Mission & Justice

Peter Cochrane; 5/11/08

A Question of Power, The Geoff Clark Case; By Michelle Schwarz; Black Inc
The Tall Man: Death and Life on Palm Island; By Chloe Hooper; Penguin

At first glance the cases discussed in The Tall Man and A Question of Power could not be more different. One is set in the far north, the other in the far south; one features a white policeman on trial for a black death in custody, the other an Aboriginal power-broker accused of leading a series of pack rapes about 30 years ago. Yet there is much in common: both involved powerful men for whom violence was or had been a routine part of life and both men were at the centre of sensational events that made their cases, to varying extent, trial by media. Race was at the heart of each case and each was so muddied by doubt as to be inconclusive, though the white man was found not guilty of manslaughter while the Aboriginal man was confirmed, though not convicted, as a rapist.

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Rana Husseini; 4/11/08

A 22-year-old man on Monday allegedly confessed, in front of Criminal Prosecutor Ahmad Omari, to sexually assaulting and murdering his nine-year-old half-sister according to official sources. The victim, identified as H. M., was found stuffed in a bag and dumped in a deserted area in the town of Jiza close to Queen Alia International Airport, Police Spokesperson Major Mohammad Khatib told The Jordan Times. The girl’s family, who had reported her missing, immediately identified the body, he added. “Suspicions are centred on one of her brothers who reportedly confessed and reenacted the crime in front of investigators,” a second source said

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Clifford Faiparik; 4/11/08

Police Commissioner Gari Baki’s encounter in assisting a sexually- abused child has prompted him to plan to set up a desk in every police station throughout the country to handle sexual abuse cases.One of his plans was to deploy senior police women officers in police stations to prosecute domestic and sexual violence cases. The other is to push for the Government to introduce rehabilitation facilities for domestic and sexual violence victims as currently such facilities are only provided by non-governmental organisations. Mr Baki said this yesterday when launching a one-week workshop on enhancing frontline policing in response to victims of crime at the Salvation Army headquarters in Boroko, Port Moresby.

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Stephen Lunn; 3/11/08; (2 Items)

Many Australians still don’t understand when they are being sexually harassed in the workplace. In a survey to be released today, more than one in five people who said they had not been sexually harassed went on to describe being subjected to behaviour considered sexual harassment under the law. The survey of more than 2000 people commissioned by the Australian Human Rights Commission found that although sexual harassment at work had declined over the past five years, many people were unaware of what constituted sexually harassing behaviour. There has been a marked drop in reporting of workplace sexual harassment, with only 16per cent of those concerned making a formal complaint or report compared with 32 per cent in the last survey, in 2003. In 2008, 22 per cent of women and 5 per cent of men aged 18-64 said they had experienced sexual harassment in the workplace, compared with 28per cent of women and 7 per cent of men in 2003.

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31/10/08

Churches need to organise training programs on child abuse and sex in order for Christians to be aware of the issues and do something about it. Social worker Margaret Kliawi, a participant of the two-day workshop on child abuse and exploitation being held in Port Moresby, Ms Kliawi made the call after revelations that while churches or Christian schools were once places of trust, experience had shown that even child abuse had occurred in these institutions or that children were abused by people of trust in those places.

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Zacery Per; 28/10/08

Politicians, businessmen and public servants are the major clients of sex workers, according to the Highlands Women’s Association (HWA). President of the HWA Daisy Kennedy brought this to the attention of the Minimum Wages Board (MWB) hearing in Goroka last Friday. She said the current economic hardship coupled with the sky rocketing prices of basic goods and services had forced a good number of women to go into commercial sex that attracts a lot of politicians, businessmen and public servants to become major clients. She said the situation forced casual employees to force their daughters and wives to go into prostitution to supplement their income.

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27/10/08

Eleven people will face court following an operation targeting illegal prostitution conducted on the Gold Coast. Operation Echo Pago was conducted by investigators from the State Crime Operations Command Prostitution Enforcement Taskforce from Thursday to Sunday last week. It is alleged during the operation women were knowingly engaging in illegal prostitution services. A 43-year old woman, a 38-year old woman and a 30-year old woman are being charged with knowingly participating in the provision of prostitution and possession of tainted property.

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Paul Toohey; 24/10/08

A deep ideological battle between law enforcement officials and remote-area doctors and nurses is raging in the Northern Territory. The clandestine and powerful Australian Crime Commission wants access to the personal records of sexually active children held by Aboriginal medical organisations. But some clinics are fighting back, insisting that the secrets of their clients never be revealed. Round one has gone to a Katherine regional health service, with the Federal Court’s Justice John Reeves — seen by some as a right-winger — surprising many by ruling last Friday that the ACC was not permitted to access personal details about eight Aboriginal girls aged between 13 and 15. These girls had received Implanon contraceptive implants at regional medical centres.
The ACC believes if girls aged 13 and 14 are receiving contraceptive implants, it follows they are engaged in sexual activity, which the ACC regards as a criminal offence — even if the sex is consensual. It also sees it as a form of abuse.

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21/10/08

Girls as young as 14 work in brothels’ around Phnom Penh, the Cambodian capital, and while the industry is often shown as serving predatory foreign tourists, local men have been found to be the mainstay of clients. Thousands of children are bought and sold for sex every day in Cambodia an investigation by Al Jazeera found. Al Jazeera filmed secretly at several brothels, and in each case found much the same thing - rooms full of young women in their early twenties, as well as teenagers. “For my virginity they gave me $200,” Ya Da, a 16-year-old former prostitute, said.

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Victoria Adituraga; 20/10/08

A research team on commercial sexual exploitation of children (CSEC) and child sexual abuse (CSA) in Fiji has compiled a report that reveals the extent of sexual exploitation in the country with reports of the abuse of women and children and the factors that are enabling this disturbing trend. The issue of sexual exploitation is an extremely important one for the region as it occurs throughout and it is common knowledge and people, especially children, are extremely vulnerable to it. That is why this report, though it is focused on Fiji, is still applicable to the whole region because we share the factors that contribute to this all too important issue.

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