combating violence against children

challenge

Over the last decade, Ukraine has undergone several important changes in its child protection system. Nevertheless, in 2021, when the initiative was conceptualised, the country was still facing challenges in meeting its European and international obligations to ensure that children could fully enjoy their rights. In particular, child sexual exploitation and abuse were still taboo topics in the Ukrainian society. Therefore, in 2021 the Council of Europe initiated a nationwide communications campaign to combat violence against children.

approach

Together with the Council of Europe, Action Ukraine developed and carried out a powerful communications campaign with the objective of raising awareness of child sexual exploitation and abuse. The project, which was implemented in 2021, also helped to increase understanding of the initiative and the efforts of the Council of Europe in the country.

The key messages for the general public and children pointed to the risks of child sexual exploitation and abuse, prevention as well as protection measures against sexual abuse.

In this context, the approach of the campaign was the following:

• Combat sexual violence against children, with separate messages for each audience and vulnerable groups – educators, parents, relevant CSO`s and children.
• Enhance knowledge of the general public on the extent, scope, consequences and risks of violence against children with a focus on child sexual exploitation and abuse. A special emphasis was also given to protection measures and services available for child victims of violence in social media, online media and events.
• Development of informational materials and organization of webinars for educators in partnership with child psychologists.
• Promotion of available national hotlines via OOH and print materials where children who are victims of violence could find help, psychological counselling and other kinds of support.
• Development of additional materials and campaign messages with 15 influencers directly addressing young children on popular social media platform, Tik Tok.