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Senate Committee Considers Bill Deploring Rape in Guinea, International Child Support Treaty

On November 17, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee approved, en bloc, a resolution deploring the rape and violence in Guinea (S. Res. 345) and The Hague Convention on International Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family Maintenance.

Violence Against Women in Guinea

Sponsored by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA), the resolution contains a number of findings, including:

  • on December 23, 2008, a group of military officers calling itself the National Council for Democracy and Development seized power in a coup in Guinea, installed as interim President Captain Moussa Dadis Camara, and promised to hold elections;
  • on September 28, 2009, tens of thousands of unarmed opposition protesters met in and around an outdoor stadium to protest statements made by Captain Camara that he may run for president, after he said that he would not;
  • government security forces killed at least 157 demonstrators, after opening fire on the crowd, and brutalized and raped dozens of women openly in public;
  • according to the humanitarian organization CARE, “What happened in Guinea is an outrage and a stark reminder of a larger epidemic of violence against women and girls around the world”; and
  • Amnesty International reports that violence against women knows few bounds, and that “in armed conflicts, countless women and girls are raped and sexually abused by security forces and opposition groups as an act of war, and often face additional violence in refugee camps. Government-sponsored violence also exists in peacetime, with women assaulted while in police custody, in prison, and at the hands of any number of state actors” and that “violence against women is a violation of human rights that cannot be justified by any political, religious, or cultural claim.”

The resolution “calls for an immediate cessation of violence, including gender-based violence and targeted killings by security forces” and “urges President Barack Obama, in coordination with leaders from the European Union and the African Union, to seriously consider punitive measures that could be taken against senior officials in Guinea found to be complicit in the violence, in particular the atrocities perpetrated against women and other gross human rights violations.” The resolution also “encourages President Obama…to continue to convey that the blatant abuse of women will not be tolerated, and to continue supporting the efforts of the appointed facilitator…to pave a way forward to credible elections.”

The Hague Convention on International Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family Maintenance

The committee also endorsed in the same en bloc vote The Hague Convention on International Recovery of Child Support and Other Forms of Family Maintenance (Treaty Doc.110-21). Adopted at The Hague and signed by the United States on November 23, 2007, the treaty would enforce legal obligations relating to child support in instances where the custodial and non-custodial parents live in separate countries. Specifically, the treaty would expand upon already existing bilateral agreements to recognize and enforce foreign child support orders and simplify the process for obtaining new child support decisions across borders.

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee held a hearing on the treaty on October 6. The Senate has yet to ratify the treaty.