Local and foreign “consumers” and organizers of the sex industry are
also perpetrators of child prostitution. Every year, tourists and locals, overwhelmingly
men, create a huge demand for children and adolescents. This demand is often met
by sending, abducting and selling local children from economically
disadvantaged areas to various cities under the disguise of “work”. This
prostitution is often organized and run by local men and women who profit from
this exchange. Refugee children are among those particularly at risk of being
subjected to exploitation due to their economic instability and physical
displacement. Increasingly younger girls are particularly at risk because they
are thought, by the perpetrators, to have fewer diseases than older girl.
We can protect the
children .It is self-evident that it is better to take steps to prevent
exploitation than to deal with its consequences. However, the concept of
prevention is deceptively complex and can take many forms. When devising a programme,
it may be helpful to begin by asking what is being prevented, how this is being
achieved, and how the results will be demonstrated. For example, in respect to
working children, prevention can be applied in various ways, and at different
levels by impacting on the reasons why children need to work, and providing meaningful
alternatives for children and families, promoting awareness of the importance
of education and discouraging parents from allowing children to work, by
interventions to prevent working children from drifting into more exploitative
types of work.
Many preventive strategies will
impact on both labour and sexual exploitation. The following are some key
issues that might be addressed. Assessing risk by means of a child-centered
situation analysis is an essential precondition for any preventive strategy.
This will need to involve governmental and non-governmental agencies, other UN
bodies and refugees themselves; including children .Facilitating children’s
access to education - including secondary and vocational education - will be
significant in diminishing risks of exploitation. Public education may help to
raise awareness of the value of education within the community. Educating
children on their rights, with various forms of social and life skills training
will help them. Supriya MACJ
No comments:
Post a Comment