By Bun Ying, World Vision Cambodia communications

Three proactive peer educators, who joined World Congress III against Sexual Exploitation of Children and Adolescents held in Brazil last year, presented their joint statement consisting of twelve recommendations to relevant government institutions and non-governmental organisations.

At a special dissemination ceremony held Phnom Penh City on July 22nd, Ul Sopheak, 18, one of the Cambodian adolescent representatives, read from the statement.

“Children have suffered too much from adult exploitation. But, organised and united, we have gone from being victims to actors. Our children’s organisations give us the strength to defend ourselves and fight for our rights. It is not enough to just give us a voice, but you must listen. Listen to our calls for urgent action, listen to our experiences and most importantly listen to our solutions.”

300 children and adolescents from around the world unanimously agreed on the joint statement during the World Congress III held from 25th to 28th November 2008. Together they proposed practical recommendations to their respective governments for taking firm action to address the issue.

One of the twelve recommendations is that children want their governments to enforce the law and policies that relate to the protection and wellbeing of children; that it is not enough that those governments make empty promises to stop the issue. Rather, they want their government to form a committee to audit the action plan in each country.

Sovann Pothy Nanarak, 17, who also joined the congress, said the outcome dissemination was very important to draw the attention of government and NGOs to continue working more thoroughly to eliminate exploitation.

“Children and adolescents are the key human resources for social development. The government must listen to the children’s voice and the solutions we came up with.”

Presiding guest H.E. Ith Samheng, Minister of Social Affairs, Veterans and Youth Rehabilitation, identified some of the challenges raised during the congress as gaps in knowledge, a solution mechanism, judicial measures, lack of resources, structure, training, information dissemination and a reliable database, which each country will be required to address.

“The Royal Government has established and enforced law, national planning and many programmes. They care about children. Cambodia set up a five-year national plan [2005-2009] to combat child trafficking and has implemented it successfully. Now, a national task force to combat human trafficking, in which children and women are the priority, has also been included,” said H.E. Ith Samheng, during the opening ceremony.

Abid Gulzar, World Vision’s Asia Pacific Regional Advocacy Programme Manager, commented that it was a good initiative because it reflected that, besides civil society working to promote protection mechanism, the Royal Government of Cambodia was taking ownership to address the issue. He added that it’s challenging to have adolescent participation.

“It is a good starting point. However, the government needs to provide more opportunity for children to participate in such events. It should not be just a symbol of participation, but they must actively engage in further policy making.”

The dissemination ceremony was organised by the Cambodia National Council for Children and ECPAT-Cambodia (End Child Prostitution, Abuse and Trafficking in Cambodia) with support from World Vision Cambodia and UNICEF.