124 GENDER PERSPECTIVES ON TORTURE: Law and Practice Introduction “They touched our breasts and stomachs to see if we were pregnant. Some girls were made to take urine tests.”1 In some countries girls routinely face mandatory or coerced pregnancy tests in order to gain access to school or to sit exams.2 Some of these “tests” involve teachers feeling girls’ breasts and stomachs or compelling them to take urine tests. Girls are then frequently subjected to public shaming and punishment. Pregnancy status is still a disciplinary offence in some countries, and girls in such discriminatory contexts are excluded from school if suspected of being, or found to be, pregnant.3 In other contexts, humiliating, degrading and discriminatory “virginity” tests are a prerequisite for girls seeking to enrol in school or college, sit exams, or apply for bursaries for study.4 The issue of mandatory pregnancy and “virginity” tests in educational settings was raised by the mandate of the United Nations (UN) Special Rapporteur on Torture in former mandate holder Juan E. Méndez’s ground-breaking report on gender and torture or other ill-treatment.5 This article explores these two very specific violations of the right of girls6 to be free from torture and other ill-treatment in educational settings. 1 Amnesty International, Shamed and Blamed: Pregnant girls’ rights at risk in Sierra Leone (Index: AFR 51/2695/2015), interview with 18-year old-girl, Sierra Leone, 2015, p. 26, available at https://www.amnesty. org/en/documents/afr51/2695/2015/en/. 2 Amnesty International, Shamed and Blamed: Pregnant girls’ rights at risk in Sierra Leone. Further, a follow up research trip findings also provide further testimony and evidence for the continued violation of girls’ human rights: Amnesty International, Sierra Leone: Continued pregnancy ban in schools and failure to protect rights is threatening teenage girls’ futures, 2016, available at https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2016/11/ sierra-leone-continued-pregnancy-ban-in-schools-and-failure-to-protect-rights-is-threatening-teenage-girls­ futures/; Further, Center for Reproductive Rights, Forced Out: Mandatory Pregnancy Testing and the Expulsion of Pregnant Students in Tanzanian Schools, 2013, available at https://www.reproductiverights.org/document/ tanzania-report-forced-out-mandatory-pregnancy-testing-expulsion. 3 Amnesty International, Shamed and Blamed: Pregnant girls’ rights at risk in Sierra Leone; Amnesty International, Sierra Leone: Continued pregnancy ban in schools and failure to protect rights is threatening teenage girls’ futures, 2016; and Center for Reproductive Rights, Forced Out: Mandatory Pregnancy Testing and the Expulsion of Pregnant Students in Tanzanian Schools, 2013. 4 News24, Girls be warned: Lose your virginity, you lose your bursary, 22 January 2016, available at http:// www.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/municipality-warns-maidens-lose-your-virginity-lose-your­ bursary-20160122; The Guardian, South Africa’s ‘virgin bursaries’ ruled unconstitutional, 17 June 2016, available at: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/jun/17/south-africa-virgin-bursaries-ruled-unconstitutional­ university-scholarships-women-gender-equality-education; Human Rights Watch, Indonesia: Military Imposing ‘Virginity Tests’, 13 May 2015, available at: https://www.hrw.org/news/2014/11/17/ indonesia-virginity-tests-female-police; Human Rights Watch, Abusive, Inaccurate ‘Virginity Tests’ Won’t Help, Educating Children Will, 14 September 2014, available at https://www.hrw.org/news/2013/09/14/ abusive-inaccurate-virginity-tests-wont-help-educating-children-will. 5 In the report by the Special Rapporteur to the Human Rights Council titled Gender perspectives on torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment (A/HRC/31/57) the issues of virginity testing, forced or coerced pregnancy testing and the expulsion of pregnant girls from school are specifically raised in paragraph 46 of the report, as follows: “In some States, such practices include requiring sex workers to undergo weekly gynaecological examinations and blood tests, and forced or coerced pregnancy testing by means of physical examination or urine testing as a precondition for attending schools and public examinations. Virginity testing and the expulsion of pregnant girls from schools, which often result in long-term harmful consequences, constitute forms of discrimination and ill-treatment” and, further, in paragraph 71(f) of the report, which recommends that states “Effectively monitor and regulate practices by public and private actors in health-care and educational settings to ensure the eradication of prohibited practices including, inter alia, the denial of maternal health care and compulsory medical examinations such as forced pregnancy and virginity testing, and investigate, prosecute and punish perpetrators;” 6 Although the article largely focuses on girls under the age of 18, women who have also been subjected to virginity testing in higher educational settings such as academies and colleges are also referred to.