“Now I want to get the bullet out of my body. I feel it when I sleep for a long time on the right side of my body or when it is cold.” -- Fady, who was shot by armed bandits while traveling in a car in Mali in 1993. A single bullet shattered two lives. It passed through her husband's chest and entered Fady's right thigh, where it remains. Her husband died in the attack.
Fady’s is one of 16 stories in a new publication by the IANSA Women’s Network depicting the impact of guns on women’s lives. ‘Survivors - women affected by gun violence speak out’ presents women’s experiences of gun violence, from torture in Central Africa to domestic violence in Europe; from crossfire in Asia to grieving a murdered child in the Americas.
The global gun violence epidemic affects men and women differently. Men are the overwhelming majority of victims and perpetrators; but women suffer disproportionately given that they are rarely gun purchasers, owners or users. Every year over 30,000 women and girls are killed by guns and millions more are traumatised, intimidated, enslaved, robbed and raped at gunpoint.
Unlike men, women are more likely to encounter gun violence in the home than in public places. Several testimonies highlight women’s vulnerability to sexual violence at gunpoint, which is often used as a deliberate military and political tactic.
The IANSA Women’s Network believes that effective solutions to the global gun violence crisis depend upon both women’s full involvement and an understanding of the different ways that women and men are affected by and respond to guns.
Click here to download the report.
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