Woman feared a ‘curse’ if she ‘refused to hand child over for FGM’ | UK News

A woman was afraid she’d be ‘cursed’ if she didn’t allow a three-year-old girl British girl undergo female genital mutilation (FGM) in Kenya, a court has heard.

Somali-born Amina Noor, 39, is charged with assisting a non-UK person to mutilate the girl’s genitalia in 2006.

The alleged offence only came to light in 2018 after the girl confided in her English teacher at school when she was 16.

Noor, who is on trial at the Old Bailey, told the court today that she would have been ‘disowned and cursed’ by community members if she did not take part.

The court heard that on a trip to Kenya, Noor and the girl travelled with another woman in a tuk-tuk to a private house where the procedure took place.

When Noor was initially interviewed by police, she denied that anyone made threats to force her to agree to FGM.

But in her defence at the trial she said she had been warned she would be disowned.

She said: ‘I didn’t know whether this was going to be something that is harming (the girl) but I did not want to allow it whatever it might be.

‘I was told I would be cursed if I refuse.’

She told the court she ‘felt pain’ over the threat, adding: ‘That was a pressure I had no power to do anything about.’

Prosecutor Deanna Heer KC asked the defendant why she had not told police before.

Noor said she did not think it was safe to say anything and also that she had not been asked about it.

She also claimed what she’d said about being ‘disowned’ and ‘cursed’ was not passed on by the interpreter, although jurors were told she had agreed translations of the interviews.

Noor was born in Somalia, the court heard, and moved to Kenya at the age of eight during the civil war in her home country.

She moved to the UK at the age of 16, and was later granted British citizenship.

According to United Nations’ figures, 94% of females of Somali origin living in Kenya undergo FGM, the court heard.

There was no dispute in the case that the girl had undergone FGM outside the UK by a Kenyan woman. It’s also agreed by all that the victim was a UK citizen.

The girl, who is now aged 21, cannot be identified for legal reasons.

Noor, from Harrow, north-west London, denies the charge against her and the trial continues.

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