Researchers have found that Papua New Guinea police do follow up reports of sorcery related violence, but not often enough.
Police are frequently criticised for turning a blind eye to the violence.
Australian National University academic, Miranda Forsyth, said they estimate up to six deaths and 12 violent attacks, attributable to sorcery accusations, happen every month.
She said accusers do go to court, but rarely - perhaps two percent of cases every year.
But Dr Forsyth said the problem is not the police, rather the repeal of the Sorcery Act in 2013, which aimed to bring in penalties for sorcery accusations.
Poster promoting International Day Against Sorcery Accusation Violence Photo: supplied
She said one outcome of the legislation change is it has brought widespread confusion.
"People are not sure what does that mean. Does it mean that there is no provision against these types of crimes, or what actually is going on," she said.
"So one thing that we have really learnt from the repeal of this Act is that there needed to be a lot more education about what that repeal actually meant."
The researchers are also warning of increasing numbers of children, under the age of 12, being accused.
Papua New Guinea police Photo: RNZ / Johnny Blades
Dr Forsyth said they discovered that, since about 1996, there has been a surge in children directly accused, or who were secondary victims of sorcery accusations.
She said the characteristics are these children may have parents accused, they maybe non-conformist, or unhealthy looking, or have a jealous stepmother.
Ms Forsyth said the PNG Government needs to act quickly to deal with this.
"And one of the things that really concerns us is that this is also a trend in many sub-Saharan African nations, where there are now groups of children living on the streets as a result of being accused of being sorcerers," she said.
"So this is a trend that it is very important that Papua New Guinea gets very quickly on top of."
