CHILE-WOMEN: FACING UP TO DOMESTIC VIOLENCE.

Publication: Women's E-News

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COPYRIGHT 2004 Global Information Network

By Jen Ross

SANTIAGO, CHILE, December 31 2004 (WOMENSENEWS) Four years ago, just before Christmas, Teresa Lobos was planning her suicide.

After 17 years of physical and emotional abuse by her husband, she says she had hit rock bottom.

"I went into a crisis that night and I wanted to kill myself," say Lobos, 40, her husky voice cracking. "I imagined tying the noose and everything. Death was on my doorstep." Domestic abuse is widespread across Latin America.

Women who report having been beaten by a spouse range from 22 percent in the Dominican Republic to 44 percent in Colombia, according to a June 2004 survey by Monitoring and Evaluation to Assess and Use Results, or MEASURE, a Maryland-based organization that collects data for The U.S. Agency for International Development. The 2002 U.S. National Crime Victimization Survey shows 1-in-5 crimes against women were violent incidents involving an intimate partner.

But in...

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