SFPA Chairs Gender-Based Violence Committee Meetings

A number of governmental institutions and international and national civil society organizations in River Nile State, led by the Sudanese Family Planning Association, (SFPA), Ministry of Health, World Health Organization, UNFPA, UNICEF, and the Family and Child Protection Police, strongly condemned the violations that women, girls and children have been and are being subjected to due to the increase in gender-based violence due to the ongoing war, affirming their interest in preserving the legal, and health rights of victims of sexual rape crimes.
Representatives of these bodies and other organizations that participated in the first meeting of the Gender-Based Violence Committee in the state, which was held in the Health Insurance Hall in Atbara, headed by Ms. Kawthar Mohamed Ibrahim, Executive Director of the SFPA, supervising the committee, in the presence of Dr. Essam Ali Al-Hassan, the national expert in gender-based violence, Chairman of the Committee, announced the importance of concerted efforts to combat the phenomenon of the spread of gender-based violence, especially in conflict areas and shelters and camps.
They called for the importance of joint cooperation between official institutions and voluntary organizations in order to optimally utilize material and human resources and capabilities in this regard. The Executive Director of the SFPA in the state explained that they have a partnership with UNFPA that includes cooperation in this regard, and that the goal of forming the committee is to enhance cooperation between the specialized bodies in the field of combating and caring for cases of gender-based violence in all its forms.
She indicated that the country is experiencing exceptional war emergency conditions, which necessitates the importance of strengthening coordination between the active parties to achieve a number of goals, the most important of which is developing a comprehensive vision in the state that reflects the association’s interest and support for efforts to address issues of rape and gender-based violence in cooperation with partners, establishing a database in the field and achieving access to the largest number of target groups and providing the required services to them..
The head of the committee, Dr. Essam Mohamed Ali Al-Khabir, explained the importance of forming the committee to create harmony between its components to create a shift in this field, indicating that there is an urgent need for this cooperation, especially the increasing rates of cases exposed to domestic and social violence that are not talked about, indicating that treatment begins with acknowledging the problem and raising awareness of the phenomenon, especially rape cases that have a major immediate and future impact on individuals and society.

Ms. Rehab Hamdto, Director of Programs at the Association, called for the importance of each party determining its policies and the role it can play in the field of work of the committee.

Rehab provided an enlightenment to the meeting about the association’s vision for this..
After deliberation and discussion, the meeting agreed on the aforementioned recommendations and called for the necessity of cooperation between society and official and unofficial state institutions, health, social, police and justice, in this regard and recommended preparing a strategy and preparing programs for awareness, training and working together to care for and treat victims and punish criminals.