:00:00. > :00:00.ban. Others have encouraged women to not join in. Time for Our World. The
:00:00. > :00:00.following programme contains graphic accounts of female genital
:00:07. > :00:18.mutilation which some people may find upsetting. Kurdistan, the
:00:19. > :00:24.safest and most prosperous region . Many have been caught in the name of
:00:25. > :00:28.religion. Few in the outside world knew that female genital mutilation
:00:29. > :00:33.existed here. That is until a charity launched a campaign with the
:00:34. > :00:39.help of local campaigners to tell stories. TRANSLATION: I.e. Pick up a
:00:40. > :00:53.big rock and threw it at the midwife's had. I am here to find out
:00:54. > :00:58.about the fight against FGM. Women talk about the impact of FGM on
:00:59. > :01:32.allies. I will ask if enough is being done to stop the practice in
:01:33. > :01:42.Kurdistan. Kurdistan, a remote and mountainous region with a sleepy
:01:43. > :01:47.pace of life. There have been dramatic changes. This is one
:01:48. > :01:56.village in Kurdistan to have banned FGM. Traditionally, watermark was
:01:57. > :02:02.the time that girls were circumcised by the village midwife. Now, this is
:02:03. > :02:09.nothing more than the start of a school term. Two years ago, they
:02:10. > :02:19.agreed to stop cutting women and girls. It is one of seven FGM`free
:02:20. > :02:24.villages in Kurdistan. There is an incentive to uphold the band. The
:02:25. > :02:30.Mayor tells me he thinks the government only started paying
:02:31. > :02:34.attention providing the village with a school in electricity because of
:02:35. > :02:44.the interest generated by banning FGM. TRANSLATION: We believe that
:02:45. > :02:49.your body is yours and the cutting part of it as an act of violence. We
:02:50. > :02:59.are very proud to be the first to start this campaign. The Mayor and
:03:00. > :03:02.his wife seemed to have a genuine commitment to the cause. They
:03:03. > :03:08.stopped their youngest daughter from being cut years ago. Her big sister
:03:09. > :03:15.was cut in secret by her grandmother while her parents were out of the
:03:16. > :03:19.house. TRANSLATION: Venue I wouldn't want to cut hair so they did it when
:03:20. > :03:27.I was out. It couldn't be done on done. `` wouldn't be undone. She is
:03:28. > :03:37.unhappy. She asks me, why couldn't you stop it? I wanted both of them
:03:38. > :03:43.to not be cut. Most of the cutting in villages like this is done by a
:03:44. > :03:51.midwife using unsterilised tools. With three hours of it that `` three
:03:52. > :03:55.Hours Drive away, none of the girls would have medical assistance they
:03:56. > :04:04.needed it. All they have it as a razor blade and some ash to seal of
:04:05. > :04:08.the wound. The man has come too late for most of them here. Almost every
:04:09. > :04:18.woman and girl spoke to had already had what . They are keen to tell me
:04:19. > :04:29.about a subject that was too but when they were growing up. Who here
:04:30. > :04:46.has been cut? Everybody here except you? TRANSLATION: I am unhappy that
:04:47. > :04:50.I have been cut but bassist hasn't. I feel very sad about it, very sad
:04:51. > :04:57.that she has been cut. She would have felt pain like all of the
:04:58. > :05:14.others. I wish she wasn't cut, a wish she was like me. Do any of you
:05:15. > :05:17.remember it? TRANSLATION: I was very little and I was playing with a
:05:18. > :05:20.friend when my mother grabbed me and set the man who sells fruits and
:05:21. > :05:23.vegetables is here in the village so we are going to buy you something.
:05:24. > :05:27.We were taken to a house and that is when a hat to have it done. You
:05:28. > :05:40.didn't know that you were going to be cut? TRANSLATION: No, if I did, I
:05:41. > :05:45.wouldn't have gone. Can you tell me what it was like being taken into
:05:46. > :05:50.that room? TRANSLATION: It was very painful. Two woman healthily down.
:05:51. > :05:54.Our bodies belong to ours. Why did they take something that was mine?
:05:55. > :06:13.Why did they cut a piece of me that was mine? Kurdistan has been in
:06:14. > :06:17.autonomous from Baghdad since 1991. It is more recently enjoying an oil
:06:18. > :06:26.boom that has brought security and foreign investors are known in the
:06:27. > :06:31.west of the country. When FGM was uncovered, it sent shock waves
:06:32. > :06:35.through society. Too many, it was" that this ancient tradition could be
:06:36. > :06:46.going on. It was discovered by chance. In 2004, following the fall
:06:47. > :06:52.of Saddam Hussein, a local charity centre teams into the villages to
:06:53. > :06:54.provide support. The refugees never arrived but the charity started
:06:55. > :07:08.coming back with stories of young girls being cut. People ask them
:07:09. > :07:14.about FGM and if they cut, and how they cut. We were quite surprised.
:07:15. > :07:21.We knew that it existed but we didn't know that the practice was
:07:22. > :07:27.continuing. They reported that 60% of the women they interviewed on
:07:28. > :07:30.mutilated or suffer from mutilation. He took his findings to the
:07:31. > :07:33.authorities who were shot with the idea that FGM could still be
:07:34. > :07:40.happening in Kurdistan. `` who were shocked. At first, it was denied and
:07:41. > :07:48.then there was a challenge. We needed to prefer it was existing or
:07:49. > :07:52.not. `` needed to prove. In an effort to persuade the government to
:07:53. > :07:54.believe it was happening, they started to ask women to document
:07:55. > :08:15.their stories. The stories they came back with were
:08:16. > :08:25.like nothing hurt before. Heard. TRANSLATION: It is forbidden to
:08:26. > :08:35.discuss this. The story that made me to fight FGM was a story of one girl
:08:36. > :08:39.who got cut when she was about six. They said, let's go to another
:08:40. > :08:42.village, the house and your auntie, don't wear trousers, don't put on
:08:43. > :08:47.your underwear, your blouse is enough. Two woman took me away and
:08:48. > :08:57.said, you will style your hair. Certainly, both women held my legs.
:08:58. > :09:02.One said, hold her leg, come and cut hair. I picked up an eye. I said to
:09:03. > :09:07.them, leave me alone or I will stab you. They said, we will cut you. I
:09:08. > :09:16.still had the knife in my hand and said, let me go! They let me go and
:09:17. > :09:21.I ran away. She is telling her story briefly to the camera of how she was
:09:22. > :09:27.fighting. A midwife and her mother wanted to cut hair and nobody was
:09:28. > :09:31.there to help her. After a third of the story, it influenced me. I said,
:09:32. > :09:38.from now, we will defend these younger girls. TRANSLATION: I picked
:09:39. > :09:52.up the big rock and threw it at her head. WADI launched a campaign to
:09:53. > :09:56.end FGM. They worked with a filmmaker travelling from village to
:09:57. > :10:03.village, filming women's stories and gathering data on the level of FGM.
:10:04. > :10:07.The filmmakers gained access to it being practised. They filmed these
:10:08. > :10:22.upsetting images of young girls being cut. Women are told to Burma
:10:23. > :10:28.FGM involves cutting a young girl's clitoris. Most of them say they felt
:10:29. > :10:36.obliged to do it to make them pure. FGM isn't mentioned in the Koran. I
:10:37. > :10:46.have asked him and he says it is pure to perform at so we have to
:10:47. > :10:51.follow his words. In some regions, WADI found every single woman over
:10:52. > :10:56.60 have been cut. For teenagers across the country, it was almost
:10:57. > :11:14.half. On average, they found the level of FGM was higher than first
:11:15. > :11:20.thought. In the beginning we were surprised because this was hidden.
:11:21. > :11:26.For me, I didn't do. I had to check with my family members and they
:11:27. > :11:30.started to speak out. We found out it isn't very spread out in our
:11:31. > :11:36.family. Then, I found out that everybody is too shy because it is
:11:37. > :11:43.related to sex issues and the genitals of women. Nobody is ready
:11:44. > :11:48.to talk about it. If e`mail is the maker joint sitting to help find
:11:49. > :11:55.women who were willing to talk. TRANSLATION: It is a sensitive and
:11:56. > :12:01.frightening term. The hardest thing was finding women who were willing
:12:02. > :12:03.to talk on camera. As a woman, a understood their suffering and tried
:12:04. > :12:09.to put myself in the position to feel their pain. I wanted to raise
:12:10. > :12:14.awareness server next generation of woman doesn't have to go through
:12:15. > :12:25.this. She found a few girls who had not been cut and they were
:12:26. > :12:30.stigmatised. One of the girls would have been in years six or seven. She
:12:31. > :12:34.was one of the few who had not been cut. With friends and relatives she
:12:35. > :12:45.said the officer to avoid humiliation. Do you want to be cut?
:12:46. > :12:52.No, but I will be teased eBay say a heaven. They will say I will go up
:12:53. > :12:58.after boys. They will teased me and say, your clitoris is not cut. Why
:12:59. > :13:05.do they say those things to you? I don't know. Does the teasing make
:13:06. > :13:17.you want to get cut? No, because now I just tell them that AM cut. ``
:13:18. > :13:23.that I am cut. In 2001, things change dramatically. Human Rights
:13:24. > :13:29.Watch released a report into the practice in Kurdistan. They
:13:30. > :13:34.described and painful detail, the impact on young girls. International
:13:35. > :13:40.pressure began to mount for it to be banned. It emerged it was not simply
:13:41. > :13:59.a religious obligation. Nobody in the outside world really knew about
:14:00. > :14:03.it. That was the real shocker. Some people do it in Kurdistan as part of
:14:04. > :14:07.social pressure. My inclination, after speaking to religious leaders
:14:08. > :14:16.in Iraqi Kurdistan, is that it really is to control the population.
:14:17. > :14:24.They did say to me, in hot climates, something it to be done to control
:14:25. > :14:32.women's sexuality. The filmmakers found that it GM was not just
:14:33. > :14:35.practised in villages, they found some women to talk about the impact
:14:36. > :14:45.of it on their marriage. `` female genital mutilation. The interview
:14:46. > :14:52.has never been showed outside Iraq. TRANSLATION: I don't have desire. I
:14:53. > :14:58.have no desire for a man. I knew from an early age I was like that.
:14:59. > :15:07.Of course, when you are a kid you don't understand that, but when you
:15:08. > :15:13.grow older you know the difference. When you are cut, did they remove a
:15:14. > :15:22.little or a lot? My husband says, nothing is left of you! So, I don't
:15:23. > :15:30.know, but that is what he says. TRANSLATION: The circumcision is
:15:31. > :15:34.similar to neutering animals. It is a major problem, there is no
:15:35. > :15:42.sensation, and it feels like lying next to a cold fish. With all due
:15:43. > :15:49.respect, I often ask her to come to me, but because she gets no pleasure
:15:50. > :15:57.from it I had to call her five or six times. If she enjoyed it, I
:15:58. > :16:01.could get her to come faster. I didn't know there was such a thing
:16:02. > :16:10.as sexual pleasure. I was a young girl, I was 18 when I got engaged,
:16:11. > :16:16.and 19 when I got married. Even when I had to make kids, I still didn't
:16:17. > :16:19.understand. I thought that marriage is having your own house, coming and
:16:20. > :16:28.going as you wish, and having a family. I didn't know what that
:16:29. > :16:33.thing was. I wasn't aware of this when I married her, if I had known,
:16:34. > :16:37.I swear to god, even if they had paid the $10,000, I wouldn't have
:16:38. > :16:44.married her stop because it is a problem for me. But I'm trying to
:16:45. > :16:48.tolerate the situation. At the public debate intensifies, the
:16:49. > :16:51.filmmakers found women talking openly for the first time about
:16:52. > :16:57.whether or not they should cut their daughters. This ambivalence meant
:16:58. > :17:02.some children had been cut without their mothers even knowing.
:17:03. > :17:06.TRANSLATION: I was away one afternoon, and my mother`in`law took
:17:07. > :17:14.my daughters to the neighbours. The woman had come to the neighbourhood
:17:15. > :17:22.to cut children. When I came back, she was cut. I have not had hartanah
:17:23. > :17:35.done to my younger daughter yet. Some say you have to do it, others
:17:36. > :17:42.don't. I can't decide what to do. Just months after filming, the law
:17:43. > :17:45.was changed. Female genital mutilation was outlawed, as part of
:17:46. > :17:55.a wide`ranging law to improve women's rights. The family violence
:17:56. > :17:58.law is all`encompassing. It includes issues like honour killing, domestic
:17:59. > :18:02.violence, child labour and female genital mutilation. A mother charged
:18:03. > :18:11.with cutting her daughter could face up to three years in prison and a
:18:12. > :18:15.fine. This woman was head of the women's rights committee where the
:18:16. > :18:22.law was passed, and helped push it through Parliament. TRANSLATION:
:18:23. > :18:29.This was difficult for members of Parliament, and even society to
:18:30. > :18:31.accept. We were often told by ordinary people that you have
:18:32. > :18:36.anything better to work on that female genital mutilation? We knew
:18:37. > :18:39.we might face difficulties mentioning it, due to cultural
:18:40. > :18:49.sensitivity, so we decided we should put it within a wider proposal for a
:18:50. > :18:56.law against domestic violence. The law was a huge milestone, but the
:18:57. > :19:00.campaign to end FGM is not over. When the law changed in 2011, some
:19:01. > :19:07.warned that banning the practice would simply drive it underground. I
:19:08. > :19:11.want to know how effective the new law has been, so I am on my way to a
:19:12. > :19:20.village, one of the most conservative areas of Kurdistan.
:19:21. > :19:26.Thousands of copies of the law have been printed, and they are
:19:27. > :19:36.travelling to the villages telling them that FGM is now illegal. They
:19:37. > :19:40.have been to the village twice before, and you get the sense that
:19:41. > :19:47.women are keen to say the right thing when asked awkward questions,
:19:48. > :19:57.which makes it hard to tell what is really going on. Because it has been
:19:58. > :20:02.discussed in the media so much, some people are keen to tell you what you
:20:03. > :20:06.want to hear. A woman told me of course not, my children have not
:20:07. > :20:09.been cut. But after the conversation, one of her children
:20:10. > :20:15.pulled me aside and said, yes years. She did not want to say this on
:20:16. > :20:24.camera, though. Eventually, we meet women who are happy to talk more
:20:25. > :20:30.candidly. This woman told me she values the old ways of life. You
:20:31. > :20:36.have a granddaughter. Do you think she should be cut? TRANSLATION: In
:20:37. > :20:41.my opinion, it needs to be done, as it is gods will. In my opinion she
:20:42. > :20:47.should be cut because God likes it, nothing else. Were you aware of the
:20:48. > :20:57.law that was passed by the government to ban FGM. I heard on TV
:20:58. > :21:02.it had been banned. Before, people used to do it and it was normal.
:21:03. > :21:09.Now, people don't talk about it because TV said it should be done.
:21:10. > :21:13.Although she has heard that the law has changed, it appears this ancient
:21:14. > :21:26.tradition is still deeply rooted in some villages. To date, no one has
:21:27. > :21:34.been convicted for performing FGM. I want to know of the politicians who
:21:35. > :21:39.masterminded the ban, and whether they think it is working. Why is it
:21:40. > :21:42.that only one case has gone to court after two years, when you know as
:21:43. > :21:48.well as I do that this practice dildos on? TRANSLATION: It is true
:21:49. > :22:01.that two years have passed. In the next term, we need to work
:22:02. > :22:07.more to understand the problems of this law, and why it isn't being
:22:08. > :22:24.implemented. We have to make sure the law will prevent FGM. `` this
:22:25. > :22:32.practice does go on. The Kurdistan government has said it is
:22:33. > :22:36.investigating the practice of FGM, and that the results should be
:22:37. > :22:46.released next year. This is one of the few girls they met, who had not
:22:47. > :22:49.been cut. TRANSLATION: They don't call me names now, only my aunt
:22:50. > :22:56.calls me names when my mother is in the. She say to you? She calls me
:22:57. > :23:01.the uncut vagina, which makes me angry, and I stop talking to her.
:23:02. > :23:12.Would you like to be cut? Of course not. Why not? I don't like it. I am
:23:13. > :23:20.older now, and it is wrong. You regret cutting your other daughters.
:23:21. > :23:26.Yes. Why do you feel sorry? Because they have no desire any more. That
:23:27. > :23:39.is why we did it so early. To avoid trouble for them. After almost ten
:23:40. > :23:44.years of working and campaigning against FGM, do you believe that
:23:45. > :23:55.things are getting better now? First of all, the to`do is broken, it is
:23:56. > :24:04.not to do any more. `` taboo. Now, we look with open eyes at it. The
:24:05. > :24:17.government is obliged to implement this law. Back in the village,
:24:18. > :24:24.lifting it taboo has led to difficult conversations. I am going
:24:25. > :24:35.to speak to the older women of the village before I leave. TRANSLATION:
:24:36. > :24:38.Of course I regretted, who would want to harm their children? But in
:24:39. > :24:43.those days, we were told otherwise. We were told it was a religious
:24:44. > :24:51.obligation, that their husbands would send them back in the morning
:24:52. > :24:59.if they weren't cut. All five girls were cut, who remembers being told
:25:00. > :25:02.she was going to buy sweets. TRANSLATION: There is no need to be
:25:03. > :25:08.angry with her mother. It was a widespread prat is, and we should
:25:09. > :25:15.not be angry with her. `` practice. We should be angry with the people
:25:16. > :25:20.in the region. FGM is now falling in Kurdistan, but from what I have
:25:21. > :25:25.seen, the country still scarred this ancient tradition. From grandmothers
:25:26. > :25:29.who feel wronged by the change in the law, to girls angry at being
:25:30. > :25:32.mutilated. And others, who are neither did what they thought was
:25:33. > :26:18.right, and cannot undo the damage done in the name of tradition.
:26:19. > :26:23.We wouldn't normally start our look at the weather by jumping nearly 48
:26:24. > :26:26.hours ahead, but then the prospects for the late Sunday and Monday are
:26:27. > :26:27.quite far from normal for the British