On Tuesday, one day before the International Women's Day, delegate of the National People's Congress (NPC) Wang Xianzhen said that in China, domestic violence was increasing in families and women were the main victims.

Fearing that divorce would bring a negative consequence to children, many women do not tell their sufferings to other people and as a result, they suffer a lot both mentally and psychologically.

Most domestic violence occurs when husband beats the wife. In some cases, old people or children in a family are the victims. Every year, domestic violence results in numerous deaths or severe injuries in a family. A recent report published by the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences titled 1995-2005: Gender Equality and Women Development Report shows that 30 percent of the 270 million families in China encounter some form of domestic violence and most are done by men.

China has published many laws and regulations in an aim to prohibit domestic violence. However, as some NPC deputies said, these laws and regulations did not give a clear definition to domestic violence and relative punishment was also weak and difficult to implement. Therefore, they could not protect women effectively.

Wang said more and more domestic violence occurred in families because as competition intensified in society, men were under great pressure and some release their pressure by beating their wives. At the same time, women are discriminated in many things such as education and marriage. 

(China News Service March 9, 2006)