What should we do together to prevent rape?

The Rape victims are women and girls living in rural areas and those are the poor, and orphan who were raped by men. So they are also living in dangerous situation, frightened and scared as though there are tigers or crocodiles around them and they are likely to be wolfed down at anytime. Most offenders were not punished or jailed. Sometime victims were give small compensation to drop the complaint or there are many rape cases being settled out of court. In order to participate in preventing the rape, Organization of Gender and Development for Cambodia (GAD/C) gave some recommendations to prevent the spreading of rape.

• Raise awareness among radio and TV presenters, news and magazine reporters, and human right officers on reporting the personal rights and wishes for anonymity of victims by avoiding exposing their identities and addresses;
• Radio, TV, news, magazine and human rights institutions should expose perpetrator’s name and addresses in order to make the abuser feel ashamed;
• Health officers should not require rape victims to pay for their examination;
• Raise the level of Gender sensitization among healthcare, social service providers, and other actors in term of assisting the victims and sending them to emergency centers;
• Educate people for further understanding about the law on the prevention of domestic violence and protection of victims;
• Promote Gender mainstreaming in projects concerned with the prevention of HIV/AIDS;
• Advocate for providing rape victims with free legal aid;
• Promote social education and metal support for victims and avoid having contempt for victims of rape.

In case, the three police officers who were charged for raping a 12-year-old girl over 3-day period in Siem Reap in November 2006 remain at large. By the way, the provincial court is in delay to issue arrest warrant to arrest suspects. Police help ensure social order, protect all people and enforce the law but they broke the law and commit crime, which is unacceptable. While court is weak to find justice for victim, if the victim is poor and not powerful, the court will not be motivated to work.