Mrs. Compaore,

Please accept our sincere congratulations for your appearance on the show Africanité on channel TV5, this past September 27. We wish to express our heartfelt admiration and joy for your continued support in the fight against Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) in Faso including your support to Avfe-ClitorAid during the grand opening of our Kamkaso Hospital in Bobo Dioulasso that you had planned to inaugurate this past spring.

Unfortunately, several unpleasant and deliberate administrative setbacks resulting from religious discrimination delayed the opening and inauguration of the Hospital. Consequently, the ceremony had to be postponed. But despite this difficulty, our American surgeon volunteers were still able to help 38 FGM victims at a nearby clinic. These patients were from Burkina Faso, other neighboring countries, as well as from the Horn of Africa, all eager to undergo the surgical procedure. But today, the reality is that our waiting lists still grow and we have hundreds more women who implore us every day to help them regain their dignity and sense of pleasure as a woman. (Our surgeries are completely free for charge)

This is why your recent interview on TV5-world has caught our attention again. As you know, it has now been ten years since we first engaged in this battle that means a lot to you. But unfortunately, our humanitarian association is still unable to help these circumcised women in spite of the fact that our hospital has been fully equipped and operational to treat women for the past six months. To this end, you can imagine the frustration our four American doctors and surgeons experienced this past March when their temporary licenses to practice, which were initially issued by the Faso Board of Doctors, were arbitrarily revoked in the midst of a humanitarian undertaking that the First Lady of Burkina Faso holds so dear.

After listening to your speech on TV5 we would be more than happy to help you in this great humanitarian cause and await this opportunity with great enthusiasm. Your full support would be incredibly meaningful to the hundreds of women who are still waiting to be treated. It goes without saying that the sooner the better because each month that goes by without the use of our hospital is another cry of pain for these women who have been scarred by circumcision.

We eagerly wish to inaugurate our hospital on February 6, 2015, a day that the UN has decreed, "Zero Tolerance Day for FGM." On that day, we would be honored by your presence that you so generously promised in October 2013 and again in March 2014.

With your latest televised support for the abolition of Female Genital Mutilation and the violence against women, we are confident that the administration of your country will reexamine our request with better judgment and facilitate the opening of our hospital dedicated to your cause. It is also our hope that this will be done prior to "Zero Tolerance Day to FGM" and without any problem for our American surgeon volunteers who dedicate part of their lives to this great humanitarian cause and who do not deserve to have their licenses revoked by the Burkinabe Board of Doctors for unsubstantiated reasons.

Our excised sisters deserve the best from all of us regardless of our individual spiritual differences. And what great opportunity to make it happen in Burkina Faso, the best example of this rich and respectful symbiosis of diverse spiritual communities.

We hope to hear from you soon.

In the meantime, please accept, Madam, our warmest regards.

Nadine Gary

Communications Director

Obstetrician/gynecologist who opposed AVFE/CLITORAID Kamkaso Hospital opening must pay punitive damages

LAS VEGAS, July 7 – In a verdict released on June 30, the Ouagadougou Supreme Court of Burkina Faso, West Africa, found Professor Charlemagne Marie Ouedraogo guilty of defaming the Raelian Church of Bukina Faso. The court sentenced Ouedraogo to a stiff fine of 100, 000 FCFA plus 1 million FCFA in punitive damages, payable to the Raelian Church. He must also pay for the cost of the trial.

AVFE/Clitoraid’s Kamkaso Hospital, the world’s first clinic to offer free repair surgery for victims of female genital mutilation (FGM), had scheduled its grand opening for March 7, 2014, but Ouedraogo and others vigorously opposed it. Subsequently, Burkina Faso’s Health Minister issued a last-minute decision denying the facility the right to open.

“That decision caused continued suffering and disappointment for our patients, many of whom had traveled long distances to have the surgery,” said Clitoraid Communications Director Nadine Gary. “Our volunteer doctors and nurses who had flown in from abroad to do the surgeries were shocked, as were the thousands of donors whose financial contributions made the hospital construction possible.”

Gary said Ouedraogo issued a defamatory letter on February 24, 2014, in which he referred to the Kamkaso Hospital project as “a big scam campaign organized by Rael’s cult.”

“He wrote that letter shortly after we issued a press release announcing the hospital opening, and his comments could easily have prompted the Health Minister’s decision,” Gary said. “In fact, the letter even included the statement, ‘The minister and the governor have decided to stop this intoxication campaign.’ At any rate, the Health Minister refused to grant us authorization to open the clinic, and after that, the Medical Association repealed our volunteer doctors’ licenses to practice in Burkina Faso.”

The Raelian Church and the AVFE/CLITORAID Association subsequently filed the defamation lawsuit against Ouedraogo.

“We’re elated with the court ruling,” Gary said. “Professor Ouedraogo and his supporters should be ashamed for blocking our humanitarian effort. They catered to personal interests at the expense of women who suffer daily from FGM effects. When our hospital finally opens to help them, it will be a great success story that people will talk about for years to come."

LAS VEGAS, July 7 – In a verdict released on June 30, the Ouagadougou Supreme Court of Burkina Faso, West Africa, found Professor Charlemagne Marie Ouedraogo guilty of defaming the Raelian Church of Bukina Faso. The court sentenced Ouedraogo to a stiff fine of 100, 000 FCFA plus 1 million FCFA in punitive damages, payable to the Raelian Church. He must also pay for the cost of the trial.

AVFE/Clitoraid’s Kamkaso Hospital, the world’s first clinic to offer free repair surgery for victims of female genital mutilation (FGM), had scheduled its grand opening for March 7, 2014, but Ouedraogo and others vigorously opposed it. Subsequently, Burkina Faso’s Health Minister issued a last-minute decision denying the facility the right to open.

“That decision caused continued suffering and disappointment for our patients, many of whom had traveled long distances to have the surgery,” said Clitoraid Communications Director Nadine Gary. “Our volunteer doctors and nurses who had flown in from abroad to do the surgeries were shocked, as were the thousands of donors whose financial contributions made the hospital construction possible.”

Gary said Ouedraogo issued a defamatory letter on February 24, 2014, in which he referred to the Kamkaso Hospital project as “a big scam campaign organized by Rael’s cult.”
“He wrote that letter shortly after we issued a press release announcing the hospital opening, and his comments could easily have prompted the Health Minister’s decision,” Gary said. “In fact, the letter even included the statement, ‘The minister and the governor have decided to stop this intoxication campaign.’ At any rate, the Health Minister refused to grant us authorization to open the clinic, and after that, the Medical Association repealed our volunteer doctors’ licenses to practice in Burkina Faso.”

The Raelian Church and the AVFE/CLITORAID Association subsequently filed the defamation lawsuit against Ouedraogo.

“We’re elated with the court ruling,” Gary said. “Professor Ouedraogo and his supporters should be ashamed for blocking our humanitarian effort. They catered to personal interests at the expense of women who suffer daily from FGM effects. When our hospital finally opens to help them, it will be a great success story that people will talk about for years to come."

LAS VEGAS, May 4 – “Today, we’re launching our second annual International Clitoris Awareness Week, May 4-11,” said Nadine Gary, Clitoraid spokesperson. “We invite women worldwide to defend, explore and rejoice in their right to sexual pleasure.”

Although Clitoraid focuses on clitoral repair surgery for women suffering effects of Female Genital Mutilation (FGM), its central mission is to raise public awareness.

"In some African countries, 98 percent of the women have had their sexual organs mutilated,” Gary said. “They will never experience sexual pleasure unless they have the surgery that Clitoraid is offering to do right now for free in Burkina Faso, and soon in many other countries. But there is also a mental mutilation component, one that almost all women worldwide suffer from after being told for centuries that sensuality and sexuality are dirty.”

Clitoraid was the vision of Rael, founder and spiritual head of the Raelian Movement.

“He wrote 'Sensual Meditation,' a book emphasizing the importance of pleasure for men and women, and he pointed out that repression of sexual pleasure is damaging to our fulfillment as human beings,” Gary said, adding that women have born the brunt of that repression.



“The clitoris is a magnificent organ that has been ignored, vilified, made taboo, and even considered sinful through antiquated, patriarchal religious teachings,” she explained. “It’s time to give it the attention it deserves as the only organ with an exclusive sexual pleasure function!”

Gary said it’s easy to see why Western women still experience sexual guilt.“Not that long ago, 'nymphomania' was considered a disease, and masturbation was thought to cause blindness and premature death,” she pointed out. Doctors even believed that sexual arousal destroys a woman’s mental balance!”

The clitoris, boasting the most nerve endings of any human organ (8,000, against 5,000 in the penis), was declared the source of the purported problems.



“In 1865, the president of the British Medical Society recommended clitoral excision to cure illnesses like epilepsy and hysteria,” Gary said.” And scientists didn’t fully research the clitoris until recently. Dr. Helen O’Connell, an Australian urologist, mapped it completely 8 years ago, using an MRI device.”

Clitoraid is inviting women to organize special events this week. “They should celebrate their sexual beauty,” Gary said. “Sexual expression brings self-esteem and inner balance, so let's celebrate the clitoris without shame or guilt!”

The most joyful celebration is expected to take place in Burkina Faso, West Africa, where a group of FGM victims is celebrating surgically restored clitorises this week, thanks to Clitoraid. “They’re experiencing sexual pleasure sensations for the first time!” Gary exclaimed, adding that the woman had the free surgery 2 months ago under

Clitoraid volunteer surgeons Dr. Marci Bowers and Dr. Harold Henning, who flew to Burkina Faso for our first medical humanitarian mission there.

b]Clitoris Awareness Week[/b]