Pressure on women to give birth to boys is fueling a culture of discrimination and violence against women and girls according to a report released by the United Nations agencies on Wednesday.
The report jointly released by UNICEF, UN Human Rights, UNFPA and WHO states that sex selection favoring boys can lead to violence, abandonment, divorce or even death among women who give birth to girls.
The son preference culture is common in many parts of South, East and Central Asia. The report says the preference of boys over girls was an abhorrent form of gender discrimination which must be brought to an end.
Rupert Colville from the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights at the UN headquarters in New York says that sex selection in favor of boys, is a symptom of pervasive social discrimination.
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The report says the preference of boys over girls has caused sex ratio imbalance in many countries particularly in South Asia, East Asia and Central Asia where ratios as high as 130 boys for every 100 girls have been observed.
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