Fighting to Protect Gender-Based Asylum: Arnold & Porter Helps Tahirih File Second Circuit Amicus Brief
Mariama Barry endured the practice of female genital mutilation in Guinea as a child. Today, she has a US citizen daughter and has to make an impossible decision, if forced to return to Guinea—leaving her daughter in the United States to be raised by strangers or taking her home and witnessing her certain torture.
Mariama was denied asylum as a direct result of the Board of Immigration Appeals’ recent decisions in Matter of A-T-, where the court held that past FGM alone cannot provide a basis for a fear of future persecution, and Matter of A-K-, where the court held that a parent cannot receive “derivative” asylum to protect a United States citizen child from FGM.
As this issue impacts many of our clients facing similar struggles, Tahirih felt compelled to weigh in on the federal court case. In May 2008, Tahirih filed an amicus brief in the Second Circuit Court of Appeals arguing that FGM can cause permanent and continuing harm to women who are forced to undergo the procedure, often leading to ongoing health issues. In addition, the brief argued that the ritual can in some cases be re-inflicted on a woman and is part of a series of acts of gender discrimination and persecution that continue throughout a woman’s life.
Photograph is not of Mariama. Photography: Rosita Najmi
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Related News: “A Victory for Women”
New York Times, June 22, 2008
The trend of increasing barriers to gender-based asylum may yet be shifting, giving reason to be hopeful for a positive decision in Ms. Barry’s case. In a similar battle involving three women who were also victims of FGM, the Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit ruled unanimously that the Board of Immigration Appeals had committed “significant errors” and ordered the court to reconsider the women’s cases. The New York Times reported:
“One of the judges wrote separately to underscore what the board failed to recognize: the ritual mutilation of girls to promote chastity and thwart sexual desire is a perpetual injury. It is performed without anesthesia, often with dirty instruments, and leads to disfigurement, severe complications and lifelong trauma.”
