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"I've been working in the field of refugee studies for more than ten years now," Paszkiewicz told me. "In recent years I have seen positive changes in the UK Government's approach to women's rights, so on the surface it looks like finally women's issues are taken on board, but then I realized that there is a discrepancy between how women are treated in the UK, if they are British citizens, as opposed to how women who are seeking asylum are treated.""If we want to protect women and girls from FGM we have to protect them not just in this country and in countries abroad but also when they flee from abroad to seek protection here in the UK. Anything less smacks of hypocrisy." –Debora Singer
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Paszkiewicz ventures that, rather than being considered on its merits, Maimuna's case may have been rejected in part because it was too high profile. "If her case was successful it might have quite broad implications for how women fleeing FGM are treated," she said – which is frightening if, by the same logic, the rejection of Maimuna's claim sets a precedent for rejecting other women and children fleeing FGM.Maimuna has exhausted her right to appeal, but she is actively protesting against the Home Office decision. She says she won't stop campaigning against FGM either, whatever happens to her as a consequence."Sometimes I question why I left all of my children," she says, "but when I think of those girls, when I think of what happened to me, I don't want it to happen to those girls. This is the fight that I take. My campaign is not to campaign until I am granted asylum and then forget it and go. No. I'm taking it forever."Follow Charlotte on Twitter."I started thinking, to stop being a cutter is a crime in my home country, but it's not only there—it can be a crime anywhere else." –Maimuna Jawo