Women as refugees

20 million people are in flight worldwide, according to the UN-High Commission for Refugees, and most of them are women.

Famines, environmental disasters and wars are the causes of flight - but there are also reasons that affect only women, so-called women-specific reasons for flight.

Women flee because of rules that apply only to women - be they legal, cultural or religious rules. Sometimes the state is the one persecuting or discriminating, other times it is people they are dependent on, and sometimes it is their own religious group or their own family.

Women flee from

• forced marriages
• forced prostitution
• forced abortion
• forced sterilization
• ritual killings (eg, widow burning)
• sexual violence
• rape in connection with ethnic cleansing
• rules about dress codes or the appearance in public (e.g. compulsory veiling)
• threat of female genital mutilation
• threat because of their political activities or sexual orientation.

In asylum procedures, it is still very difficult to achieve recognition of gender-specific reasons for flight.