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[KATHMANDU, 19 November 2008] - A leading human rights group has accused police in Nepal of torturing scores of children, sometimes for fun.

The New York-based Human Rights Watch said it had received more than 200 reports this year of the torture in police custody of street children or minors suspected of crimes.

"Sometimes, the torture is inflicted to extract confessions from the children," said Human Rights Watch researcher Bede Sheppard.

"At other times it appears to be carried out purely for the entertainment of the official," Sheppard said.

The youngest alleged victim of police torture was a 13-year-old, and methods of torture reported on the minors included kicking, punching, forcing metal nails under toenails and beatings with plastic pipes, the rights group said.

Despite widespread accounts of abuse, no police officer or government official has ever been prosecuted, and the maximum punishment is just a fine and one year in prison, Human Rights Watch said.

"By torturing children in custody they (the police) are committing crimes against those they are supposed to be protecting," Sheppard said.

Police declined to comment on the report, although a foreign ministry spokesman rejected the allegations.

"The report is wrong and baseless," Nabin Kumar Ghimire, a spokesman from Nepal's foreign ministry told AFP.

"If there has been any mandhandling, torture or abuse of children in police custody, offenders will face justice," the official said.

Read the full Human Rights Watch press release here

Further information

• Nepal: Five minors arrested and tortured, rights activists say (6 June 2007)
• Commitee on the Rights of the Child: General Comment No. 10: Children's Rights in Juvenile Justice (February 2007)
• Download the UN Study on Violence Against Children

Previous News release items

• 18/11/2008: BURUNDI: Albino boy killed, body dismembered
• 18/11/2008: NEPAL: Displaced children face hardship
• 18/11/2008: DISCRIMINATION: The status of childhood
• 18/11/2008: BAHRAIN: Children celebrate their day without a law to protect them (Arabic)
• 17/11/2008: TANZANIA: Women attacked in attempted kidnap of Albino children

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AFP - Agence France Presse

Last updated 19/11/2008 06:11:36

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