Politiet og NGOer i Østtimor melder om flere tilfælde af alkoholrelateret vold. Unge arbejdsløse står i de fleste tilfælde bag. Ifølge politiet er der også flere tilfælde af vold i hjemmet.
DILI, 1 August 2012 (IRIN): National police and NGOs in Timor-Leste have noted an uptick in alcohol-fuelled violence, especially among unemployed youths.
Vidal Campos Magno, now 29, grew up surrounded by conflict, was a teenager during the final years of the Indonesian occupation of Timor-Leste, and then went through the turmoil that followed the 1999 referendum for independence.
“I was involved in the fighting. I remember hanging around with friends, then we would plan to go and hurt this person or that person. We had to fight because of the political situation.”
It was not until he was accepted into university that Magno decided to change what he calls his “bad behaviour”.
Now a project coordinator at Ba Futuru, a local peace-building organization, he draws on his experiences to help young people, including former gang members and ex-prisoners.
One of the common problems, he said, is that unemployed youths are stuck in a cycle of alcohol and violence.
In Timor-Leste, unemployment among young people is estimated at over 40 percent, and approximately 16.000 young people enter the labour market each year. The problem is expected to grow, with 41 percent of the population under 15 years old, according to government data.
“There’s a lot of youth unemployment and sometimes young people hang around and drink alcohol, then go to the main road to fight each other or throw rocks at cars. This is their reality,” said Magno.
An analysis of drug and alcohol issues in the Pacific by the Australian National Council on Drugs in 2008-2009 concluded that “alcohol is still a substance of concern” in Timor-Leste, but noted a lack of official data.
The most recent national data reported to the World Health Organization (WHO) was in 2006, before a political crisis displaced more than 100,000 people, a tense and violent presidential poll in 2007, and a presidential assassination attempt (mordforsøg) in February 2008.
There are no government-funded rehabilitation facilities for people addicted to drugs or alcohol, but Pradet, a national mental health NGO, was one of the first groups to provide treatment. It has offered community awareness workshops to prisoners, police and community leaders since 2009, funded by AusAID.
Læs videre på
http://www.irinnews.org/Report/95997/TIMOR-LESTE-Alcohol-fuelled-violence-a-growing-concern
