Lia Saralidze (Public Health and Medicine Development Fund): “one of the reasons behind domestic violence against children is the culture of dealing with problems through fights and shouting. Social and economic problems that exist in Georgia are also contributing factors to domestic violence. By this I mean that unemployment, economic hardship, prevailing mentalities, alcoholism, depression and other risk factors may cause the collapse of the normal functioning of the family.”

According to the assessment of several NGOs working on the issue of violence against children, the mother appears most often as the perpetrator in cases of abuse. 

Nato Zazashvili (the Rehabilitation Center of Victims of Domestic Violence “Safari”): “The vector of domestic violence is mainly directed from husband to wife and from wife to child.  So, according to these roles, the father and mother frequently appear to be the main violators. This is also confirmed by research. More than 70% of children in Georgia recognize that different kinds of domestic violence are conducted against them- mostly from the mother.”

The high rate of various forms of violence against children is mentioned in the research conducted over the period of 2007-2008 by the NGO “Public Health and Medical Development Fund” in cooperation with the “International Society of Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect.” 79% of children under the age of 11 suffer from physical violence, and 82.3% suffer from psychological violence.  44% of children between the ages of 11-18 suffer from physical violence and 59.1%  from psychological violence. It is estimated that 9% are the victims of sexual abuse.

Maya Kurtsikidze (UNICEF Communication Program Officer): “Of particular concern is the fact that one-fifth of our respondents (21.5%) confess that they are systematically beating children. It’s worrying as well that the so-called method of “child- shaking” is so widespread- 46.1% of our respondents employ this behavior, which is dangerous for children’s central nervous system.”

As the world practice shows, the problem of domestic violence against children needs a resolution at many different levels. In this regard, Georgia has recently launched a referring system.

Anna Arghanashvili (Public Defender’s Office, “Women’s and Children’s Center”): “It is a sad reality that referring mechanism are not actively working yet. We’ve had many cases where the victim of domestic violence- the child- was attending school but the teacher did not contact or notify the appropriate authorities in cases where abuse was suspected. Public awareness is still low in the fact that making a post is mandatory.”

Maya Kurtsikidze (UNICEF Communication Program Officer): “According to our statistics, within one year, the referring system has significantly increased the violence-related cases referred to the Social Services Agency. Before the procedures were developed, there were few referred incidents.  The three Ministries (Ministry of Labor, Health and Social Welfare, Ministry of Education and Science and the Ministry of Internal Affairs) exchange the information. As for the gaps within the referral structure, these are the main ones:

• persons involved in the system at this stage do not have enough knowledge in order to effectively identify cases of violence by making judgments based on reasonable suspicion.

• At this stage, the medical institutions are not involved in the referring system and have not been given the role and function they are required. In addition, at this stage, its unknown how to cover the child’s medical examination or treatment costs in the case of violence or alleged violence.

• Nursery schools are not considered in the referral system because they are subject to the municipalities and by the order of the above-mentioned three ministries; their commitments could not be determined.

• There is a lack of services for rehabilitation that is needed for the children who are victims of violence.”

Anna Arghanashvili (Public Defender’s Office, “Women’s and Children’s Center”): “When the fact of child abuse is revealed, there are no rehabilitation services. Although non-governmental organizations have similar services, it’s not right to put the whole responsibility on them. If a child is the victim of violence, he must be assisted in every system. When helping children, the continuity of services is needed. The child should be moved smoothly from one system to another and no service interruptions should occur. When there is no data base, there is no information for which stages the child passed, to what level of rehabilitation he or she came up, or if such service was provided at all. The process, from prevention and identification to the complete psychological rehabilitation should be systemic.”

Inga Darbaidze