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Sexual Violence
The CAVR concluded that there was widespread evidence of sexual violence, a particularly heinous crime against humanity. Although there are cultural taboos against admitting such violations, the CAVR received hundreds of direct testimonies that showed that rape, sexual torture and other acts of sexual violence were widespread and systematic. The CAVR found that the Indonesian authorities' "institutional practices and formal or informal policy" encouraged such behaviour1.
The evidence showed that "the violations were commonly committed in a wide range of military institutions" and that "military commanders and civilian officials knew that soldiers under their command routinely used military premises and equipment for the purposes of raping and torturing women and took no steps to deter these activities or to punish those involved." In fact, "the commanders and officials were in some cases themselves also perpetrators of sexual violence."2
Sexual slavery was commonplace; East Timorese women were enslaved sexually "without fear of reprisal, inside military installations, at other official sites and inside the private homes of women who were targeted."3 This, too, occurred with the "knowledge and complicity of members of the Indonesian security forces, the police force, the highest levels of the civilian administration and members of the judiciary."4 The victims of sexual violence were not just East Timorese women; men too were raped.
Frequently reported examples5 of sexual violence occurring inside official Indonesian military installations include:
- mutilation of women's sexual organs, including insertion of batteries into vaginas and burning nipples and genitals with cigarettes
- use of electric shocks applied to the genitals, breasts and mouths
- gang rape by members of the security forces
- forcing of detainees to engage in sexual acts with each other, while watched and ridiculed by members of the security forces
- rape of detainees following periods of prolonged sexual torture
- rape of women who had their hands and feet handcuffed and who were blindfolded.
- forceful plucking of pubic hairs in the presence of male soldiers
- rape of pregnant women
- forcing of victims to be nude, or to be sexually violated in front of strangers, friends and family members.
- women raped in the presence of fellow prisoners as a means of terrorising both the victims and the other prisoners
- placing women in tanks of water for prolonged periods, including submerging their heads, before being raped
- the use of a snake to instill terror during sexual torture
- threats issued to women that their children would be killed or tortured if the women resisted or complained about being raped
- repeated rape by a multitude of (unknown) members of the security forces
- forced oral sex
- urinating into the mouth of victims
- rape and sexual violence indiscriminately inflicted upon married women, unmarried women, and young teenagers still children by law.
- keeping lists of local women who could be routinely forced to come to the military post or headquarters so that soldiers could rape them. Lists were traded between military units.
1 Chega! Executive Summary p 118.
2 Chega! Executive Summary p 118.
3 Chega Executive Sumary p 121.
4 Chega! Executive Summary p 122.
5 Chega! Executive Summary p 118-9.
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