Child Abuse and Neglect

New stricter law in Poland refers to penalties for the most serious crimes against children as well as the legal obligation for everyone to react and report, if he/she suspects, sees or knows about such crime. Till now such obligation was only a moral one.

While the police is often vilified for being lackadaisical and incompetent to take up gender-sensitive initiative, the Mumbai Police have spoken against child abuse while initiating a campaign on social media. Titled #LetKidsSpeakUp, the campaign addresses child abuse and the plight a kid goes through following a similar experience.

©Mikael Damkier – Fotolia.com

On 1 March 2017 Human Rights Watch published the report about the situation of asylum seekers at the Belarus-Poland border. Since 2016, large numbers of asylum seekers, mostly from the Russian Republic of Chechnya, but also from Tajikistan and Georgia, have tried to apply for asylum in Poland at the border with Belarus. Most of them are families with children. Polish authorities routinely deny them the right to apply for asylum and instead summarily return them to Belarus.