Children from all around the world face fundamental infringements of their rights on a daily basis. In many cases, a society’s strong cultural and religious doctrines, weak economy and ex-treme political views contribute to the aggravation of children’s rights violations. 

An abused and exploited child can be anywhere around you, in the next apartment, building, street or even next to you at school. Due to the innocent and young of their age, children are one of the most vulnerable targets of exploitation and ill-treatment. 

In our effort to protect children globally and support their rights, CITIZENS RIGHTS WATCH (CRW) underlines some of the most core violations against children, informs the public about their legal protection by human rights laws and asks for the respect and fortification of children’s rights.

Key facts

Nowadays, concerns on the violations of children rights are culminated and underline the irreversibly catastrophic consequences on a child’s right to life, physical and mental health, education, and dignity. 

Child maltreatment and violence, neglect, death, famine, ill treatment in juvenile detention centers, forced labour, commercial sexual exploitation, early marriage; female genital mutilation (FGM) and the use of children in military are some of the most central violations that children are daily subjected to. 

The number of children involved into exploitation and abuse situations is getting higher day by day. 

• According to United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF’s) report “On average, about 6 in 10 children worldwide (almost 1 billion)  between the ages of 2 and 14 are subjected to  physical (corporal) punishment by their caregivers on a regular basis” (UNICEF, 2014, 166)

• “More than 130 million girls and women alive today have been cut in the 29 countries in Africa and the Middle East where FGM/C is concentrated.” (UNICEF, 2014)

• Globally, one out of 4 women has been married before her 18th birthday (UNICEF, 2014).

• The number of children-soldiers are approximately more than 300.000 (Häggström H, 2000)

• International Labour Organization (ILO) has noted that 168 million children are victims of child labor and out of them 85 million work under risk for their health and life (ILO- International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour (IPEC), 2013, p.3).  

Child Protection under Human Rights Laws

The first serious necessity to strengthen human rights and enhance child protection came after the atrocities of the Second World War (WWII) and its disastrous consequences (Detric S, 1999 p.13). Even though attempts to protect children globally have been conducted by the League of Nations back in 1924 through the adoption of the Geneva Declaration, the International legal protection on children’s rights formally came into light with the adoption of the Universal Declaration on the Rights of the Child (UNDCR) in 1952(Detric S, 1999 p.13-14).

However, the first actual effort for the protection of children’s rights and their recognition as human rights within the frame of International Human Rights Law was introduced by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) in 1989 which came into force in 1990 (Todres J, et al, 2006 &Unicef, 2013, p.13). 

UNCRC, descendant of the 1952 UNDCR, aims to promote the best interest of every child and to cover its rights on the grounds of any sort of discrimination. The Convention has been ratified by 193 countries (except for the United States and Somalia) and encourages and requests the member-states of the convention to take measures to protect children’s rights properly and prevent harmful practices against them(United Nations Treaty Collection Database). 

UNCRC and its three protocols (Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Con-flict, Optional Protocol on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornography and Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on a Communications Procedure), two of them adopted in 2000 and the third in 2011, have been recognized internationally as the most important legal binding documents on the protection and promotion of children’s rights. 

Moreover, the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child 1990 and the European Convention on the Exercise of Children’s Rights 1996, as well as many other global and regional treaties (e.g. International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), European Convention on Human Rights 1950 (ECHR) and others) have included the protection of children rights in their provisions (The Law Library at Congress, 2014).

Deductions

International Human rights Laws have made some important steps towards the improvement of children’s rights and their (children rights) recognition as human rights. However, the implementation of the law is still weak and violations against children’s rights are still a sad reality.

Political and economic interests, poverty, wars, natural disasters and a vast number of reasons have contributed to the insufficient application and enforcement of domestic and international laws. 

Children are the future of this world and this future faces a serious threat. Even though, growing up in a safe and healthy environment is a given for many children in the world, for many of them it is still just an elusive dream.

In 2015, CRW promises to fight any type of child exploitation and mistreatment and engages to put all its efforts into improving children’s rights and strengthening child protection.

Contact: Ms. Athanasia Zagorianou, LLM

Researcher & Member, CRW Trustees Council

zagorianoua@gmail.com

References

Chapter IV: Human Rights: 11. Convention on the Rights of the Child, New York, 20 November 1989. United Nations, Treaty Collection Database. Retrieved from: https://treaties.un.org/Pages/ViewDetails.aspx?src=TREATY&mtdsg_no=IV-11&chapter=4&lang=en 

Children’s Rights: International Laws (2014). The Law Library of Congress. Retrieved from: http://www.loc.gov/law/help/child-rights/international-law.php 

Detric S, (1999). A Commentary on the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child. Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, Netherlands

Häggström H, (2000) Stop the Use of Child Soldiers. Medical Association for Prevention of War Retrieved from: http://www.mapw.org.au/files/downloads/Henrik%20H%C3%A4ggstr%C3%B6m%20-%20Stop%20The%20Use%20of%20Child%20Soldiers.pdf

ILO& IPEC, (2013). Marking progress against child labour -Global estimates and trends 2000-2012. Geneva: ILO

Todres J, et al (2006) The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child: An Analysis of Treaty Provisions and Implications of U.S. Ratification. Transnational Studies, US 

UNICEF (2013) Championing Children’s Rights: A global study of independent human rights in-stitutions for children, UNICEF Office of Research, Florence.

UNICEF, (2009) Child abuse: a painful reality behind closed doors. Challenges: Newsletter on progress towards the Millennium Development Goals from a child rights perspective No 9, p.5 Retrieved from: http://www.unicef.org/lac/Boletin-Desafios9-CEPAL-UNICEF_eng.pdf

United Nations Children’s Fund (2014). Hidden in Plain Sight: A statistical analysis of violence against children. New York: UNICEF