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South Africa: Shocking levels of violence in mining area
by MSF, BBC News
 
One in four women living in a key platinum mining area in South Africa has been raped in her lifetime, a survey by medical charity MSF has said.
 
About half of women in Rustenburg had been subject to sexual violence or intimate partner violence, it said.
 
The charity said the findings of its survey were "shocking but not uncommon" in South Africa.
 
South Africa has one of the highest incidences of rape in the world and a low prosecution rate.
 
Based on its survey of more than 800 women aged 18-49 in Rustenburg municipality, north-west of Johannesburg, MSF said only 5% of the approximately 11,000 women and girls raped each year reported the incident to a health worker.
 
The research also suggested that a very low number of these women were aware of how to prevent HIV transmission and even pregnancy.
 
MSF said survivors of sexual violence faced numerous other barriers to seeking care.
 
"Stigma within communities is high and options are few for accessing well-resourced, dedicated sexual violence health services," it said.
 
Despite lying at the centre of South Africa''s platinum belt, Rustenburg is home to many poor communities. The area attracts both men hoping to work in the mines and women from across South Africa and abroad who hope to benefit from the local mining economy.
 
MSF said unemployment was particularly high for migrant women "creating conditions that promote dependency on men who are more readily employed by mines in the area".
 
The charity said there was a need to increase the number of staff trained in sexual healthcare in the area.
 
The BBC''s Pumza Fihlani in Johannesburg says the authorities hope ongoing awareness campaigns will encourage rape victims to seek medical attention and even legal recourse.
 
http://www.msf.org/en/article/south-africa-responding-pervasive-sexual-violence-platinum-belt http://www.un.org/en/women/endviolence/


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Video as Evidence Field Guide
by Kelly Matheson
Senior Attorney & Program Manager, WITNESS
 
After in-depth research, field work and cross-sector collaboration, we have produced the first Video as Evidence Field Guide.
 
At the core of WITNESS is our steadfast conviction that video is a uniquely powerful tool for human rights change. But citizen video doesn’t often reach a standard for it to be considered legal evidence; and simultaneously, legal systems around the world have been largely under-equipped to handle the influx of citizen footage made possible by today’s mobile technologies.
 
The goal of the Video as Evidence Field Guide to is bridge existing gaps so that citizens, activists, and lawyers can — together — use video more effectively for justice.
 
The complete Video as Evidence Field Guide is available online. The more people out there who know how to effectively document human rights abuse, the closer we are to change, and to a better world.
 
The Guide’s primary audience is people working in the field who are or will potentially film human rights abuses. These may be citizen journalists, activists, community reporters, and human rights investigators.
 
If you are already filming abuses, the Guide can help enhance the evidentiary value of your videos. And if you are already investigating human rights abuses by traditional means, this Guide can help to strategically incorporate video into your human rights investigation so that it enhances your evidence collection, access the guide via the link below:
 
http://vae.witness.org/video-as-evidence-field-guide http://www.eyewitnessproject.org http://www.atha.se/blog/eyewitness-atrocities-innovative-technology-enhancing-accountability


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