On June 26, the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Western Hemisphere held a hearing on violence in Central America, with a particular focus on youth gang violence.
Highlighting the damaging effects of domestic violence, Geoff Thale, program director of the Washington Office on Latin America, stated, “The spectrum of violence begins with intra-familial violence. Violence between partners, particularly violence by men against their wives or girlfriends, is widespread in Central America. While reliable data isn’t regularly collected, the trend is clear. In Guatemala, according to studies, 36 percent of women who live with a male partner suffer domestic abuse, including physical, sexual, or psychological abuse.” He said that, according to the International Violence Against Women Survey, “60 percent of women in Costa Rica often considered the least violent country in Central America reported having experienced domestic violence during their lives.” Mr. Thale continued, “Violence by parents against children is also widespread. These kinds of domestic violence are for many people their first and most powerful introduction to violent behavior. There is extensive evidence both from the United States and from Central America that those who experience violence in the home are more likely to act violently on the street. Support for community and school based programs that reduce family violence can have a tremendous long-term impact on overall levels of crime and violence.”
Lainie Reisman, director of the Inter-American Coalition for the Prevention of Violence, agreed that “persistent and recurring forms of violence…have a much broader impact throughout the populace.” She said, “These include high levels of child abuse, inter-family violence, sexual abuse, and self-directed violence and suicides. Taking into account the impacts of violence in terms of costs to treat victims, lost productivity, long-term emotional and psychological damage, and other related issues, violence becomes perhaps the biggest, and most complex, challenge facing the region. The levels of violence in the region have led the public health sector to deem the existence of a violence pandemic. And I would be remiss if I did not state for the record my extreme concern regarding the reports of feminicide in Guatemala and extra-judicial killings of young men and women throughout the region.”
