Visit with Angelina Jolie at the @UN peacekeeping conference - thank you being a steadfast voice in support of the world's most vulnerable. pic.twitter.com/0qgTii6pJ2
The 42-year-old actor, mother and Special Envoy of the United Nations
High Commissioner for Refugees is giving a keynote speech in Vancouver
today at the UN Peacekeeping Defence Ministerial Summit. HuffPost Canada
got an exclusive first look at excerpts from her speech.
The mom-of-six urges politicians, defence ministers and military
leaders to help UN peacekeepers better respond to sexual violence around
the world, and outlines the myths she believes are at the heart why
these crimes persist, and which "we have to overcome together."
"The first myth is that this behaviour is sexual,"
Jolie's speech explains. "All too often these kinds of crimes against
women are laughed off, depicted as a minor offense by someone who cannot
control themselves, as an illness, or as some kind of exaggerated
sexual need,"
"But a man who mistreats women is not oversexed. He is abusive."
Jolie cites UN claims that almost every female Rohingya refugee in
the camps in Bangladesh is a survivor of, or witness to, sexual
violence, sexual assault, rape, or gang-rape.
"This is rape and assault designed to torture, to terrorise, to force
people to flee, and to humiliate them. It has nothing to do with sex.
It has everything to do with the abuse of power."
Jolie says the second myth is that sexual violence isn't seen as "serious" enough
of a crime to warrant significant action. It isn't treated as "a
central issue for peace negotiations or agreements. Not grave enough to
mount prosecutions and imprison those responsible."
According to the UN,
around 120 million girls worldwide have experienced forced intercourse
or other forced sexual acts at some point in their lives. And although
there are some statistics on how many women are raped and experience other forms of sexual violence during conflict, Human Rights Watch notes that sexual violence in conflict areas are under-reported
because of "stigma, the risk of retaliation, lack of access for
monitors, inadequate means for safe reporting, and weak government
response."
Even though millions of families are under threat of sexual violence
in conflict areas, Jolie notes that, "It is on our television screens
and in our newspapers. Why then, does nothing change?"
The third myth is that we can't do anything to stop sexual violence,
at home or abroad, according to Jolie. Even if the first two myths are
dispelled, many still think the problem is too big to solve. But Jolie
says it's not impossible, and that countries have the "laws, the
institutions, and the expertise in gathering evidence. What is missing
is the political will."
As the Special Envoy of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and co-founder of the Preventing Sexual Violence Initiative, Jolie is well-versed on sexual violence.
In June, the humanitarian and film director visited Nairobi, Kenya, to meet with refugee girls who were living in a safe house after fleeing sexual and gender-based violence.
Speaking at the International Peace Support Training Centre, Jolie
said, "The reality is that women and girls, as well as men and boys, can
still be raped with near-total impunity in conflict zones around the
world."
She also hasn't shied away from speaking out on her own experiences
with sexual violence, noting in her speech today that sexual violence
can happen anywhere, even where you work.
Although she didn't specify details, the "First They Killed My Father" director told the New York Times in October that she "had a bad experience with Harvey Weinstein in my youth,
and as a result, chose never to work with him again and warn others
when they did. This behaviour towards women in any field, any country is
unacceptable."
Last month, the New York Times and the New Yorker
detailed several women's accounts of the sexual assault and harassment
they allegedly experienced from the disgraced Hollywood mogul. Since
then, many more women, including prominent actresses such as Gwyneth Paltrow and Lupita Nyong'o, have come forward to share their stories of rape, abuse and harassment they allegedly experienced at the hands of Weinstein.