Ministers with responsibility for child protection, along with experts in child protection, law, policy reform, health and other sectors from around the Caribbean will meet in Barbados next week for a conference themed ‘Combating Sexual Violence Against Children – From Isolated Actions to Integrated Strategies’.
According to a press release from the United Nations (UN) Secretary-General’s UNiTE campaign to End Violence Against Women, the delegations from Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Montserrat, Saint Lucia, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago, the Turks and Caicos Islands, and the British Virgin Islands, will focus on ending sexual violence against children.
The conference will seek to identify coordinated responses to the problem.
The Government of Barbados and UN Caribbean offices will host the conference, which is also being supported by the British High Commission in Bridgetown and the United States Embassy for Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean. The venue is the Hilton Barbados Resort and the dates are November 20 to 21.
The release said that the main objectives of the conference are to create a network of participating countries that can share initiatives on ending violence against children and to produce a country-level action agenda. The anticipated outcome will be a political commitment to the implementation and enforcement of mandatory reporting policies and the resolution of child sexual abuse cases by professionals.
This conference, the press release noted, is being convened on the heels of a special Caricom Council on Human and Social Development (COSHOD) meeting, held in Guyana in July 2012, where ministers from throughout the Caribbean sub-region expressed grave concern about the alarming prevalence of sexual abuse of children in member states and in their communiqué pledged to develop an “integrated approach – combining strong responsive and preventive measures that emphasize child care and protection, and those to end impunity.”
Barbados’ Minister of Family, Culture, Sports and Youth, Stephen Lashley; UN Resident Coordinator for Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean, Michelle Gyles-McDonnough; Caricom Secretary-General Irwin LaRocque; and UNICEF Regional Director for Latin America and the Caribbean, Bernt Aasen, will address the opening ceremony.
