The Dramatic Rise of Female Genital Mutilation in Ireland

The standard definition applied to female genital mutilation (FGM) is that it is a practice involving the partial or total removal of the external female genitalia or genital organs for non-medical reasons.
While this kind of definitional brevity certainly has its place, it would be wise not to accept it in isolation or without consistent reference to the additional classifications applied to FGM by the World Health Organisation and others.

This approach will aid us in grasping, even to a limited degree the true barbarity of the practice and the egregious breach of human rights that it represents.

The WHO Inter Agency Statement on Eliminating Female Genital Mutilation is helpful in this regard. There we find reference to the 4 Types of FGM that have traditionally prevailed.

It is almost incomprehensible to reflect that FGM practices as classified above are carried out in most cases on young girls and babies between infancy and age 15 years who mainly reside in or originate from within the African continent or the wider Middle East.

The scale of the practice is staggering, with reliable WHO estimates suggesting that between 100 million and 140 million girls and women have been subjected to some form of FGM and a further 3 million girls are at risk each year. This, the WHO point out, equates to 6,000 women and girls undergoing FGM daily in the world.
Awareness around the prevalence of the practice and the numbers of children and women living with the outcomes of FGM has to a welcome, if incomplete degree broken through to the consciousness of the western world.

This is due at least sustained educational campaigns that have followed on foot of the exponential growth in global immigration rates and the presence of diaspora communities from Africa and the Middle East residing in countries and territories such as the United States, Europe, and Australia.
It has also been assisted through the oftentimes very public conflicts that have been created when attempts to defend the practice on rights based or religious or cultural grounds have come up against western legal and medical traditions that have historically considered FGM anathema and indefensible.
Ireland is one such state that has been attempting to respond appropriately and humanely to the issues presented by FGM.

At the international level Ireland has ratified various international conventions condemning FGM, including the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and the Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW).

At the domestic level a key event is the publication in November 2008 of Ireland’s National Plan of Action to Address FGM that was issued in collaboration with15 other European countries.
The Action Plan identified five strategy headings as essential components of any attempt to address FGM in Ireland. These headings are legal, asylum, health, community and development aid.
The first specifically legal effort that emerged out of this process was Irelands Criminal Justice (Female Genital Mutilation) Act 2012, initially introduced in June 2011.

The Act not only criminalised the act of doing female genital mutilation, it also provided for the offence of attempting to do an act of female genital mutilation.

The Act also contains provisions relating to the aiding, abetting, counselling, conspiring or procuring the commission of female genital mutilation.

This provided substantial legal clarity to existing but otherwise broad legal prohibitions on procuring the commission of an indictable offence dealing with bodily injury such as mutilation and the removal of organs or body tissue.

Under this Act it is also a criminal offence for someone resident in Ireland to take a girl to another country to undergo FGM. The penalties under the Act are up to 14 years in prison and/or a fine of €10,000.

When judged against the remarks of the then Minister For Health Dr James Reilly when he initially introduced the Act-that it would provide indisputable legal clarity-the Act has been a success.

However, the overall picture that emerges when viewed against the Minister’s further remarks, that the legislation was “the first step in ensuring the practice will not take hold in Ireland,” is less favourable.
This is despite the fact that, as we have seen above, the Act was part of a broader willingness of Irish Governments to create awareness around FGM and its commendable adoption of a zero-tolerance approach to its practice.

Ireland would go on approach the health strategy heading of the 2008 Action Plan through the country’s national strategies on domestic sexual and gender-based violence (DSGBV).

The Irish Health Service Executive (HSE) is also currently undertaking a mapping exercise of its services with a view to identifying gaps in the provision of supports to victims and survivors of FGM.

This is extremely important as it is unquestionably the case that there is a growing demand for such services in Ireland.

We can see evidence of this in an Irish Times report from November 2024 where it emerged that a service to help women affected by female genital mutilation increased more than 300 per cent over two years.

The Report was published by Ireland’s Irish Family Planning Association. It estimated that at least 10,000 women and girls living in Ireland have experienced FGM.

It also reported that its appointment levels for FGM related supports increased by 338 per cent in 2023.
The Association’s medical director Caitriona Henchion confirmed that the number of people being treated was “originally small” but from 2020/2021 migration from “high-incidence countries increased so demand has hugely gone up”.

In the context of migration from high incidence countries, it is worth observing that Section 7(2)(f) of Ireland’s International Protection Act 2015 provides that “acts of a gender-specific or child specific nature” are examples of acts which may amount to persecution.

As such, Ireland’s International Protection Office (IPO) considers that FGM is persecutory in nature as it “violates a series of well-established human rights principles, including the principles of equality and non-discrimination on the basis of sex, the right to life when the procedure results in death, and the right to freedom from torture or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment, as well as the rights of the child.”

In conclusion we can say that as Ireland continues to experience an unprecedented wave of inward migration from the countries including those within the African continent and the Middle East, the demand for FGM related services will continue to dramatically increase.

This places extraordinary pressure on Ireland’s health and community service due to the complex cultural sensitivities that often arise. Hopes for a reduction in the number of children and women presenting may be overly optimistic due to the clear recognition in the research literature of the pervasiveness and stubbornness of the practice and its resistance to elimination.

UNICEF has itself warned that female genital mutilation is again on the rise among Nigerian girls aged 0-14 with rates risen from 16.9 per cent in 2013 to a recent high of 19.2 per cent.

There will also be significant challenges for Ireland’s police force, An Garda Síochána although it has recently launched an initiative called Operation Limelight to provide information to passengers travelling to and from Ireland which explains what FGM is, and people what they can do if they are worried that a girl may be at risk of FGM.

To date Ireland’s approach to FGM has been exemplary but this needs to be matched by a higher rate of criminal convictions and the allocation of targeted resources to bring this about.

It is alarming to observe that although FGM was criminalised in 2012 the first conviction for FGM in Ireland only occurred in 2020. The case involved a married couple who performed FGM on their one-year-old daughter in 2016.

The sheer horror of this case lends the need for such an approach a clear moral and social imperative.