Cambodia
Child Labour
Labor is an everyday reality for around 45% of children age 5 to 14 in Cambodia. It is estimated that more than 300,000 children are required to work to support the needs of their families.
Extremely dangerous tasks await children from the poorest families. These children are often confronted with the sex and drug trades. Others must provide unsafe and dangerous labor in salterns, factories, or for the booming construction industries.
Sexual abuse of children
Many Cambodian children looking for work are exploited. They are often victims of exploitations and sexual assaults. A major part of this traffic takes place on the border with Thailand. There, young Cambodians fleeing the poverty of their country, find themselves at the heart of the sex trade and face abuse, assault, unwanted pregnancies, and miserable living conditions.
Cambodian legislation suppresses this child trafficking and sexual exploitation, but unfortunately, law enforcement is unreliable and law enforcers are frequently the perpetrators of harassment, abuse, and violence towards those that they arrest. Because of this, the rare rapes and assaults that are reported are lost in a completely corrupt judicial system.
Child marriage
23% of young Cambodian wives confess to have been married before the age of 18.
It happens that when a Cambodian girl is raped and the aggressor is known, the family of the victim, ashamed by the impurity of their daughter, proposes marriage to the rapist. The young girl must then not only overcome the appalling aftermath of a rape, along with marriage at too young an age, but she must also accept her rapist sharing her life every day. Such a situation is appalling to say the least, and the psychological consequences it creates are seriously irreparable.
Right to Identity
More than 30% of births are not officially reported in Cambodia.
Registering a child’s birth and granting them a nationality gives them legal capacity; this means that for children whose identity is not registered, they are not officially recognized as a member of society and therefore cannot assert their rights; they are invisible in the eyes of society.
Child Labour
Labor is an everyday reality for around 45% of children age 5 to 14 in Cambodia. It is estimated that more than 300,000 children are required to work to support the needs of their families.
Extremely dangerous tasks await children from the poorest families. These children are often confronted with the sex and drug trades. Others must provide unsafe and dangerous labor in salterns, factories, or for the booming construction industries.
Sexual abuse of children
Many Cambodian children looking for work are exploited. They are often victims of exploitations and sexual assaults. A major part of this traffic takes place on the border with Thailand. There, young Cambodians fleeing the poverty of their country, find themselves at the heart of the sex trade and face abuse, assault, unwanted pregnancies, and miserable living conditions.
Cambodian legislation suppresses this child trafficking and sexual exploitation, but unfortunately, law enforcement is unreliable and law enforcers are frequently the perpetrators of harassment, abuse, and violence towards those that they arrest. Because of this, the rare rapes and assaults that are reported are lost in a completely corrupt judicial system.
Child marriage
23% of young Cambodian wives confess to have been married before the age of 18.
It happens that when a Cambodian girl is raped and the aggressor is known, the family of the victim, ashamed by the impurity of their daughter, proposes marriage to the rapist. The young girl must then not only overcome the appalling aftermath of a rape, along with marriage at too young an age, but she must also accept her rapist sharing her life every day. Such a situation is appalling to say the least, and the psychological consequences it creates are seriously irreparable.
Right to Identity
More than 30% of births are not officially reported in Cambodia.
Registering a child’s birth and granting them a nationality gives them legal capacity; this means that for children whose identity is not registered, they are not officially recognized as a member of society and therefore cannot assert their rights; they are invisible in the eyes of society.
