| The BBC notices what we've been talking about the last three years. |
Children in post-conflict areas are being abused by the very people drafted into such zones to help look after them, says Save the Children. After research in Ivory Coast, southern Sudan and Haiti, the charity said an international watchdog should be created to deal with the issue.
The UN has said it welcomes the report, which it will study closely.
Save the Children said the most shocking aspect of child sex abuse is that most of it goes unreported and unpunished, with children too scared to speak out. A 13-year-old girl described to the BBC how 10 UN peacekeepers gang-raped her in a field near her Ivory Coast home, and left her bleeding, trembling and vomiting on the ground. No action has been taken against the soldiers.
| Course not. The UN complains it doesn't have jurisdiction and therefore can't deal with the problem directly. The countries providing the soldiers don't really care: the tots and women raped and abused aren't their citizens. The UN can't push those countries because no one else is willing to provide 'peacekeeping' troops. Simple. |
After research involving hundreds of children from Ivory Coast, southern Sudan and Haiti, the charity said better reporting mechanisms needed to be introduced to deal with what it called "endemic failures" in responding to reported cases of abuse. It also said efforts should be made to strengthen worldwide child protection systems.
| Oh yes, better reporting will solve the problem. Criminy ... |
Save the Children says the international community has promised a policy of zero-tolerance to child sexual abuse, but that this is not being followed up by action on the ground.
| Again: who's going to enforce it? |
| Except the UN doesn't care, is complacent and offers impunity to all the peacekeepers. Again, simple. |