In the News
Rape Rampant in Asia, Says UN Study
- 11 September 2013
One in 10 men in some parts of Asia and the Pacific region admit to having raped a woman who wasn't his partner, and a quarter of the men in those places say they have raped wives or girlfriends, according to one of the first large-scale studies of male sexual violence against women.
The studies, which were published in the British medical journal The Lancet and conducted by the World Health Organization, the United Nations Population Fund and others on behalf of the United Nations, involved interviews of more than 10,000 men in six countries in the Asia-Pacific region.
The scientists found that, on average, between 6 to 8 per cent of men raped a woman who wasn't their partner, and between 30 and 57 per cent of wives or girlfriends were subjected to some form of abuse.
Men between the ages of 18 and 49 in Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea and Sri Lanka were interviewed from January 2011 to December 2012. The interviewers, who were also male, made sure not to use the word rape in their interviews, instead describing situations constituting forced sex and asking whether the men had ever participated in such scenarios.
Read the full story by Marisa Taylor on Al Jazeera America
