17th Jan 2021 Belgrade – The Autonomous Women's Center is proud of the young women who have empowered themselves and reported the rape and sexual abuse that happened to them by a person in whom they had absolute confidence, who was there to teach and support them.
We remind of the fact that great courage is needed to speak out against a person who, taking advantage of his position of power and authority, built a relationship of trust with children, made them feel special, and then abused them in the most revolting way, imposing a sense of responsibility, shame and embarrassment upon them.
At the same time, we commend all the media who covered this topic without sensationalism, respecting the privacy and dignity of these young girls. We hope that other media will take care not to jeopardize further investigative actions that will be undertaken in this procedure by their reporting and that it will not put these young women in greater danger.
In addition, we strongly encourage all parents to talk to their children about how to recognize sexual abuse through open and supportive conversations that encourage children to contact them if something like this should happen to them.