15 January 2008 - CRINMAIL 948
**NEWS IN BRIEF**
To view this CRINMAIL online, visit: http://www.crin.org/email/crinmail_detail.asp?crinmailID=2563
Your submissions are welcome if you are working in the area of child rights. To contribute, email us at info@crin.org. Adobe Acrobat is required for viewing some of the documents, and if required can be downloaded from http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep.html If you do not receive this email in html format, you will not be able to see some hyperlinks in the text. At the end of each item we have therefore provided a full URL linking to a web page where further information is available.
PETITION: Campaign for a complaints procedure under the CRC
A group of national, regional and international organisations have launched a campaign for an Optional Protocol to the CRC to establish a complaints procedure.
We hope you will join us by signing the petition. This mechanism would strengthen enforcement of the Convention, providing children and their representatives with a channel for pursuing breaches of all the rights guaranteed by the CRC.
What is it?
A complaints or communications procedure allows individuals, groups or their representatives, who say their rights have been violated by a State that is a party to a convention or covenant, to bring a complaint before the relevant committee provided that the State has recognised the competence of the committee to receive such complaints.
Why do we need a complaints procedure for the CRC?
Eighteen years after adoption of the CRC, the basic human rights of millions of children are still not being met.
The CRC will soon be the only international human rights treaty with mandatory reporting that lacks a complaints mechanism to challenge such violations (one is currently being drafted for the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, and all other instruments have one). This is a serious matter of discrimination against children.
A complaints mechanism would allow children and their advocates to appeal when domestic or regional remedies fail or simply do not exist. It would provide new pressure on States Parties to fulfil their obligations and also encourage them to provide effective remedies at national level.
While children and their representatives can use the mechanisms already established under other international instruments to pursue many of their rights, those instruments do not cover, separately or together, the full range and detail of rights in the CRC.
Furthermore, communications or complaints made on behalf of children to the other bodies are not considered by a Committee with special expertise on children’s rights. Similar persuasive arguments were made for the adoption of the communications’ mechanisms under the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) and under the new Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
What are the main arguments in favour of a complaints mechanism for the CRC?
- The right to be heard – The CRC provides children with the right to express their views freely, and have their views given due weight in accordance with their age and maturity. Establishing a complaints mechanism for the CRC would provide children with a mechanism through which they could exercise this right by bringing complaints directly or through others.
- The principle of equality – Children have as much of a right as adults to challenge violations of their rights; it is a matter of serious discrimination that no complaints mechanism exists for the full range of children's rights in the CRC.
- To strengthen the accountability of States Parties to the UNCRC – When domestic complaints mechanisms fail to provide an effective remedy for the violation of a child’s rights, or do not exist, then a remedy should be available at the international level.
For more details see http://www.crin.org/law/CRC_complaints/
Call to action:
We, as local, national, regional, and international bodies, including NGOs, human rights institutions and others from every part of the world, call on States Parties to the CRC to:
- Support and encourage the development of an Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child to provide a complaints/communications procedure;
- Support the establishment of an Ad Hoc Working Group to draft the Optional Protocol, ensuring it is an effective instrument for the safeguarding of children’s rights;
- Once adopted, sign and ratify the Optional Protocol, promote rapid ratification by other States Parties and work to ensure that adequate resources are provided to support the Committee on the Rights of the Child in responding to complaints/communications.
Organisations are invited to sign up to the statement here, or email us: info@crin.org
Please circulate this petition to other organisations. View the list of signatures here
Visit: http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=16175&flag=news
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COMMITTEE ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD: State Reports and Alternative Reports [publication]
The 47th Session of the Committee on the Rights of the Child is taking place from 14 January - 1 February 2008 at the Palais Wilson in Geneva, Switzerland.
The Committee is examining reports from the Dominican Republic and Timor-Leste on their implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Sessions on Bhutan and Georgia have been postponed.
The Committee will also review reports on the implementation of the Optional Protocol on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography (OPSC) from Chile, Kuwait and Timor-Leste and reports on the Optional Protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflict (OPAC) for Chile, Germany, Ireland, Kuwait and Timor-Leste.
A special CRC news page devoted to the activities of the Committee on the Rights of the Child has been set up on the CRIN website in partnership with the NGO Group for the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The page provides summaries of the Committee sessions by country, UN press releases, NGO press releases, information about the Day of General Discussion, Decisions, General Comments and other activities of the Committee.
States Parties reports submitted by governments to the Committee on the Rights of the Child are available in English, French and Spanish on the website of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR).
Alternative Reports submitted by NGOs to the Committee on the Rights of the Child are made available on the CRIN website in partnership with the NGO Group for the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The reports can also be searched by country, Committee session or by organisation. Note that Alternative Reports are posted on the CRIN website as they are received.
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GENERAL REPORTING
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TIMOR LESTE
Initial Report
On Wednesday 16th January, the Committee will examine Timor Leste’s Initial Report. The Report (CRC/C/TLS/1) is accessible in English, French and Spanish on the OHCHR website.
Alternative Reports
- NGO Shadow Report presented to Child Rights Committee Members
By: Forum Tau Matan - Eyes on Human Rights
Report in: English - Briefing by the Global Intitiative to End All Corporal Punishment of Children
Report in: English
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DOMINICAN REPUBLIC
Second Periodic Report
On Monday 21st January, the Committee will examine the Dominican Republic’s Second Periodic Report. The Report (CRC/C/DOM/2) is accessible in English, French and Spanish on the OHCHR website.
Alternative Reports
- Briefing by the Global Intitiative to End All Corporal Punishment of Children
Report in: English
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OPTIONAL PROTOCOLS
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TIMOR LESTE
Initial OPSC and OPAC Reports
On Thursday 17th January, the Committee will examine the reports submitted by Timor Leste under article 12 (1) of the Optional Protocol on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornography (CRC/C/OPSC/TLS/Q/1), and article 8 (1) of the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict (CRC/C/OPAC/TLS/1). The reports are accessible in English, French and Spanish on the OHCHR website.
Alternative Reports
- NGO Shadow Report presented to Child Rights Committee Members
By: Forum Tau Matan - Eyes on Human Rights
Report in: English
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GERMANY
Initial OPAC Report
On Friday 18th January, the Committee will examine the report submitted by Germany under article 8 (1) of the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict (CRC/C/OPAC/DEU/1). The report is accessible in English, French and Spanish on the OHCHR website.
Alternative Reports
- Child Soldiers - A Shadow Report
By: German Coalition to Stop the Use of Child Soldiers
Report in: English
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IRELAND
Initial OPAC Report
On Wednesday 23rd January, the Committee will examine the report submitted by Ireland under article 8 (1) of the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict (CRC/C/OPAC/IRL/1). The report is accessible in English, French and Spanish on the OHCHR
website.
Alternative Reports
- No Alternative Reports are currently available
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KUWAIT
Initial OPSC and OPAC Reports
On Thursday 24th January, the Committee will examine the reports submitted by Chile under article 12 (1) of the Optional Protocol on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornography (CRC/C/OPSC/KWT/1), and article 8 (1) of the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict (CRC/C/OPAC/KWT/1). The reports are accessible in English, French and Spanish on the OHCHR website.
Alternative Reports
No Alternative Reports are currently available
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CHILE
Initial OPSC and OPAC Reports
On Monday 28th January, the Committee will examine the reports submitted by Chile under article 12 (1) of the Optional Protocol on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornography (CRC/C/OPSC/CHL/1), and article 8 (1) of the Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict (CRC/C/OPAC/CHL/1). The reports are accessible in English, French and Spanish on the OHCHR website.
Alternative Reports
Visit: http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=16166
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ITALY: Separate school buses for traveller children proposed [news]
[ROMA, 12 January 2008] – A town council in a district in Rome, Italy, has passed a motion to separate children from traveller families from other children on school buses following reported clashes in the last few days.
The motion was passed with the votes of the Communist Refoundation party, the Democratic Left and the centre right parties, while the Democratic Party, the most powerful member of the coalition, voted against the motion.
The events unfolded in Rome’s 7th District, a traditional communist stronghold in the Italian capital which encompasses the working class areas of Centocelle, Prenestino Quarticciolo, Alessandrino and la Rustica.
‘I thought we were in the era of inclusion, not exclusion. We cannot return to the times of Rosa Louise Park’, said councillor Maria Coscia, from the Democratic Party.
Rosa Louise Park was an American activist (1913 – 2005) who became a symbol of the civil rights movement after refusing to give up her bus seat to a white person in 1955.
The head of the town council from the Democratic Party in Rome’s town council, Pino Bataglia, urged the Communist Refoundation and the Democratic Left to back down, saying that the vote ‘is not only deeply incoherent, but also a worrying sign of confusion about the fundamental values that unite us’.
Bataglia strongly rejected discrimination against children.
The motion was presented after a group of parents demanded the separation in buses after a recent fight.
According to the parents, the children from traveller families behaved ‘too forcefully’ and the two adults accompanying the children could not calm them down.
Following the outbreak, they requested a return to the old days when schoolchildren from traveller families went to school in a different bus to other children.
Further information
- Czech Republic: Govt guilty of forcing Roma children into special schools (November 2007)
- Serbia: Study shows poor and Roma children excluded (14 June 2007)
For more information, contact:
Terra Actualidad - EFE
http://actualidad.terra.es/
Visit: http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=16154
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RIGHT TO INFORMATION: Twins' marriage sparks debate over rights of adoptees [news]
[LONDON, 13 January 2008] - Twins separated at birth and adopted into different families in the United Kingdom married each other without realising that they were related, Lord Alton has revealed. The pair, whose identity has been kept secret, met as adults and married after feeling what the peer described as "an irresistible attraction".
When the couple discovered the truth about their incestuous relationship, they were granted an annulment by the courts, which ruled that their marriage had never actually existed. Their plight sparked widespread debate over the rights of children to know the identity of their birth parents.
Lord Alton, who learnt of the disturbing case from a judge involved in the case, referred to it during a House of Lords discussion on the Human Embryology and Tissues Bill. The Bill, which if passed will relax the rules governing fertility treatment, will be voted on in the Lords on Tuesday.
Lord Alton used the twins' case to support his argument that birth certificates should be changed to include information on both the genetic parents, as well as whether or not the child was conceived by a sperm donor.
He insisted: "The state is colluding in a deception. We are opening the door to more cases like this one. The issue here is about human rights." A German man recently served a two-year prison sentence after fathering four children with his sister, from whom he was separated at birth.
The couple are now campaigning for the right to continue their relationship in violation of the country's ban on incest.
[Source: Independent on Sunday]
Further information
- UK - Birth Certificates to Name Father (25 June 2007)
Visit: http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=16138
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**NEWS IN BRIEF**
Mozambique: Bracing for more flooding (15 January 2008)
http://www.crin.org/resources/infodetail.asp?id=16172
United States: MySpace makes site safer for children (15 January 2008)
http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=16174&flag=news
Ghana: African cup prompts concern over trafficking and sex tourism (15 January 2008)
http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=16171&flag=news
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