Radio New Zealand - Te Reo Irirangi o Aotearoa

Fiji police say morality needs addressing to tackle violence against women

Posted at 20:20 on 04 February, 2013 UTC

The police in Fiji say more effort is needed to address morality in the country, to tackle the high rate of violence against women.

A survey by the Fiji’s Women’s Crisis Centre reveals that 64 percent of the more than 3000 women interviewed have been physically or sexually abused in their lifetime.

A police spokesperson Ana Naisoro says police are ill-equipped to deal with the problem alone.

She says the police commissioner has been holding meetings with various groups including churches to address the issue of morality.

“All crimes are issues of morality and these people know something is wrong and yet they still intend on committing the crimes and there’s something wrong with their moral values. So these are just some of the steps that we are taking where hopefully we can have more of these church organisations, more of these stakeholders come on board and say yes we need to fight this battle together.”

Ana Naisoro says women are now more confident with reporting cases of violence and she hopes this continues.