Out of the Shadows Index, which benchmarks how 60 countries are preventing and responding to child sexual exploitation and abuse, ranks the UK, France, and Sweden highest overall based on its 2022 Index framework.
Our joint advocacy efforts and progress made in each of these countries is reflected in their important commitments delivered at the first-ever Global Ministerial Conference on Ending Violence Against Children.
Sweden
As one of the co-hosts of the Global Ministerial Conference on Ending Violence Against Children, Sweden demonstrated its political will and commitment to ending violence against children. Historically, Sweden has been a role model in advancing children’s rights and made significant progress in areas such as child protection, education and social care. It was the first country in the world to introduce a ban on corporal punishment of children in 1979. Sweden also has a strong civil society and research environment, which helps promote the children's rights and has been prominent in implementing legislation that puts the best interests of children at the center.
"All children have the right to a life free from all forms of violence. Unfortunately, for many children and young people, the reality is different. I hope that this conference will be a catalyst for addressing violence against children and raising the issue higher up on the global political agenda."
Swedish Minister for Social Services, Camilla Waltersson Grönvall
Ahead of the Ministerial in Bogota, Together For Girls’ previous engagements with Sweden have primarily been through the World Childhood Foundation, an organization founded by Queen Silvia of Sweden to end violence against children. In 2023, our founder, Dr. Daniela Ligiero, received an award at the annual World Childhood Foundation USA gala for her work to elevate survivor voices and create a global movement to protect children from sexual abuse and exploitation through Together for Girls and the Brave Movement.
Together for Girls and the World Childhood Foundation
In her acceptance speech at the Gala, Dr. Ligiero commended the World Childhood Foundation “for their work to prevent and address child sexual abuse, exploitation and violence against children globally.”
She also thanked Queen Silvia “for taking on this issue more than 20 years ago when no one else would. She paved the way for so many of us to protect children from violence and continues to do so through her work with the World Childhood Foundation.”
In 2024, the World Childhood Foundation awarded Together for Girls and the Brave Movement $100,000 USD to help us push boundaries to ensure prevention, healing and justice for children and survivors. The grant supports key pillars of our work, including advocating for a safer internet for children, addressing the gap in global data on sexual violence against children and expanding the Brave Movement’s regional platforms around the world to build political will to drive lasting change.
ISPCAN Congress
TfG led several important sessions in Sweden at ISPCAN, the largest congress in the world focused on child abuse. These included topics on leveraging data and evidence for policy and practice to prevent and respond to school-based violence, the practice-based knowledge framework by the Safe Futures Hub, and a session on the Humanitarian Violence Against Children and Youth Survey in Ethiopia.
Sweden’s Ambassador to the UK, H.E. Stefan Gullgren, joined us in marking the 100 day-Countdown to the Ministerial as we launched the Brave Movement’s survivor-centered short film, Beyond the Screen: Hidden Voices of Online Abuse.
Brave Movement Co-Founder and SAGE member Mie Kohiyama presented at the WHO’s high-level political kick-off event for the Ministerial, where the Governments of Sweden and Colombia publicly launching the global fight to end violence against children. Sweden’s Ambassador, Anna Jardfelt, highlighted Sweden’s host role in the Ministerial, emphasizing "it is time to come together on how we can move faster to end violence against children."
There is no path to the SDGs without dramatic reductions in the violence experienced by a billion children each year, impacting 5% of GDP.
Sweden’s Ambassador to the UK, H.E. Stefan Gullgren
Minister Camilla Waltersson Grönvall represented Sweden, joining our satellite event hosted by the Brave Movement, Safe Online and WeProtect Global Alliance called Safe Digital Futures for Children. Our aim was to bring attention to online child sexual exploitation and abuse and other online risks and harms to children.
Sweden’s pledge at the conference
Sweden focused on parent and caregiver support, and response and support services. Specifically, Sweden pledged to invest in and continue to strengthen parental support by 2025, contributing to more accessible and target group-adapted parental support. They also pledged to invest in family counselling regarding violence prevention in the Budget Bill for 2025.
Additionally, Sweden pledged to strengthen the alternative care system to ensure access to safe, qualitative and efficient care for children in both family based and institutional care, and in the long-term, decrease the necessity of institutions and place more children in family-based alternative care.
Finally, they pledged to offer children with disabilities who are unable to remain at parental home foster care or housing with special services designed to create the right conditions for an independent life.
France has also been making significant progress to end childhood sexual violence, and the Be Brave France platform, led by survivor advocate, SAGE member and Brave Movement co-founder, Mie Kohiyama, has been actively involved increasing France’s commitment to protecting children and ending childhood sexual violence on various levels. Some of the key issues that Be Brave France is committed to and is advocating for include online safety, ending statutes of limitations, and creating a national survivor council in France. Be Brave France actively engages with the French ChildSafetyON coalition with partners like ECPAT France, Fondation pour L’Enfance, Caméléon Association and more to raise awareness about and advocate for causes like ending online childhood sexual violence.
Mié and Be Brave France have conducted crucial advocacy work calling on the French government to take leadership on regulation to combat child sexual violence online and offline. On September 19th, 2023, they joined a Day of Action by the European Child Sexual Abuse Legislation Advocacy Group (ECLAG), in Brussels. In a powerful demonstration outside the European Parliament, a ‘Clean Up the Internet Crew’ consisting of 50+ survivors, youth activists and children’s rights organizations sent a clear message urging decision-makers to shield children from online abuse.
Alongside the demonstration, the advocates engaged with MEPs from across Europe to explain the urgency of the situation and urge them to support the new European regulatory proposal for a safe internet for children. In October, 2023, Be Brave France took the ‘Clean Up the Internet’ demonstration to Paris and called on Emmanuel Macron and the French government to make the internet safer for children.
The ongoing advocacy efforts of Mie and Be Brave France, and their partnerships with various coalitions and organizations across France and the EU have helped coordinate advocacy efforts ahead of the VAC Ministerial Conference as well.
The road to Colombia
On May 29th, 2024, Mie attended the World Health Assembly’s high-level political kick-off event for the Global Ministerial Conference on Ending Violence Against Children. This event brought together host governments Sweden and Colombia to publicly launch the global fight to end violence against children.
On June 4th, 2024, the International Day of Innocent Children Victims of Aggression, BeBrave France, ECPAT France, Cameleon France, Fondation pour L’Enfance and other partners organized a public activation to call for collective efforts of governments and policies to end childhood sexual violence.
On October 17th, Be Brave France, alongside the ChildSafetyON coalition hosted a screening of the Brave Movement’s global online safety film “Beyond the Screen” and emphasized the importance of the French government making strong commitments for online sexual violence committed against children at the VAC Ministerial conference. As shared by activist and author Andréa Bescond, “We need France to rise to the occasion at the Bogota Conference.”
“The ChildSafetyON coalition calls on the French government to mobilize for the rights of children at the conference in Bogota. We must create a safer digital environment for our children.”
Melanie Marie, ECPAT France
At the event, Mie Kohiyama also reiterated that the VAC Ministerial is historic in the fight for ending violence against children.
Mie has also been advocating for the creation of a French national survivor council, and France’s Commission on Incest and Child Sexual Violence (CIIVISE) has heard from Mie about this and it is currently being discussed internally.
The road to Colombia
In the lead up to the Bogota Conference, French activists and the Brave Movement’s partners continued to call on the French Minister of Family and Early Childhood at the time, Agnès Canayer, to attend the conference and make strong commitments.
By October 21st, former Minister Canayer responded to these calls, stating that child protection is a priority for her and that she will attend the conference.
At the Global Ministerial Conference, Mie Kohiyama, who was also a member of the Global Survivors’ Council, was present on the ground. On the first day of the conference, November 7th, Mie was interviewed on France24 about the conference.
French Minister Agnes Canayer met with Mie and the Brave Movement’s Director of Global Campaigns, Emily Laurie at the conference and walked through our Break the Record Installation at the conference as well.
France’s pledge at the conference included parent and caregiver support, response and support services and addressing online harms.
Specifically, France aims to strengthen awareness-raising and training materials for professionals, provide support for professionals through the 119 national reporting number and run a national awareness campaign aimed at professionals and the general public.
France also pledged to strengthen efforts to combat the sexual exploitation of minors, aiming for both prevention and providing more effective support to victims.
Furthermore, France will raise parents’ awareness and inform them of the risks their children face when using digital tools, in particular exposure to violent and inappropriate content or online harassment. Finally, France will also take steps to fight violence against children in the digital environment, and work to protect children in armed conflicts.
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom has also made notable efforts to end childhood sexual violence. The United Kingdom has the highest score on the Out of the Shadows Index based on its framework in 2022, and both Together for Girls and the Brave Movement have engaged with the UK over several years to drive progress for childhood sexual violence.
PVSI 2022
In 2022, the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCDO) hosted the second-ever international conference for their Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict Initiative (PVSI) in London. During the conference, Together for Girls and the Brave Movement, alongside the FCDO and other civil society partners, co-created a session. The session highlighted the crucial role of education in protecting children, supporting survivors and preventing sexual violence in conflict. Suresh Chhetry, Co-Founder of the Brave Movement and SAGE member spoke on a panel during the event about the impact of survivors’ voices in formulating solutions.
Panel speakers from left to right: Alicia Herbert OBE, Yasmine Sherif, Suresh Chhetry, Nadine Tunasi, Hon. David Sengeh, Josephine Kamara
Members of the Brave UK platform, including Brave Movement Co-Founder Dr. Matthew McVarish and other powerful survivors and allies, have also been spearheading crucial advocacy efforts in the UK and across Europe. In 2022, survivors in Brave UK called on the UK government to drive forward Prevention, Healing and Justice Policies and Programs at the G7 Summit.
Brave UK members also joined survivor advocates in the Brave Movement from around the world at the G7 Summit in 2022 to continue to call on world leaders at the summit to prioritize ending child sexual abuse.
As a result of their advocacy efforts, the G7 Final Communique included clear language on leaders’ commitment to combatting child sexual abuse: “We commit to step up our fight against trafficking in human beings and our efforts to prevent and combat child sexual abuse and exploitation globally, both online and offline.”
Read Brave UK co-founder and survivor advocate Patrick Sanford’s memoir about the Brave Movement’s G7 campaign here.
Lanzarote Committee
In addition, through the efforts of Matthew McVarish, the Brave Movement was officially granted Observer Status to the Lanzarote Committee through a unanimous decision by its members.
As a result, the voice of the survivor has a permanent seat at the table, and will be present alongside all nations of Europe and various important global NGOs as they gather to end childhood sexual violence.
July 17th, our event to mark 100 Days before Global Ministerial Conference to End Violence Against Children
On July 17th, 2024, an event to mark 100 days before the VAC Ministerial conference was held in London, UK.
The importance of prioritizing online safety at the Ministerial was highlighted at the event, and the Brave Movement’s survivor-centered short film, “Beyond the Screen: Hidden Voices of Online Abuse,” premiered at the event.
Learn more about the film and how you can support our work to end online child sexual abuse here.
Global Survivor Council
On October 23rd, 2024, Michelle Duffy, a member of the Global Survivor Council for the VAC Ministerial met with the Justice Minister of Northern Ireland, Naomi Long at Stormont.
Read Michelle's blog about the power of schools to protect children against violence.
At the VAC Ministerial Conference in Bogota, the UK made bold commitments to end violence against children, and made powerful contributions to the discussions at the conference.
During the Brave Movement’s “Safe Digital Futures for Children” side event with Safe Online and WeProtect Global Alliance at the conference, Alicia Herbert OBE, the FCDO’s Director of Education, Gender and Equalities, and the UK’s Special Envoy for Gender Equality said:
The UK’s pledges at the conference, announced by Alicia Herbert OBE, included safe and enabling school environments, addressing online harms, continuum of services, data collection and monitoring and more. Some of their specific commitments include working across sectors internationally to promote evidence-based and survivor-centred approaches to prevent violence in a range of settings and investing in multisectoral gender-transformative approaches to contribute to the global evidence base on effective approaches.
Ultimately, while the United Kingdom, France and Sweden are three of the global leaders in efforts to end violence against children, it is crucial for them to also act on the important pledges they made at the Global Ministerial Conference on Ending Violence Against Children. Only then will we finally see a world where every child is safe.
