Zwischengeschlecht.org
Human Rights for Hermaphrodites Too!
Subject: Asking to meet OHCHR representative re: Intersex Genital Mutilations
Dear Office of the High Commissioner of Human Rights
Delegates of the European human rights group Zwischengeschlecht.org and of the US based organisation Advocates for Informed Choice (AIC) will be attending the 22th UNHRC session, regarding the SRT’s report A/HRC/22/53 on Monday March 4th, and a related side event on Tuesday March 5th.
On this occasion we would like to ask if we could meet with a representative of the OHCHR to elaborate on our concerns, and to offer our future assistance.
Preferable times for us to meet would be Tuesday morning or noon, march 5th, or Monday late afternoon after 4 pm, march 4th. From our side we would be 2-4 delegates attending.
Our organisation’s fields of interest and expertise are
a) generally human rights violations against children and adults born with atypical sex anatomy, or medically speaking children and adults diagnosed a.o. with intersex conditions or Disorders of Sex Development/DSD, already mentioned by OHCHR a.o. in A/HRC/19/41 (para 57), and
b) specifically the concerned children’s submission to — in the wording of the SRT’s report A/HRC/22/53 (para 76, 77) — “forced genital-normalizing surgeries … performed without their informed consent, or that of their parents, ‘in an attempt to fix their sex’, … [that] are rarely medically necessary, can cause scarring, loss of sexual sensation, pain, incontinence and lifelong depression and have also been criticized as being unscientific, potentially harmful and contributing to stigma”, and furthermore “involuntary sterilization … leaving them with permanent, irreversible infertility and causing severe mental suffering”.
Members of Zwischengeschlecht.org and AIC have contributed a.o. to the german CEDAW Shadow Report 2008, the Swiss NGO Coalition’s UPR Shadow Report 2012, and entered solicited testimonies to the WHO regarding the upcoming statement on sterilization, and the current report of the SRT regarding abuses in health care settings.
We apologize for the short notice and hope you will find time to meet and talk with us.
Kind regards
Daniela Truffer, Markus Bauer / Zwischengeschlecht.org
Markus Bauer Mobile +41 (0)78 829 12 60
Daniela Truffer Mobile +41 (0)76 398 06 50
Zwischengeschlecht.org
P.O.B. 2122
CH-8031 Zurich