Child’s death prompts calls for increased protection
Print Edition
A SUSPECTED child abuse case that resulted in the death of a 6-year-old girl has triggered calls for better protective measures for minors.
According to police in the city of Yiwu, east China’s Zhejiang Province, the girl was allegedly beaten to death by her mother during a family dispute on Monday.
Police were informed by the Beiyuan Community health center on Monday morning that despite being transferred to hospital the girl had died from “suspicious injuries.”
While the child’s father initially took the blame for hurting the child, a subsequent investigation pointed the finger at the girl’s mother.
“The mother confessed but, as she is pregnant, she will remain at home under police surveillance, while the father, a migrant worker, was arrested for deception,” said Xia Zhiqiang from Yiwu police.
The incident is not an isolated case in China.
In 2013, two sisters aged 2 and 1 from Nanjing, capital of east China’s Jiangsu Province, starved to death after being left at home alone for several months by their 22-year-old mother.
In 75 percent of the 697 child abuse cases released to the media between 2008 and 2013, the parents were found to guilty, the Beijing Youth Legal Assistance Research Center said.
Zhang Yan, a researcher with the Shaanxi Academy of Social Sciences, said that child abuse within the home is a social issue.
“It’s unfortunate that many children are not safe even at home,” she said.
“The situation is related to a fall in moral and ethical values.”
Lawyer Zhang Zhigang agreed, saying that the rights of children at home must be protected.
“Providing legal protection for minors is not enough. We must also review the penalties for child abuse,” he said.
Since January, the nation’s courts have had the right to strip the guardianship of minors from convicted drug addicts, gamblers, sex offenders and child abusers.
On February 4, the Tongshan District Court in Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province, heard the first such case and stripped a couple of parental custody after the father was found to have sexually abused his child and the mother was found guilty of neglect.
“It must be stressed that the protection of minors demands cooperation between civil affairs departments, the police, courts and communities,” said Chen Lan, head of a nongovernmental organization for abused children.
Society as a whole, and not just individual families, must play its part in protecting the nation’s children, she said.
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