Forced birth control in Greenland violated women’s rights, experts find
Summary
Greenland is creating a truth and reconciliation commission to investigate a forced birth control program that affected Indigenous Greenlandic Inuit women from the 1960s to 1990s. The program involved inserting contraceptives without consent, leading to serious health issues and infertility for some women. Experts disagree if these actions count as genocide, and Greenland aims to uncover the truth for reconciliation.Key Facts
- Between the 1960s and 1990s, at least 4,000 Greenlandic Inuit girls and women, some as young as 12, were given IUDs or contraceptive injections without their knowledge or consent.
- The program was intended by Danish authorities to reduce birth rates to improve living and health conditions in Greenland, a semi-autonomous territory of Denmark.
- Some victims suffered infections, scarring, or had their uterus removed, which caused infertility.
- Two expert reports disagreed on whether the forced contraception constituted genocide.
- Greenland’s government set up a four-member commission in 2024 to investigate the campaign further.
- Greenland’s Prime Minister said the goal is to find the truth and achieve reconciliation, not to assign blame.
- Denmark apologized in 2023 for the discrimination against Greenlanders and the parliament approved compensation payments of up to about $47,000 per affected woman.
- Some victims expressed frustration that no Greenlandic Inuit experts were involved in the investigation and called for an independent international court to decide on the genocide question.
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