By Dulcie Leimbach, WUNRN (Women’s United Nations Report Network)

Moving away from strictly categorizing rape and other sexual abuse against women as a weapon of war, the new annual report from the United Nations on sexual violence against women in conflict addresses its increasing use as a weapon of terrorism. The report also documents how mass migration has led to further sexual violence against women through human trafficking by extremist groups like ISIS and has enabled a flourishing black market in such trade across the world.

The report was spotlighted at a UN Security Council debate on women, peace and security on May 15. The document also tackles problems associated with post-sexual-violence: stigma; contracting of infectious diseases; handling of children of rape; loss of livelihoods and destitution; and other social taboos and damages that can ruin victims for life.

By acknowledging sexual violence as a weapon of terrorism, the report says, global actions to stop terrorist financing can include a link to this criminality and be tied into relevant sanctions regimes. Rape has been recognized as a war crime by the UN and international tribunals and courts for decades.

The report, covering all of 2016, comes from the office of the UN secretary-general, António Guterres. It is a yearly endeavor made possible by the UN special envoy on sexual violence against women in conflict and certain UN agencies. The envoy office has changed leadership recently, with Pramila Patten of Mauritius coming aboard in mid-June, replacing Zainab Hawa Bangura of Sierra Leone.

The term “conflict-related sexual violence” in the report refers to rape, sexual slavery, forced prostitution, forced pregnancy, forced abortion, enforced sterilization, forced marriage and “any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity” inflicted on women, men, girls and boys directly or indirectly linked to a conflict.

The report covers 19 countries for which credible information is available, collected by UN specialists. It also features a list of 46 parties using sexual violence against women in conflict, with the majority being armed terrorists like Al Qaeda and Boko Haram. National military and police forces are hardly immune, however, to such crimes, with Afghanistan, Somalia, South Sudan, Sudan and Syria also featured in the list.