Baliyeva offers to place troubled teens in foster families

She said it today during the International Symposium on Prevention of Violence against Children in Closed Institutions of Central Asian Countries.

“To my mind, the problem of rehabilitation of troubled teens can be solved by establishing family support centres which will work on placement of the children in foster families,” Baliyeva says.

She also offered to reconsider the functions of special institutions.

“The work with teens has its own peculiarities.  The people involved in this work must be trained properly. Presently, there are 5.5mln children in Kazakhstan, i.e. ¼ of the entire population of the country. Not all of them enjoy adequate care and attention of parents. More than 12,000 disadvantaged families get into temporary detention facilities every year,” she added.