Child Abuse and Neglect

In the beginning of 2009 a campaign Put Your Belt Away has been started by Center Dardedze together with partners - a campaign against corporal punishment of children. The aim of this campaign is to change the stereotype in Latvia that corporal punishment (belting, spanking, shaking etc.) is an appropriate and acceptable way of raising a child which doesn't affect the relationships among children and parents. The necessity had roused from the study made in 2005 which was made in co-operation with the study's of public opinion center SKDS.

The topic of the event was "Children rights: twenty years of work" and it was organized on the occasion of 20th anniversary of the adoption of the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Closing of the See it, Hear it, Say it campaign in Macedonia took place on 10th December 2008 during a press conference carried out by the First Children's Embassy in the World - Megjashi and AVA DDB advertising agency. The aim of the conference was to sum up the campaign efforts and its results.

See it, Hear it, Say it campaign in Latvia was launched during the national conference for child protection professionals and media representatives, that took place on 5th December 2008, in Riga. The conference was opened by the vice Mayor of the Riga City Council, who gave his patronage to the campaign.