CAIRO: Egyptian human rights groups announced on Sunday that they are taking legal action against the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF) over the use of “virginity tests” against female protesters earlier this year. In a joint statement, the groups said that a case has been officially filed against the head of the SCAF Hussein Tantawi. They have also demanded all such “examinations” are ended immediately across the country. In an Amnesty International report published in March, said that women were beaten, given electric shocks, subjected to strip searches while being photographed by male soldiers, then forced to submit to ‘virginity checks' and threatened with prostitution charges. It added that this sort of treatment is torture when forced upon individuals. “Forcing women to have ‘virginity tests' is utterly unacceptable. Its purpose is to degrade women because they are women,” said Amnesty International in March. “All members of the medical profession must refuse to take part in such so-called ‘tests'.” 20-year-old Salwa Hosseini told Amnesty International that after she was arrested and taken to a military prison in Heikstep, she was made, with the other women, to take off all her clothes to be searched by a female prison guard, in a room with two open doors and a window. During the strip search, Salwa Hosseini said male soldiers were looking into the room and taking pictures of the naked women. The women were then subjected to ‘virginity tests' in a different room by a man in a white coat. They were threatened that “those not found to be virgins” would be charged with prostitution. According to information received by Amnesty International, one woman who said she was a virgin but whose test supposedly proved otherwise was beaten and given electric shocks. “Women and girls must be able to express their views on the future of Egypt and protest against the government without being detained, tortured, or subjected to profoundly degrading and discriminatory treatment,” said Amnesty International. In May, an unnamed Egyptian general told CNN that the tests were indeed conducted. Surprisingly, he attempted to defend them. “The girls who were detained were not like your daughter or mine,” the general said. “These were girls who had camped out in tents with male protesters in Tahrir Square, and we found in the tents Molotov cocktails and (drugs). We 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. None of them were (virgins).” According to a 2008 study published by the Egyptian Center for Women's Rights (ECWR) 60 percent of Egyptian women and 98 percent of foreign women are harassed on a daily basis. The ECWR warned that harassing foreign women would lead to the loss of millions of pounds. A number of foreigners said they would never return to Egypt. 14 percent of all foreign women said they would either never return to Egypt or tell their friends not to visit. BM
