Intl meet on child abuse in Sept

MUSCAT, MAY 13 - The sixth edition of the Middle East Regional Conference on Child Abuse and Neglect 2019 (ISPCAN 2019) will be held in Muscat from September 14 to 17 this year. Addressing a press conference, Dr Mona al Saadoun, Chairperson of the Scientific Committee of the Conference, Sultan Qaboos University, said that the ISPCAN meet in Oman highlights the priority being accorded by the Sultanate in ensuring the rights of children. The ISPCAN International Congress is being held in partnership with the Oman Ministry of Social Development. Dr Mona said that since the beginning of the glorious renaissance, the Sultanate has stressed on the need for improving child care along with providing quality health, education and cultural services. “The enactment of the Child Protection Law provided further improvement to the services and rights of children. This also helped find ways and means to curb child abuse cases and report them to child protection committees in different governorates”, she said. The committees have members from the Ministry of Social Development, the Ministry of Education, the Ministry of Health, the Public Prosecution, the Royal Oman Police and other bodies responsible for the welfare of children. Dr Mona said that the conference will have discussions on new scientific developments and the involvement of all local sectors to exchange their experiences. It will also review previous achievements and chalk out plans to protect children from being abused. The conference includes five main themes such as bullying and the methods of dealing with the problem; neglect and the resulting serious accidents; the difficult behaviours of children and ways to deal with them; social media, the Internet and their risks; and harassment and harm. To be attended by 500 delegates, the conference will witness presentation of 100 working papers at 15 to 20 workshops with participation from local and international researchers in the fields of medicine, psychiatry, psychology, nursing, social work and education. The conference aims at defending the rights of the child, preventing child abuse, identifying community efforts to strengthen child protection programmes, sharing best practices and innovations in the prevention of child abuse and neglect as well as identifying areas of improvement in the existing protection services. It also aims to transfer knowledge, skills and interests to the next generation of young experts, stimulate collaboration and create new projects. Other speakers at the press conference stressed that the conference contributes to the exchange of information and experiences, viewing developments and challenges and building sustainable programmes for the protection of children.