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[BANGKOK, 14 June 2005] - During the second session, there were two
presentations on the issues affecting the region. Vitit Muntabhorn, from
the Faculty of Law of the Chulalongkorn University, and former UN Special
Rapporteur on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child
Pornography gave a few personal experiences of having to cope with the
psychological effects of violence as a child. He explained tha although
many say that violence against children is invisible, most people have
experienced it in some form during their childhood and have had to cope
with the psychological effects of violence.
He said in the Asia Pacific region, most responses have been related to the
law, but this is not adequate, the law is not complete. The UN Convention
on the Rights of the Child has been revolutionising, however many
countries still do not have laws against corporal punishment, one or two
countries still have a problem with capital punishment for youth. Violence is
culturally integrated and power related, “as a lawyer I would say, prepare
the people, not the law. We have to have a public debate”, he said.
Some of the main concerns for the region are as follows:
- violence is personal and societal
- it is is invisible, or allegedly invisible (data is sparse), and sometimes you
see it but do not know what to do with it, especially in the family, where
some consider it a private matter
- there are different categories of instances where it happens: in the
house, in schools, the family, on the streets, in detention centres, within
the law enforcement systems, there is corporal punishment, single
incidents and multiple ones, sexual exploitation, etc. Physical and
psychological, long term, generational, inter-generational, gender related
- traditional and technological violence; such as early marriage, corporal
punishment, and technology is arriving at our doorsteps with issues such
as pornography on the internet
Some positive progress:
- Thailand has a new protection law, where if one finds a case of abuse,
that person is required by law to report it. But must go together with
socialisation
- In Malaysia, in cases of domestic violence, one can ask for an interim
lawyer to keep abusers away while the case is being dealt with by the
courts
- more and more countries have inter-disciplinary teams, composed of
psychologists working with lawyers, teachers, protection teams, special
units, etc.
- National Human rights commissions exist in more than 15 countries
- Timor Leste has a national child ombudsmen person
As author of the regional report, Sawon Hong then presented a general
picture of the situation of violence against children in the East Asia and
Pacific region. The findings were based on regional assessments from
existing research gathered from government agencies, academia, NGOs,
etc. She emphasised that country comparisons cannot be considered as
comprehensive, but hopefully with the study, this would be realised in the
future.
Key facts for the region: there are 1.9 billion people in East Asia and
Pacific, including 600 million children, some countries are very large, others
very small, some wealthy, others poor. The region has linguistic, religious,
and cultural diversitities, and there are diverse political systems.
Common patterns from review :
- violence that occurs in the home and family: this type of violence
is often a root cause of violence in other sectors;
- physical and psychological violence occurs everywhere,
examples of violence perpetrated against domestic workers, and corporal
punishment, which is accepted and in some cases, encouraged, remains
legal in all countries;
- the perpetrators: most violence is perpetrated by those who are
responsible for the care and protection of children, state actors (in police
custody for instance), and children themselves, such as bullying;
- gender difference; boys are more often physically assaulted, but
girls are more often sexually assaulted than boys
Two main causes:
- vulnerability of children: Children are not vulnerable, but are
made vulnerable by factors such as hierarchical traditions, socio economic
and political forces.
- inadequate protection mechanisms: owing to weakness of
legislative and justice systems, lack of knowledge, political cultural
sensitivities and lack of social support groups
More details, including a summary of the report are available
href='http://www.crin.org/violence/search/closeup.asp?infoID=5695'>
here
During the afternoon session, delegates were divided into various
thematic working-groups. These were as follows:
- Violence against children in the home and the family
- Violence against children in schools and other educational settings
- Violence against children in institutions
- violence against children in cyberspace/online environment
- Violence against children in conflict with the law
- Violence in the street and the community
- Violence in the workplace