violence against children WORLD REPORT ON - CRIN

“How can we expect children to take human rights seriously and to help build a culture of humanrights, while we adults not only persist in slapping, spanking, smacking and beating them, but actuallydefend doing so as being ‘ for their own good’? Smacking children is not just a lesson in bad behaviour;it is a potent demonstration of contempt for the human rights of smaller, weaker people.”Thomas Hammarberg, Commissioner for Human Rights of the Council of Europe, 2006 II1FIGURE 1.1Percentage of the world’s children who are legally protectedfrom corporal punishmentHome2Protected Not protected Unknown980Alternative care47818School42580Penal system(corporal punishmentas sentence)Penal sytem(corporal punishmentas disciplinary measure)Source: Global Initiative to End all Corporal Punishment of Children (2006). Global Summary ofthe Legal Status of Corporal Punishment of Children. 28 July 2006.Range and scale ofthe problemA variety of initiatives, ranging from internationalcomparative studies to small-scale interviewstudies with children at local level, are providinga clearer picture of the magnitude andpervasive nature of the problem in all regions.Information generated by these initiatives indicatesthat, while some violence against childrenis perpetrated by strangers, the vast majority ofviolent acts is perpetrated by people who are partof the child victim’s immediate environment:parents and the wider family, boyfriends or girlfriends,spouses and partners, teachers, schoolmates,and employers. The following examples42810 20 40 60 80 100Percentage of children55give some idea of the range and scale of violenceagainst children covered by the Study:• WHO estimates that almost 53,000child deaths in 2002 were homicides. 14(See Annex for regional homicide ratesby age, income group and sex.)• In the Global School-Based StudentHealth Survey carried out in awide range of developing countries,between 20% and 65% of schoolagedchildren reported having beenverbally or physically bullied in schoolin the previous 30 days. 15 Similarrates of bullying have been found inindustrialised countries. 16192011An end to violence against children