BRUSSELS - Throughout the world violence against women continues. The state of mind that generates this violence is so deeply rooted in society that all of our forces are required in the public, political, and social arenas to begin to bring about change, however slight, in the way relations between man and women are seen.

One of the most devastating forms of the violence against women committed in the name of tradition is female genital mutilation, which affects millions of women and girls.

Female genital mutilation (FGM) is the term for various traditional practices of the partial or total removal of the external female genital organs or any cutting of them. The most serious form is infibulation, which consists of the partial excision of the external female genitals and the reduction of the vaginal opening.

It is estimated that between 100 and 130 million women living today have had this procedure inflicted o­n them, with another two million girls undergoing it every year. FGM is practised in 28

African countries. The percentage of women affected in a given society varies from five percent of women in Nigeria to 98 percent in Somalia. The phenomenon has spread to Europe, North America, Australia, and New Zealand through waves of immigration to industrialised countries.

The practice of FGM is ancestral but not necessarily linked to religion. It is performed o­n girls between four and twelve years of age, often as a rite of passage from childhood to adulthood.

Depending o­n local custom, the procedure can be carried out o­n babies as young as a few days old or o­n women immediately after marriage or even before their first pregnancy.

Virginity and fidelity

It is clear that mutilation of the genitals is a way of controlling women's sexuality. In effect, mutilation increases the price of the bride and assures her virginity and fidelity within marriage, considering that the procedure renders sex intensely painful.

Yet parents who mutilate their daughters do so out of an intent not to harm but to help them by insuring their position and future in the community. This fact, however, does not change the fact

that it constitutes the violation of a fundamental human right: the right to physical integrity, to health, dignity, and equality.

Eliminating this practice is a huge and extremely difficult endeavour as it involves changing long-entrenched thinking regarding women.

In this regard the Inter African Committee o­n Harmful Practices to the Health of Women and Girls (CI-AF) stands out. Since it was created in 1984, the organisation has succeeded in demystifying FGM and getting laws passed prohibiting it in certain countries in Africa. The CI-AF and many other organisations, like Amanitare, are obtaining results in the legislative arena, a crucial step in institutionalising change in attitudes to women and in women.

For example, there was the initiative of a group of 100 young Kenyan women who fled their homes and took refuge in a religious mission to escape mutilation. Then there were the Ethiopian newlyweds who wore signs challenging the practice of FGM: the grooms' signs read ''I am happy to be marrying a girl who was not mutilated''; those of the brides, ''I am happy to get married without being mutilated''. Examples like these, unimaginable a few years ago, are encouraging and give strength to others.

Training women

Unfortunately, the authorities in charge of enforcing the anti-FGM laws in African countries are not up to the task. To eradicate mutilation, channels of communication are needed to convey to remote villages that the failure to respect the physical integrity of women and girls will be punished. Organisations fighting FGM should be provided with the means to carry out their programmes.

These programmes involve, for example, training the women who perform FGMs to make their living in another line of work, and promoting ceremonies that symbolise the passage into adulthood without violating women's physical integrity.

It is crucial that we support such efforts made by women in countries where FGM is practised. What is needed is for them to join forces. NGOs like Aidos, No Peace Without Justice and Tamwa, have done just that, launching the Stop FGM International Campaign and with it a call for a plan of action to eradicate FGM that has already been signed by many thousands of citizens.

International Women's Day reminds us of both the progress that has been made in improving the situation of women around the world and of the many problems that persist and demand our sustained vigilance and attention. - IPS

Emma Bonino is a member of the Transnational Radical Party and deputy in the European Parliament.