Yesterday the BBC published an online article about the alleged forced sterilization of Romani women in the Czech Republic under communism, but also as late as 2003. The goverment maintains that it was the fault of individual doctors and not a government enforced practice. For this reason, national statistics do not exist. Yet in the eastern town of Ostrava alone, some 80 Roma women said they had been sterilised without their consent in the Czech health system.

Forced sterilization of minority women has been a resounding theme around the world for centuries. It is a form of violence against women that is nearly unparalleled in its calculated cruelty. Nearly...though the bizzare ways of humiliating and injuring are many.

Today is the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. Whether it is this henious crime, or another amongst the long list of abuses women suffer at the hands of family, strangers or society, learning what is happening is one step towards making the change.
 

Hats off to the brave Romani women who had the courage to come forward and denounce these horrible acts, despite being disenfranchised and having their testimonies questioned as unreliable. Applause to the legal advocats who researched, documented and stood beside these women, defending not only their human and civil rights, but those of all. The denial of human rights for one is the theft of dignity for all.