At 13, she was diligent in her schoolwork, with her math teacher recalling an eager pupil. On her run-down street in this Nile Delta village, she could often be seen hoisting a neighborhood toddler onto a skinny hip. Until her parents decided that Soheir would be taken to a nearby clinic — really just the upper floor of a house on a dead-end dirt lane — where a doctor who doubled as a mosque preacher was known for performing a procedure called thara. The term, alluding to cleansing or purifying, means the cutting away of a girls external genitalia. In that house perched beside a rubbish-strewn ravine, Soheir died. Female genital excision has been banned in Egypt since 2008, with legal efforts to eradicate it dating to the 1990s. But it remains common, particularly in rural areas. Now, for the first time, a doctor is to stand trial for carrying out the procedure, with a court date set for Thursday in Aga, a town near Soheirs village.
Posted on: Sat, 26 Apr 2014 05:45:57 +0000
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