- This decision is the result of a simultaneous international litigation strategy initiated in 2019 by the Son Niñas, No Madres (Girls, Not Mothers) Movement, and marks a milestone in guaranteeing sexual and reproductive rights, not only locally but globally.
- The Son Niñas, No Madres Movement urgently calls on the Guatemalan state to comply with the decisions of the United Nations, and on the international community to demand transparency, reforms and immediate action.
- The Son Niñas, No Madres Movement welcomes this decision, which joins the rulings against Ecuador and Nicaragua, published on January 20 by the United Nations Human Rights Committee, to prevent any other girl from being forced to become a mother.
On 5 June 2025, the UN Human Rights Committee issued a ruling against the State of Guatemala for violating the human rights of Fátima, a girl who survived repeated sexual violence by a teacher, and who was forced to continue with pregnancy and motherhood as a result of rape. This decision, which was made possible by litigation initiated in 2019 by the Son Niñas, No Madres Movement, reaffirms a fundamental principle: no girl should be forced to face unwanted pregnancy and motherhood.
“This ruling is a fundamental precedent in the protection of the human rights of girl victims of sexual violence and reaffirms the responsibility of the Guatemalan authorities to guarantee access to justice, comprehensive reparation and non-repetition. Just as importantly, this conviction is a crucial step towards justice for Fátima and her firm desire that no girl’s childhood should be taken away from her”, said the movement Son Niñas, No Madres.
This ruling is a fundamental precedent in the protection of the human rights of girl victims of sexual violence and reaffirms the responsibility of the Guatemalan authorities to guarantee access to justice, comprehensive reparation and non-repetition. Just as importantly, this conviction is a crucial step towards justice for Fátima and her firm desire that no girl’s childhood should be taken away from her.
The movement Son Niñas, No Madres
In its ruling, the committee stressed that by forcing Fátima to maintain a pregnancy with which she explicitly stated she did not want to continue, the state violated her rights to a dignified life, to make autonomous decisions about her body, to receive information, and to equality and non-discrimination. In this regard, the committee emphasized that forced motherhood interrupts and hinders girls’ personal, educational and professional goals, and severely restricts their right to a dignified life.
The committee also recognized that the sexual violence, forced pregnancy, and forced motherhood that Fátima faced caused her extreme suffering, including suicide attempts. Likewise, the state’s refusal to provide her with the reproductive health services to which she was entitled constituted cruel and inhuman treatment, and a form of discrimination based on stereotypes about the reproductive function of women.
The committee also establishes non-repetition measures to prevent other cases like Fátima’s from occurring, a particularly relevant decision given the worrying situation in Guatemala regarding child pregnancy. The figures are striking: between 2018 and 2024, the National Registry of Persons (RENAP) documented more than 14,000 births in girls aged 10 to 14 (an average of 2,000 births per year). The trend continues, as evidenced by Guatemala’s Sexual and Reproductive Health Observatory (OSAR), which between January and March 2025 documented 556 births in girls of the same age range.
Among the measures that the committee demanded from the State of Guatemala are:
- Ensure access to reproductive health services, eliminating medical, judicial and administrative barriers, as well as strengthening existing protocols for therapeutic abortion.
- Undertake actions to prevent sexual violence, including access to comprehensive sex education.
- Create a public reparation policy for survivors of sexual violence, forced pregnancy and forced motherhood, covering education, health and psychosocial support.
- Create a unified national registration system that documents cases of sexual violence and forced pregnancies to design effective public policies.
- Provide mandatory training for health, justice and education personnel on issues relating to gender, children, and human rights.
The decision in Fátima’s case joins previous rulings against Ecuador and Nicaragua (the cases of Norma, Lucía and Susana, January 2025) and against Peru (Camila’s case, in 2023, before the committee on the Rights of the Child).
Learn more about previous rulings
“With the decision in Fátima’s case, the United Nations has recognized something that we can no longer continue to ignore: no girl in this world should ever be forced to become a mother. Our girls were born to learn, to play, to dream of bright futures—not to mother or bear the consequences of violence. Forced motherhood is a form of torture. This is what the UN has established. It is the duty of states to act accordingly to eradicate sexual violence, ensure essential health services and guarantee the protection of girls’ rights, including the right to make decisions about their own bodies and life plans. Today, in honour of Fátima’s courage, we remind the entire world of a fundamental truth: They are girls, not mothers”, said Catalina Martínez Coral, Vice President for Latin America and the Caribbean at the Center for Reproductive Rights.
“Each ruling is not only a vindication for the girls who survived these violences, and who waited years for justice from the judicial systems in their countries, but also a beacon of hope for thousands who still face a landscape with no protection after surviving an event as painful as rape. With this ruling, we ratify the power of survivors’ voices, the importance of collective struggle, and the urgency of comprehensive approaches to prevent any other girl from having to abandon her childhood for forced motherhood”, says Marianny Sánchez, Communications Director for Latin America at Planned Parenthood Global, one of the movement’s founding organizations.
This decision is a milestone in guaranteeing human rights, not only at the local level, but also globally, as it obliges Guatemala and the more than 170 states that signed the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, to modify their legislation to guarantee the voluntary termination of pregnancy and ensure that no girl faces forced pregnancies or motherhood.
The Son Niñas, No Madres Movement urgently calls on the Guatemalan state to comply with its international obligations and implement all necessary measures so that no girl has to be forced to give up her dreams and life plans to take on forced motherhood.
With the decision in Fátima’s case, the United Nations has recognized something that we can no longer continue to ignore: no girl in this world should ever be forced to become a mother. Our girls were born to learn, to play, to dream of bright futures—not to mother or bear the consequences of violence. Forced motherhood is a form of torture.
Catalina Martínez Coral, Vice President for Latin America and the Caribbean at the Center for Reproductive Rights
Fátima’s story
Fátima was a girl from a low socioeconomic background in Guatemala. Between 2009 and 2010, when she was 13 years old, she was raped by a teacher who, paradoxically, had been an official of the agency responsible for protecting children, and she was subsequently forced to continue with the pregnancy resulting from the abuse. The system failed completely: health workers blamed her for her pregnancy and the legal system has not managed to capture her aggressor.
During her pregnancy, following harassment from education workers, Fátima was forced to give up school. When she wanted to return, they made her re-entry to the school conditional on her getting married. Then, even though she ranked top in academic achievement in the school, she was not allowed to carry the flag in the holiday parade because “what would people say about there being a pregnant girl at the school?” The girl and her family had to seek legal support for her to be able to return to school.
In the wake of sexual violence and unwanted pregnancy, Fátima had suicidal thoughts. In the health system, she was mistreated by medical staff who blamed her for the sexual violence she had suffered.
About the Son Niñas, No Madres Movement
Son Niñas, No Madres, is a Latin American movement for the rights of Latin American girls that has led innovative strategic litigation in the cases of Norma, Fátima, Susana and Lucía before the UN Human Rights Committee. The co-litigating organizations are the Center for Reproductive Rights, Planned Parenthood Global (Global), Mujeres Transformando el Mundo (Guatemala), Guatemala’s Sexual and Reproductive Health Observatory (Guatemala), Surkuna (Ecuador) and Promsex (Peru), which carried out a joint litigation strategy, of international scope, to prevent these cases from recurring and generate the corresponding reparations. It seeks to provide information about the serious consequences of sexual violence and forced motherhood on girls.
The movement was founded by Planned Parenthood Global, Amnesty International, Grupo de Información en Reproducción Elegida (GIRE) and the Latin American Consortium against Unsafe Abortion (CLACAI) with the aim of reporting on the serious consequences of sexual violence and forced motherhood on girls. The Son Niñas, No Madres Movement is today made up of more than a dozen organizations from across the Americas region to ensure that all girls can grow up healthy, strong and safe, and can make free and informed decisions about their health and their future.
Read the full stories here
Learn more about these cases with the ‘Son Niñas, No Madres’ podcast on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3CRfE5tXaOIHqWx0nECfUW
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