PACIFIC – Pacific island nations have some of the highest rates of violence against children in the world – an issue Unicef says needs to be brought out of the shadows.

This week, the children’s charity will host a three-day conference in Fiji to bring policy makers, civil society groups and religious leaders from 14 Pacific countries together to come up with solutions to what it calls an “alarming” problem.

Unicef’s Chief of Child Protection, Amanda Bissex, says there are high rates of violence against children in homes and schools in the Pacific.

“Across the board we found usage of corporal punishment mainly in the household but also in schools. And in most cases it was at least 70 per cent or more of adults admitted to using violent punishment in the last month.”

Research collated by Unicef in Palau, Micronesia and the Marshall Islands, showed more than 20 per cent of parents use physical punishment that hurts a child on a daily basis, and verbal abuse is used on at least 12 per cent of children every day.

It says Tuvalu, the Marshalls and Solomon Islands are among the top five countries globally with the highest proportion of adolescent boys who are supportive of wife beating.

It says between 40 and 68 per cent of Pacific women have experienced violence from an intimate partner, compared to the 37 percent globally.

Bissex says there are a number of contributing factors to the high rate of violence.

“You have social traditions that find it acceptable to use violence as a way of discipline. Children are considered possessions almost of adults. Also parents who have grown up in violent households are more likely to perpetrate that violence themselves. It becomes normalised in the culture.”

In Tonga, the Women’s Crisis Centre’s director Ofa Guttenbeil Likiliki says anecdotally, she has seen a steady increase in the number of child abuse reports.

“We’re seeing an increase in the area of reported sexual violence. This is quite a difficult area because you know, it’s still very taboo to talk about and a lot of the sexual violations that happen to our children are kept under the carpet, because of cultural taboos and embarrassment.”

Guttenbeil Likiliki says the introduction of the Family Protection Act last year means Tonga has stepped up the pace of providing protection for children. But she says changing the law is only one part of the solution.

“The law can’t do everything. We also have to change attitudes and mindsets and behaviours – that’s the hardest job. Changing mindsets and attitudes in how we are raising children and what kind of environment we are raising them in.”

The co-ordinator of the Vanuatu Women’s Centre, Merilyn Tahi, says until gender inequality in the country is addressed, violence against women and children will remain. She says it is a poor excuse to link the high levels of violence to culture.

“It is not culture. Culture has changed, cultural behaviours, cultural traditional practises have changed, so why can’t we change? If it is culture, why can’t we change and stop committing violence on women and children? Victims are getting younger and younger. How can a man commit incest on his children? If it is culture, where does that come from?

A spokesperson for the Methodist Church in Fiji, James Bhagwan, says while corporal punishment has been outlawed in the country, there is still the traditional way of thinking that if you spare the rod, you spoil the child.

“We tend to dismiss our young children as they don’t have a space in society. They are often neglected for events that adults consider more important. Unfortunately sometimes it’s to do with church, but it can also be doing things for community. So it’s where we place our priority on children.

A Samoa family court judge, Leilani Tuala-Warren, says after the introduction of the Family Safety Act in 2013, the number of victims coming forward there is increasing. Judge Tuala-Warren says the law allows the court to grant protection orders when there has been domestic violence, including on a child.

“Any person can apply for a protection order on behalf of a child. It can be a village representative, a social worker, a teacher. So all those people who may see this child coming to school with a black eye and might ask the child what’s happening. It is open for those people to apply to the court for a protection order.

Judge Tuala-Warren says there have been some problems in ensuring the police serve protection orders immediately, especially in remote parts of the country. She says, at the conference, she hopes to find out how other nations have dealt with similar issues.

“An interim protection order must be served immediately. It is a matter of life and death for some women and children. We are trying to work out ways we can get service to our most remote parts of the island, and other islands. These are sort of logistical issues that I am hoping people can share their experience when I go to this conference.” Bissex says at the conference, countries will be asked to come up with three commitments they can implement within the next 18 months. She says that could include strengthening a law, ratifying the optional protocol on the sale of children and child prostitution, or introducing child protection policies in its schools. Bissex says it’s hoped the conference will mobilise real change.