A father has been charged with abusing and burning his daughter with a car lighter.

The father has denied the accusation, and claimed he did not intend to burn the child, but only frighten her. The lighter dropped on her hand, he claimed. He would not comment on the matter when contacted by local journalists.

However, this was the conclusion of a police investigation and medical report issued by King Fahd Hospital in Jeddah, according to a report in a local newspaper on Friday. The matter has now been taken up by the criminal court in Dammam.

The public prosecutor claimed the father had abused the child when she had asked to visit her mother, who was divorced from him. The mother said that she took the girl, Elana, to hospital because she had been crying continuously.

“Elana had been abused continually by her father but we were not able to prove this until he burnt her with a car lighter. When she came to me, she could not stop crying, so I took her to a hospital in Jeddah. This is how we proved what was happening to my little girl,” the mother said.

She filed a complaint with Jeddah police and they transferred the case to the public prosecutor who started an investigation. It proved that she had been burnt “deliberately.”

There has been a rising number of domestic violence cases in the Kingdom recently, with the victims mostly women and children. There are cases before the courts, under investigation and others that have seen perpetrators fined and imprisoned. Some of the perpetrators are fathers and husbands.

Recently a man was found guilty of killing his daughter from his first wife, with the aid of his second wife. A local court found that the child, Ghosoon, had been verbally abused and physically tortured, resulting in several broken bones and other severe injuries. The girl was living with her father and his second wife.

During the investigations, the father admitted to torturing his daughter and locking her up with chains with the help of his second wife. He said he did this to “get back” at his first wife.

Psychologist Fouziya Al-Jalahmah said a recent study showed that there has been a 67 percent increase in emotional abuse of children at kindergarten level. There was a 33 percent increase in abuse of girls.

Al-Jalahmah said the study showed that 22 percent of children are continually exposed to verbal abuse, particularly in the first three years before they start primary school.

She said 21 percent are sworn at and ridiculed, 16 percent threatened and intimidated, and 13 percent locked up and isolated from others, and then neglected.

She said 8 percent of the children in the study suffer from low self-esteem and inability to trust others. They are also withdrawn, depressed, anxious, complain a lot, have no patience and are aggressive, she said.