3.2 CONTEXTO LABORAL 20.
3.3.3 Políticas educativas: Carta Magna, Plan Nacional de
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women may fear reprisals by their own community for transgressing cultural limitations on mobility (such as going unaccompanied to distribution points); they may be reluctant to leave children unattended in a war-torn region to visit distribution points; or they may hesitate to report any acts or threats of violence committed against them.259
This reluctance to report violations often stems from the fact that women may be unused to or ashamed of speaking about such acts. They may feel more comfortable or deem it more appropriate to be interviewed by a woman, through a female interpreter where necessary.260 It is imperative that these women are given sufficient time, privacy and opportunity to report violations, and subsequently aided to ensure their protection.
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international conflicts in terms of absolute numbers but also of intensity.264 The former demarcated fronts between two well-trained national military forces are being superseded by new actors, such as warlords, rebels, mercenaries and child soldiers.265 Nor is warfare a purely male domain anymore; we can no longer ignore the role of women in hostilities. Besides voluntary female combatants, thousands of girl soldiers are forced to fight.266
Women and girls are abducted and coerced into marrying warlords or held as slaves or prostitutes.267 Rape is deployed as a strategic weapon and method of torture.268 These very brutal, prolonged and disorderly conflicts afflict many civilians. This is also why there has been a huge rise in the number of refugees and internally displaced persons. Uprooted population groups, particularly women and children, live for years in camps, dependent on humanitarian aid and with limited access to vital resources.269 Discrimination against women in the distribution of food, the lack of recognition of their particular needs, attacks and acts of violence or extortion in the camps perpetuate their insecurity.270
Whilst wars and armed conflict are not only confined to Africa, the continent has been plagued with armed conflicts since 1978. According to the United Nations Peacemaker database between September 1978 (following the eruption of conflict in Namibia) and February 2009 (with the signing of the ‗Agreement on Good Will and Confidence Building for the Settlement of
264 D Smith, ―Trends and Causes of Armed Conflict‖(2004) Berghof Research Center for Constructive Conflict Managementhttp://edoc.vifapol.de/opus/volltexte/2011/2576/pdf/smith_handbook.pdf Accessed 2 June 2018.
265Ibid.
266 E Rehn & E J Sirleaf, ―Focus: Women, Gender and Armed Conflict‖(2009) https://www.oecd.org/dac/gender-development/44896284.pdfAccessed 2 June 2018.
267 ―Nigeria Chibok abductions: What we Know‖, BBC World News 8 May 2017. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-32299943 Accessed 2 June 2018.
268 N Ewigman, ―Rape as a weapon of war in modern conflicts‖ (2010) https://www.bmj.com/content/340/bmj.c3270 Accessed 2 June 2018.
269Ibid.
270 E Rehn & E J Sirleaf, art cit.
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the Problem in Darfur‘)Africa has witnessed more than 146 intra-state conflicts.271However, the trends of war in Africa show three types of conflicts, namely Resource/Opportunistic driven;
Ethno-religious/Nationalistic‘ driven; and Secessionist/autonomy driven conflicts.272 Women participate in these wars either voluntarily or under coercion especially when survival is the overriding rule for women (and men) in times of conflict. Once involved, the character of their participation is little different from that of the male combatants. Brutality is hyped in armed conflicts, as every participating combatant feels some sense of privilege and empowerment when armed with an assault rifle.273
Contextually, there are variations on the levels and patterns of participation. Findings have shown that in resource/opportunistic driven wars, women‘s participation is higher when compared to ethno-religious and secessionist driven wars.274 In the opportunistic wars of Sierra Leone and Liberia, for example, apart from the behavioral similarities of female and male combatants, they were ideologically less motivated, whereas in secessionist wars there are clear ideological reasons for women‘s involvement and they are empowered and motivated by the sense of liberation. However, the result shows some exceptions. In the opportunistic wars in Somalia and Algeria, for example, women are absent in the war as active participants due to the religious factors, yet, active (whether coerced or voluntarily) in the non-combative arena of being sex slaves or ‗Desert Wives‘ for the male soldiers/rebels.275
271 J I Lahai, Gendered Battlefields: A Contextual and Comparative Analysis of Women‟s Participation in Armed Conflicts in Africa (2010) http://www.review.upeace.org/index.cfm?opcion=0&ejemplar=19&entrada=98 Accessed on 20 March 2017.
272Ibid.
273Ibid.
274Ibid.
275Ibid.
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All these types of war share some similar features: first, they are intense and cannot end without external military and diplomatic intervention, culminating mostly in fragile power sharing governments; second, these wars result in the distortion of conventional and gender-specific roles and responsibilities defined in terms of ‗what men and women are trained to do‘ in their gender relations.276 Finally, violence is targeted at women majorly because of their sexuality.277
In addition, the effects of the war on women do not differ, irrespective of the type of war it is, for instance, socio economic effects- as members of the civilian population, women experience distinctive economic problems in armed conflict.278 In many cases women are separated from the men who traditionally may be their source of income. Lack of education and training, their role in caring for others, and general community attitudes make it extremely difficult for women to support themselves financially.279 In many cultures, moreover, it is women who have the most to gain from economic development, and are thus particularly disadvantaged when these resources are diverted during armed conflict.280