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18th
October, 2006
Much
of the violence against children is hidden and is often socially
approved, according to a landmark United Nations study presented
to the UN’s General Assembly earlier this month.
The United Nations Secretary-General’s Study on
Violence Against Children shows that violence against
children ranges “from sexual abuse at home to corporal
and humiliating punishment at school; from the use of physical
restraints in children’s home to brutality at the hands
of law enforcement officers; from abuse and neglect in institutions
to gang warfare on the streets where children play or work;
from infanticide to so-called ‘honour’ killing”.
The study focused on five settings were violence occurs -
the home and family, schools and educational settings, institutions
(both care and judicial), the workplace and the community.
The latest statistics from the World Health Organisation estimate
that as many as 53,000 children aged up to 17-years-old died
in 2002 as a result of homicide while figures from the International
Labour Office estimate that as many as 5.7 million children
were in forced or bonded labour, 1.8 million were in prostitution
or pornography and 1.2 million were victims of trafficking
in 2000.
A Global School-Based Health Survey of 16 developing countries
showed that between 20 and 65 per cent of school-aged children
reported being verbally or physically abused in the previous
30 days.
“The best way to deal with violence against children
is to stop it before it happens,” says Professor Paulo
Sergio Pinheiro, the independent expert appointed by the Secretary-General
to lead the study.
“Everyone has a role to play in this, but states must
take the primary responsibility. That means prohibiting all
kinds of violence against children, wherever it occurs and
whoever is the perpetrator, and investing in prevention programmes
to address the underlying causes.
“People must be held accountable for their actions but
a strong legal framework is not only about sanctions, it is
about sending a robust, unequivocal signal that society just
will not accept violence against children.”
- DAVID ADAMS
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