Women This Week: Girls Experiencing Significant Rate of Sexual Violence in Guatemala

Human Rights Watch Report Documents Thousands of Cases  

A report published by Human Rights Watch (HRW) this week has documented the serious impact that pervasive and systemic sexual violence is having on girls under the age of fourteen in Guatemala. While official figures vary, between January 2018 and June 2024, the National Institute of Forensic Sciences (INACIF) examined 27,660 cases of sexual violence or child pregnancies in Guatemala. 24,441 of those cases involved a girl who was fourteen or younger, which is the legal age of consent in the country. And in just the first half of 2024 alone, INACIF evaluated 1,987 cases of sexual violence against girls. Experts believe that these figures do not represent the true number of cases, as many of the victims involved often live in poverty and come from rural Indigenous communities that have little access to public services. Without adequate education and health services, young girls may not recognize early pregnancy signs, delaying healthcare access and worsening the impacts of forced pregnancies. “Without meaningful reforms—including strengthening prevention, services, and access to justice—girls in Guatemala will continue to face shocking levels of sexual violence and insurmountable barriers to realizing their rights,” said Cristina Quijano Carrasco, a women’s rights researcher at HRW. “The government needs to take urgent action to ensure that girls who are survivors of sexual violence have access to the health care, education, social security, and the legal protections to which they are entitled, in order to recover and rebuild their lives.” 

African Leaders Adopt Convention to Combat Gender-Based Violence 

In a historic milestone, the African Union (AU) adopted the continent’s first dedicated legal instrument to ending gender-based violence. AU member states met in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, last week and signed the Convention on Ending Violence Against Women and Girls, which reaffirms the continent’s commitment to ending violence against women and girls. Each country must now ratify the Convention. Anna Mutavati, the Regional Director for UN Women East and Southern Africa, said, “this is a pivotal moment for gender equality in Africa,” adding that “as we mark 30 years since the Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action, we urge the AU Member States to act promptly and ratify this Convention for it to come into effect. The CEVAWG builds on existing frameworks such as CEDAW [the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women] and the Maputo Protocol and is tailored to address both contemporary challenges and the intersection between customary and formal legal systems.” The Convention acknowledges the intersection of customary and formal legal systems across Africa and works to ensure that proposed intervention strategies are relevant to norms and local cultures.  

Education Opportunities for Women Cut in U.S. Foreign Aid Freeze 

One of the last remaining programs aimed at ensuring that Afghan women have some access to higher education has been halted as a result of the Trump Administration’s freeze on USAID funding. Classes at the American University of Afghanistan have been suspended since January, as the online school was supported by USAID funding. At present, an estimated 1.4 million girls are prohibited from attending school in Afghanistan due to the Taliban’s prohibition on secondary and higher education for women and girls. One female student in Afghanistan said, “[i]t’s been a long time that [America] has been supporting Afghanistan, Afghan girls...This is a situation where girls should be supported; it’s not like before, when we could go to university. Right now we’re just stuck in the corner of the house. We’re in a cage, and we really need support.” In 2024, the US provided $30.2 million in unspecified education support and about $1 billion in health and humanitarian assistance.  

Diya Mehta is the intern for the Women and Foreign Policy Program.