Kyrgyzstan intends to ban corporal punishment of children completely. The Guardian reported.
According to the media outlet, eight countries have made new pledges to ban corporal punishment, the most common form of violence against children, in a move that campaigners have labelled «a fundamental shift» for more than 100 million under-18s.
The governments of Panama, Kyrgyzstan, Uganda, Burundi, Sri Lanka and the Czech Republic have said they will totally prohibit corporal punishment; while the Gambia and Nigeria have promised to end it in schools.
The pledges were made as part of commitments to tackle violence against children ahead of the first global UN ministerial conference on the subject, that was held on November 7-8 in Bogotá, Colombia.
«These countries together account for about 150 million children and it is a fundamental shift for them. It’s a very strong signal to the rest of the world that this is the direction we are going in and we just don’t accept violence against children any more,» Bess Herbert, an advocacy specialist at End Corporal Punishment at the World Health Organization, said.
Corporal punishment includes physical force used to cause some degree of pain or discomfort, however light, as well as non-physical forms of punishment that are cruel and degrading.
Currently, 67 out of 193 UN member states have full prohibition of corporal punishment; the first country to ban it was Sweden in 1979.
