Human Trafficking in [Czech Republic] [other countries]Street Children in [Czech Republic Child Prostitution in [Czech Republic] [other countries] |
Prevalence, Abuse & Exploitation of Street Children In the early years of the 21st Century -
2000 to 2010 gvnet.com/streetchildren/CzechRepublic.htm
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CAUTION: The following links
and accompanying text have been culled from the web to illuminate the
situation in the ***
FEATURED ARTICLE *** Large numbers of street children discovered
in Chechnya Ruslan Isayev, www.watchdog.cz/?show=000000-000002-000001-000186&lang=1 [accessed
6 May 2011] The “difficult”
children, as they are called by the staff of the republic’s juvenile
rehabilitation inspectorates, are now approaching their favourite
time of year, when it becomes possible for them to sleep out in the open.
With the arrival of spring, their numbers usually increase. The lives of such
children have a rather narrow focus, which is centred
mostly on begging, stealing, or at best a job at a gas station. Many of them
start smoking or experimenting with alcohol at any early age. The most common
activity is glue-sniffing. Before the war, foreign cameramen could literally
“smell out” the places where such children were hiding, and the estranged
faces of young drug addicts often appeared in the world's television news. Rustam was only 10 when
the second war began. His was the usual fate of the neglected child : divorced
parents, a bad stepmother, a drunken father. Now he is almost 17. He has a
job as an ancillary worker on a construction site, and earns around 300 roubles (about $12) a day. He is going to get married. He
likes to remember the time when he was homeless. “They were the freest years
of my life,” he jokes. ***
ARCHIVES *** UNICEF
– www.unicef.org/infobycountry/crepublic_statistics.html [accessed
6 May 2011] Human Rights
Reports » 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/hrrpt/2005/61644.htm [accessed 31 January 2011] CHILDREN
- The
government is committed to children's rights and welfare. The government
provides free and compulsory education through age 15. The UN Children's Fund
(UNICEF) reported a primary school enrollment rate of 90 percent from 2000 to
2004. Most children continued through secondary school. There were no
statistics available on Romani attendance rates. Concluding Observations of the Committee on
the Rights of the Child (CRC) UN Convention on the Rights of the Child,
31 January 2003 www1.umn.edu/humanrts/crc/czechrepublic2003.html [accessed 31 January 2011] [63] The Committee
is concerned that there is a growing number of children living on the street
in urban areas vulnerable to, inter alia, sexual abuse, violence, including
from the police, exploitation, lack of access to education, substance abuse,
sexually transmitted diseases, HIV/AIDS and malnutrition. Furthermore, the
Committee notes that the primary response to the situation of these children,
as described by the State party in its report, is institutionalization. Large numbers of street children discovered
in Chechnya Ruslan Isayev, www.watchdog.cz/?show=000000-000002-000001-000186&lang=1 [accessed
6 May 2011] The “difficult”
children, as they are called by the staff of the republic’s juvenile
rehabilitation inspectorates, are now approaching their favourite
time of year, when it becomes possible for them to sleep out in the open.
With the arrival of spring, their numbers usually increase. The lives of such
children have a rather narrow focus, which is centred
mostly on begging, stealing, or at best a job at a gas station. Many of them
start smoking or experimenting with alcohol at any early age. The most common
activity is glue-sniffing. Before the war, foreign cameramen could literally
“smell out” the places where such children were hiding, and the estranged
faces of young drug addicts often appeared in the world's television news. Rustam was only 10 when
the second war began. His was the usual fate of the neglected child :
divorced parents, a bad stepmother, a drunken father. Now he is almost 17. He
has a job as an ancillary worker on a construction site, and earns around 300
roubles (about $12) a day. He is going to get
married. He likes to remember the time when he was homeless. “They were the
freest years of my life,” he jokes. Up
To Ten Thousand Czech Children Go Missing Every Year Dita Asiedu,
Radio [accessed
6 May 2011] Although most missing children are found, Mrs Baudysova points to the
disturbing fact that in the short time they spend out on the streets, they
are at a very high risk of being abused:
With time the great majority of the missing children in the Czech
Republic do turn up, and statistics include only those cases reported to the
police. The number of children who are
abducted is unknown but is believed to make up only a fraction of the total
number of those who go missing, most of whom are runaways. Ashoka Fellows -
Michaela Svobodova This
profile was prepared when Michaela Svobodova was
elected to the Ashoka Fellowship in 1997 [accessed
6 May 2011] [click on “The
Strategy” tab]
- In order to improve the quality of life of runaways, Michaela has started a
series of related programs that are designed to meet the varied and complex
needs of these troubled young people as they move from homeless runaways to
productive adult member of society. Facts - An International Perspective Re-Solv, the national charity solely dedicated to the
prevention of solvent and volatile substance abuse (VSA) www.re-solv.org/international.asp [accessed
6 May 2011] [scroll down to Czech Republic, Reports to Treaty Bodies Committee
on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, August 2003 At
one time this article had been archived and may possibly still be accessible
[here] [accessed
6 May 2011] The following
points were noted with concern: the
growing number of street children, noting their vulnerability to, among other
things, sexual abuse, violence (including from the police), exploitation,
substance abuse, sexually transmitted diseases, HIV/AIDS and malnutrition;
the rise of delinquency and crimes committed by children; discriminatory
behavior on the part of some persons working with and for children, including
teachers and doctors. All
material used herein reproduced under the fair use exception of 17 USC § 107
for noncommercial, nonprofit, and educational use. PLEASE RESPECT COPYRIGHTS OF COMPONENT
ARTICLES. Cite this webpage as: Patt,
Prof. Martin, "Street Children – |
Human Trafficking in [Czech Republic] [other countries]Street Children in [Czech Republic Child Prostitution in [Czech Republic] [other countries]