A/HRC/RES/44/16
consistent with their evolving capacities, and women participate meaningfully in decisions
affecting their lives;
(d)
Developing, supporting and promoting educational programmes on human
rights, gender equality, health and life skills that challenge the negative stereotypes and
harmful attitudes and practices that sustain female genital mutilation and perpetuate violence
and discrimination against women and girls;
(e)
Training social workers, teachers, medical personnel, community and religious
leaders and relevant professionals, ensuring that they provide competent and supportive
services to all women and girls who are at risk of or who have undergone female genital
mutilation and encouraging them to report to the appropriate authorities cases in which they
believe that women or girls are at risk;
(f)
Ensuring that universal health coverage integrates the prevention and treatment
of the health risks and health complications associated with female genital mutilation,
including through access at the primary health-care level to the mental, sexual, reproductive,
maternal, newborn and child health-care services needed for women and girls affected by or
at risk of female genital mutilation;
(g)
Ensuring a more holistic and coordinated approach to the humanitariandevelopment nexus by integrating the prevention and response to female genital mutilation
into humanitarian preparedness and response, including in the continuum of essential
services for gender-based violence;
(h)
Stopping the medicalization of female genital mutilation, which implies
drawing up and disseminating guidance and legal provisions for medical personnel and
traditional birth attendants so that they are able to respond to social pressures in their
interaction with local communities to perform medicalized female genital mutilation, and to
provide an adequate response to the chronic mental, psychosocial and physical health
problems of the millions of women and girls who have undergone female genital mutilation,
as these problems hinder progress in the field of health in general and in the protection of
human rights, including the right to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of
physical and mental health;
(i)
Protecting and supporting women and girls who have been subjected to female
genital mutilation and those who are at risk, including by developing interdisciplinary,
accessible, sustained and coordinated social, legal and psychological support services and
appropriate remedies and ensuring health-care services, including for mental, sexual,
reproductive, maternal, newborn and child health;
(j)
Conducting specialized awareness-raising and training programmes for healthcare providers, including those working with immigrant communities, to address the unique
health-care needs of women and girls who have undergone female genital mutilation or other
harmful practices, and providing specialized training also for professionals within child
welfare services and services focused on the rights of women, and within the education and
police and justice sectors, and for politicians and media personnel working with refugee and
migrant girls and women;
10.
Urges States to take measures to develop and strengthen accountability
systems in the context of comprehensive and multisectoral strategies, policies, plans and
budgets to prevent and eliminate female genital mutilation, including by:
(a)
Adopting national legislation prohibiting female genital mutilation, in
accordance with international human rights law, and ensuring its strict application, while
working to harmonize their laws in order to effectively combat the cross-border practice of
female genital mutilation, including by strengthening transnational police and judicial
cooperation in the exchange of information on victims and perpetrators of female genital
mutilation, in accordance with national laws and policies and international human rights law;
(b)
Ensuring timely and effective remedies for women and girls at risk of or
affected by female genital mutilation, including by informing women and girls about their
rights, removing all barriers to access to legal assistance and remedies, providing gender- and
age-responsive training for law enforcement officials and other relevant authorities, and
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