UNICEF has expressed concern about the high prevalence of violence against children in Fiji and is calling on Fijians to break the curtains of silence.

UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell who was in the country, says this issue prevails in many nations and decades have been spent to address it.

Russell says the most effective way to deal with the problem is to stop it before it is committed.

Commenting on sexual crimes against children the UNICEF Chief says changing mindsets is key to addressing any form of violence.

“From my perspective the most important thing is to try and avoid it in the first place, to try and prevent any of this sort of conduct and I think the key to that is to change the way a society views it to say this is not acceptable.”

With evidence showing that perpetrators are mostly men, Russell says education is key to safeguarding the future of children, particularly girls.

“A lot of these, not all but a lot of these are directed at men so changing the way boys think about violence and how to solve these problems and violence is not the way to do that, that sexual violence is not okay, we need to learn that early and it needs to be part of the discussion and adults who engage in that kind of behavior needs to be punished for it.”

UNICEF Pacific Representative Jonathan Veitch says that 83 percent of children in Fiji have reported experiencing some form of violence in the past six months, a figure he deems unacceptable.

“The problem is when the violence is happening there is a kind of curtain of silence, so in the village, if somebody is being beaten it stays in the family, the woman or child is sent back to the family just to become a victim again and that is what we are saying is not acceptable.”

The UNICEF Executive Director is hopeful that the Child Protection and Child Justice Bill in Fiji will be passed promptly to address the significant challenges Fijian children are facing. She departed our shores this evening.