Anna Niu, Head of International Cooperation of Beijing Children’s Legal Aid and Research Center (BCLARC) was invited to join the ECPAT Regional Consultation East and Southeast Asia, the theme of which is‘Developing a Roadmap towards Ending the Sexual Exploitation of Children’ during 24-27 October,2018.
ECPAT is an expanding network of local civil society organisations and coalitions with one common goal – to end the sexual exploitation of children around the world, and up to now there have 104 Member Organisations 93Countries.
This is the second time that BCLARC joined the ECPAT meetings. The last time was in Bogota where the summit on the protection of children in travel and tourism was held. It was during that ECPAT and BCLARC signed a MOU and became partners with the aim of strengthening the collaboration in addressing child exploitation.
Before that in March 2018, the CEO of ECPAT international Ms. Dorothy Rozga was also invited to join the A20 Global Social Leadership Summit on Child Advocacy co-hosted by BCLARC and Alibaba and shared the landscape of ECPAT with all the participants.
The secretariat of ECPAT International and members from different countries or regions in Southeast Asia gathered in Cebu Philippine to join the workshop, each shared their working in fighting sexual exploitation against children. Anna was also asked to speak on the panel of Overview of Sexual Exploitation of Children in East & Southeast Asia, and she presented about the legal framework in addressing the Sexual Exploitation of Children in China, which attracted the interest of many participants.
With the support of the ECPAT Philippine, the group also paid a field trip to local communities and visited some survivors of sexual exploitation. Representatives from different sectors of Bohol explained the SECTT Ordinance adopted in the Province of Bohol. The ordinance requires all tourism establishments in the province to develop and implement a child protection policy within their businesses.
It has become more and more clear and urgent that international cooperation is crucial in combating sexual exploitation against children and we need to play a more active role so as to protect our children from any kinds of exploitation and provide them with a better world to live in.
