10,375 cases of domestic violence reported in 2020 — MoSD

AMMAN — The Ministry of Social Development (MoSD) dealt with 10,375 cases of domestic violence last year, of which 5,776 of the victims were females. 

Bark Al Dmour, MoSD secretary general, said that when domestic violence is reported, case-specific risk assessment is conducted first to determine the needs of the victims — who can be either an individual or a whole family — to stand on the causes of the violence and after that determine the appropriate way to eliminate the cause.

He added that the ministry works on long-term plans to prevent the violence cycle in a case-specific approach. The approach focuses on fulfilling the needs and wants of the victims, that will lead to a stable family environment and will help victims take effective and positive part in their family and community when the cause is eliminated.

Dmour noted that the ministry acts as a social service provider in cooperation with Family Protection Unit of the Public Security Directorate (PSD), where they asses the needs of each case and then send them to the needed service provider which can be either legal, social, psychological or physical.

Most domestic violence cases were reported in January totaling 1,160, while the least were during April totaling 319 cases.

Statistics shows that the husbands were the abusers in 64 per cent of the reported physical domestic violence cases, while recorded 45 per cent when it came to psychological domestic violence cases. 

The majority of the sexual assault’s abusers were not family members with a 83.5 per cent.

He also pointed out that one of the top priorities for the ministry is to provide the victims — whether they were kids or female with safe shelter.

The total of the physical violence cases was 5,646, Females above the age of 18 were more likely to be physically abused totalling 4,060 during the year 2020.

Regarding sexual assaults, there was 784 reported cases, 1,214 reported psychological domestic violence cases and 2,731 cases of neglect.