AFGHANISTANAFGHANISTANQualitative research into adults’ perspectives on everyday physical violence against children within the family, published in 2008, involved interviews with more than 200 men and women from 61 families in urban and rural areas in four provinces, plus 56 focus group discussions and 46 interviews with key informants. The study found that violence against children is widely used and recognised, though to a significant degree is not regarded with approval. Physical violence existed to varying degrees within all 61 case study families, most commonly slapping, verbal abuse, punching, kicking, and hitting with thin sticks, electrical cables and shoes. More unusual types of violence included shooting at children, tying them up, washing them in cold water outside during winter and public humiliation. Corporal punishment was used on children as young as 2 or 3 years. No clear difference between punishment of boys and of girls was found, but men were perceived as having more “rights” to be violent towards children than women in the family.
(Smith, Deborah J., 2008, Love, Fear and Discipline: Everyday violence toward children in Afghan families, Kabul: Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit)
In a survey by Save the Children reported in 2003, 82% of children interviewed reported that slapping, kicking and hitting with a stick are common forms of punishment. Hair and ear pulling were reported by nearly 6% of children. Over half reported being hit or severely beaten for being noisy or naughty, almost a quarter for not learning their school lessons, and nearly one in ten for disobeying adults.
(Save the Children Sweden Afghanistan, 2003, Mini Survey Report on Corporal Punishment, Kabul: Save the Children, cited in Jabeen, F., 2004, Corporal/physical and psychological punishment of girls and boys in South and Central Asia Region, Save the Children Sweden Denmark)
Report by Jabeen available at: www.scslat.org/search/publieng.php?_cod_84_lang_e
A study involving 2,080 questionnaires and focus group discussions with children in orphanages found that violence against children was sometimes cited as a major concern, and many references were made to corporal punishment in the home and in schools.
(Ministry of Labour and Social Affairs and UNICEF Afghanistan, 2003, Children deprived of parental care in Afghanistan – whose responsibility?)