COUNCIL OF EUROPE: Consultation with experts on the prevention of sexual abuse of children

The Council of Europe Children’s Strategy for 2009-2011 ‘Provision, Protection and Participation in Europe’ has, amongst its major focuses, that of eradicating all forms of violence against children.

In particular, it calls upon the organisation to launch comprehensive awareness-raising actions to prevent and combat sexual exploitation and sexual abuse of children.

In response to this mandate, the Council of Europe shall in autumn 2010, launch a Europe-wide campaign to stop sexual violence against children.

A call for expressions of interest was addressed to experts wishing to participate in a meeting held in Strasbourg on 10 -11 December 2009 to prepare a specific aspect of the coming campaign: the prevention of child sexual abuse within the family and community.

This report summarises the contributions of the participants who attended the meeting in December 2009 and is based on:

• the information given in presentations from the experts at the meeting;

and

• the discussions that followed presentations and took place in plenary summary events.

Experts’ contributions were summarised by the rapporteur and presented at the close of proceedings for participants to consider. The result of the discussion that followed is included in this report.

Further information 

• More on children and violence
  
• UN Study on Violence Against Children
• More on children and sexual exploitation