Highlands women attend a funeral for a victim of a sorcery accusation-related attack Photo: Supplied
What is thought to be only a small percentage of sorcery accusation related violence, or SARV is dealt with the courts, most of the cases come before the village courts.
For many Papua New Guineans the village courts, of which there are over 1800 in the country are their only access to the formal legal sector.
Academics from the PNG National Research Institute and the Australian National University have been looking at the pressures on the village courts and how they might be improved so they perform better when dealing with sorcery accusation cases.
RNZ Pacific's Don Wiseman spoke with Miranda Forsyth from the ANU's School of Regulation and Global Governance.
