush. Rebecca thought he was dead. Trekking for 28 days, she was forced to wade through Lake Chad, up to her neck in water, to go to the extremists’ camp. Rebecca miscarried on the journey. She was sold to a Boko Haram Àghter and forced to marry him ― but she refused to sleep with him. “I did not give in to him, most nights when he wanted to touch me I would rub the faeces of my children on my body... this always kept him away from me.” As a punishment, she was beaten and Áogged. They also made her dig a hole for three weeks, until she reached water. Then Rebecca fell ill. Her youngest son Jonathan, now three, was thrown into Lake Chad as a further punishment. They then interred her in a pit.
Fr Gideon said: “When she came out of the pit after almost four days, she was very weak and the Boko Haram man forced himself upon her and made her pregnant.” Despairing, she intended to kill herself with an overdose of paracetamol, but a pastor’s wife, who had already two children from an extremist, persuaded her to live. She later gave birth to a boy. Rebecca managed to escape when the Islamists were carrying out raids. Getting permission to visit a cousin in a nearby village (also under Boko Haram control) from the wife of a senior Àghter who had been left in charge, she made a break for it. She walked for over three weeks with her two sons. Eventually they arrived in Diffa, Niger. Army troops ferried them to Maiduguri, where she found her husband was alive ― but believing she was dead, he was preparing to remarry. He called off the wedding, but was distraught because of the new baby fathered by the Boko Haram Àghter. The family was initially looked after in a refugee camp run by Maiduguri Diocese along with 500 other IDPs. In 2021, the family is living outside the camp, but they are still receiving help from the diocese. Rebecca and her husband have renewed their marriage vows and, despite their challenges, they face the future with hope.
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