One in 10 men in parts of Asia have raped: UN study

The combined sample prevalence of intimate partner rape in men who had ever had a partner was 24 per cent,ranging from 13 per cent in Bangladesh to 59 per cent in Papua New Guinea,according to the United Nations report.

Almost a quarter of men surveyed admitted to committing at least one rape. Of those who admitted rape,just under half said they had done so more than once.

For the study conducted in January 2011-December 2012,10,178 men were interviewed from nine sites in Asia and the Pacific across six countries: Bangladesh,China,Cambodia,Indonesia,Papua New Guinea,and Sri Lanka.

Men self-completed questions about rape perpetration but the word rape was not used in the questionnaire. Men were asked questions like: Have you ever had sex with your partner when you knew she didn’t want to but you thought she should agree because she’s your wife/ partner?

Another question was have you ever had sex with a woman or girl when she was too drunk or drugged to say whether she wanted it or not?

In Papua New Guinea,more than six out of 10 men surveyed admitted forcing a woman to have sex.

It was least common in urban areas of Bangladesh,where it was just under one in 10 and Sri Lanka where it was just over one in 10.

In Cambodia,China and Indonesia it ranged from one in five to almost half of all men surveyed.

Around 73 per cent of men who committed rape said they did so for reasons of “sexual entitlement”.

“They believed they had the right to have sex with the woman regardless of consent. The second most common motivation reported was to rape as a form of entertainment,so for fun or because they were bored,” report author Dr Emma Fulu was quoted as saying by the BBC.

Nearly 38 per cent men committed the act because they wanted to punish a woman and 27 per cent did so under the influence of alcohol.

Only 55 per cent of perpetrators felt guilty,while just 23 per cent had ever been sent to prison for rape.

Men who had themselves suffered violence as children,especially childhood sexual abuse were more likely to have committed rape.

Also,58 per cent of men who raped a non-partner committed their first rape as teenagers.

Rape of a man with prevalence of 3 per cent across the whole Asia and Pacific region was less common than rape of a non-partner woman,and had the highest prevalence in Papua New Guinea,rural Bangladesh,Sri Lanka and Cambodia.

The study was developed by Partners for Prevention,a regional joint programme of the UN Development Programme,the UN Population Fund,UN Women,and UN Volunteers for the prevention of gender-based violence in Asia and the Pacific,in collaboration with the Medical Research Council of South Africa and the individual country research teams.

“Although this study focused on countries in Asia and the Pacific,the findings are of substantial global interest,partly because most of the world’s population lives in this region and the countries are very culturally diverse,” said the study published in the journal Lancet Global Health.