violence against children WORLD REPORT ON - CRIN

“They treat you badly. You don’t feel like walking in the street, they give you names. They whisperwhen you pass. They take it that when one person in the house is sick, all of you in that house are sick.”Girl, 16, Eastern and Southern Africa, 2003 II296Violence against children in the communityin the street, and who rarely or never go home.In Nairobi, for example, local NGOs estimatenumbers to be as high as 20,000. 62 In China,one countrywide estimate was 150,000, 63 andin Indonesia it was 170,000. 64 The majorityof children living on the street everywhere areboys. 65Discrimination and violence against childrenliving on the street often stems from the stigmaassociated with having no family (of course,many do have families) and with the activitiesthey may have to adopt to survive. Childrenliving on the street everywhere report beingdemonised for activities which – even theyinvolves petty offences – in no way warrant thekind of cruel and gratuitous violence to whichthey are often subjected. 66Murder of children living on the street has beenreported from Colombia, Brazil, Guatemala,and the Philippines. 67 Appalling brutality hasbeen documented in the Haitian capital of Portau-Princewhere the 3,000 children who liveon the streets are frequently targeted by armedvigilantes. 68 The extent of serious human rightsviolations may be much greater than the few andunreliable available figures indicate. Many casesare not reported because of the lack of witnesses,or because victims or their relatives live on thefringes of society, and tend to remain anonymous.The World Organisation against Torturereported that in Ciudad Boliviar, Bogota,Colombia, 850 children and adolescents wereassassinated between 2000–2004, and that 620were abducted between August 2003 and August2004. The national police force was amongthose cited as being responsible for this. 69UNICEF/HQ05-1829. Giacomo PirozziUKRAINE, 2005, Two boys sniff glue in a sewage pipe inthe port city of Odessa.Girls and boys living on the street are vulnerableto sexual abuse from many individuals,including from passers-by and from thosewho offer them shelter. 70 They also risk beingrecruited by pimps and traffickers for sexualand economic exploitation, or having to resortto ‘survival sex’ (sex in exchange for food orshelter). 71HIV and violence in the communityChildren whose parents are ill because of HIV/AIDS or those who have been orphaned by thedisease face psychological violence, stigma anddiscrimination. They may be rejected by theirfriends and schoolmates, as well as at healthcentres. In addition to the grief and loss theyfeel, the estimated 15 million orphans due toAIDS face growing up without adequate bond-