POLICE NOTE INCREASE IN CRIMES AGAINST CHILDREN

An increase of 25 per cent for crimes against children has been recorded by the Fiji Police Force last month.

There were 160 cases compared to the 118 cases reported for the same period last year.

From these cases, 11 per cent were domestic related between parent and child relationships.

The remaining 89 per cent were perpetrated by relatives within domestic settings. These included cases of sexual offences, assault and other offences.

The Fiji Police Force is doing its best through Community Policing efforts to try and minimize the number of crimes women against children.

Additionally, a drop of 6 per cent in overall crime rate was recorded between January and October this year.

Included in this are aggravated robbery, crime against women and children.

Cases recorded last month were nine per cent less than what was recorded for the same period last year.

Aggravated robbery cases recorded decreases for the 10-month reporting period, sustaining a declining trend noted from May to October.

For this, there were 25 cases recorded last month which was a significant drop from the 45 cases recorded for the same period in 2021.

Crimes against women for the month of October recorded a 23 per cent reduction.

Given the statistics, Police said women and children were falling victims of crime within domestic settings, perpetrated by people known to them.

Police is calling for increased participation from community leaders and groups, civil society, non-government organisations and religious groups to understand and identify societal behaviours and factors that contribute to crimes against women and help in identifying preventative measures.

Police have also been promoting community policing efforts through initiatives such as “Know Your Neighbour” throughout the country to enhance neighbourhood watch efforts in partnership with Police.

For this festive season, the tempo of operations focusing on receivers of stolen goods is expected to increase to counter opportunistic crimes targeting mobile phones, electronic gadgets and other valuable items that can be disposed of quickly in return for a quick dollar