CAIRO: On March 9, Egypt's military cleared protesters from Cairo's Tahrir Square. Among them were women. Shortly after it was revealed by Amnesty International that a number of the women had been forced to take “virginity” tests by the military. One of those young women was then tried in a military court and was alleged forced to take one of the tests and was tortured. On Tuesday, Egyptian human rights groups fought back, filing a lawsuit against the head of Egypt's armed forces. The groups, who did not release the identity of the woman, said she was tried before a military court without her knowledge of the charges against her. According to the groups, all the female protesters rounded up on March 9 were sentenced within four days. The girl “was exposed to the worst kinds of humiliation, torture and violation to the sanctity of her body to the extent of inspecting her virginity within view and earshot of army prison workers”, the groups said in a statement. The case against the head of the armed forces and other unnamed individuals was filed with an administrative court by the Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights, the Nadeem Center for the Rehabilitation of Victims of Violence and Torture and the Hisham Mubarak Law Center. A senior Egyptian general told CNN that women detained on March 9 at Cairo's Tahrir Square had been forced to undergo ‘virginity tests', which the government has previously denied. The general, speaking on condition of anonymity, justified the abuse by saying that the women “were not like your daughter or mine. These were girls who had camped out in tents with male protesters.” “This admission is an utterly perverse justification of a degrading form of abuse,” said Amnesty International. “The women were subjected to nothing less than torture.” “The Egyptian authorities must condemn these discriminatory, abusive and insulting attitudes which have been used to justify torture of women protesters, and which are clearly present at the highest levels. Amnesty International gathered the testimonies of women protesters subjected to forced ‘virginity tests' in March, and wrote to Egypt's Supreme Council for Armed Forces requesting an investigation. However, no response was received. The general also told CNN that the reason for the ‘tests' was “[w]e didn't want them to say we had sexually assaulted or raped them, so we wanted to prove that they weren't virgins in the first place.” “This general's implication that only virgins can be victims of rape is a long-discredited sexist attitude and legal absurdity. When determining a case of rape, it is irrelevant whether or not the victim is a virgin” “The army must immediately instruct security forces and soldiers that such ‘tests' are banned.” BM
