'What does the Ministry of Family do for the Prevention of Sexual Abuse of Children?'

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Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) Muş MP Şevin Coşkun has brought up the child abuse to the parliamentary agenda.

Muş MP Coşkun has reminded that the Convention on the Rights of the Child accepted by the United Nations (UN) on November 20, 1989 has been signed by the Republic of Turkey on October 14, 1990 and entered in force after being published on the Official Gazette on January 27, 1995.

In her parliamentary question, Coşkun has also given reference to the bianet's April 2019 Male Violence Monitoring Report.

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"The signees of the Convention on the Rights of the Child are obligated to take legal and social precautions to protect every individual who is younger than 18 years of age against violence and abuse. The number of the children abused in Turkey despite the obligation of protecting all the rights of the children has been continuously increasing."

In this context, HDP Muş MP has addressed following questions to Zehra Zümrüt, the Minister of Family, Labor and Social Services:

• How many children have been reported as exposed to sexual abuse and sexual harassment between the years 2002-2019?
• How many lawsuits of sexual abuse and/or sexual harassment are in progress?
• How many verdicts of non-prosecution and/or settled case with the cases related to the "child sexual abuse" have been there since 2002?
• Which penalties have been inflicted on the perpetrators in the child abuse cases settled with the sentence?
• The signatory countries of the Convention on the Rights of the Child are obligated to take legal and social precautions to protect every individual who is younger than 18 years of age against violence and abuse. Are there any preventative actions conducted by the Ministry for the prevention of the child abuse? If yes, what are they?
• Is there any working of the Ministry and the related ministries so that the children who were exposed to sexual abuse could get over their traumas and healthfully maintain their lives? If yes, what are they?
• Do you have any works on the statistical data on the child abuse, violations of children's rights, violence and deliberate murders in Turkey? If yes, why are these statistics not shared with the public?

Men sexually abused 13 girls in April 2019

According to the news reports compiled by bianet from local and national newspapers, news websites and agencies, men sexually abused 13 girls in the fourth month of 2019. Last year in the same month, this number was 37. A man tried to kidnap a girl in İstanbul. Also, a man in Kütahya opened fire with a shotgun towards two boys because they made noise.

Two of the children were abused by the security staff in their school, one by her step-father, nine by the men whom they do not know. A girl was abused by the ex-husband of her older sister.

Men abused two of the children at school, one at the school garden, one at the workplace, two at the well, two at home, two on the street, and two on the collective taxi (dolmuş). (AÖ/TY/SD)