On Monday, the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit ruled 3-0 that a family in Northern California whose daughter underwent forced genital mutilation in Indonesia can seek political asylum in the U.S., the San Francisco Chronicle reports. According to the appeals court, any female genital mutilation is "horrifically brutal." The appeals court also said that federal courts and the Justice Department's immigration courts have established female genital mutilation as a type of persecution.

The family entered the U.S. legally in 1999 and applied for asylum in 2002 after the father's business visa expired. The appeals court ruling gives them the opportunity to challenge deportation to Indonesia, where their oldest daughter underwent forced genital mutilation when she was five days old. The family has said that a younger daughter would face ritual mutilation if they are deported and that keeping her from being deported would be meaningless if the rest of the family were deported.

In its decision, the court criticized immigration judges who ordered the family to be deported after citing a State Department report that said the type of female genital mutilation practiced in Indonesia "involves minimal short-term pain, suffering and complications." The State Department report contrasted the type of female genital mutilation in Indonesia with the kind practiced in Ethiopia, where the genitals are cut with a knife and recovery takes 40 days. Immigration officials ruled that the Indonesian girl had not been persecuted and that neither she nor her family was entitled to asylum in the U.S.

In the appeals court ruling, Judge Margaret McKeown said that the immigration review board's "attempt to parse the distinction between differing forms of female genital mutilation is ... a threat to the rights of women in a civilized society." The appeals court also cited a World Health Organization report that found even the least severe forms of female genital mutilation cause physical and psychological harm and create a risk of serious complications. Robert Ryan, the family's attorney, argued, "There's no such thing as mild female genital mutilation."

The court returned the case to the immigration board to decide whether the family's younger daughter faced a likelihood of genital mutilation in Indonesia and, if so, whether all family members are eligible for asylum or if they should be sent to Venezuela, the mother's native country and the birthplace of the younger daughter (Egelko, San Francisco Chronicle, 8/25).

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