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CRINMAIL 87:
September at the UN
In this issue:
*New format CRINMAIL*
Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC)
- Session 61
- Committee news
- Complaints mechanism / CRC in Court
Other Treaty Bodies
Human Rights Council
- Session 21
- Special Procedures
- Universal Periodic Review
- Thematic studies
UN Security Council
Useful Resources and Contacts
Having trouble reading this CRINMAIL, click here.
New Children's Rights at the UN CRINMAIL
Welcome to our rebranded CRINMAIL!
You are receiving this new CRINMAIL because you were either subscribed to our CRC CRINMAIL, our HRC CRINMAIL, or both. In order to contribute to ongoing mainstreaming efforts and to give our readers a fuller picture of how children’s rights are addressed in the UN - and how NGOs can participate - we have decided to combine both CRINMAILs and extend our coverage to children’s rights within all human rights bodies of the United Nations.
Specifically, we will:
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Inform readers about ongoing discussions and developments taking place at the Human Rights Council, the Security Council, Treaty Bodies, with a focus on the Committee on the Rights of the Child, the General Assembly, and other UN bodies and mechanisms.
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Alert readers to events, debates, deadlines for participation, etc.
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Identify new opportunities where children’s rights can be raised.
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Connect readers with other active organisations for collective lobbying.
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Compile lists of relevant resources and give readers an opportunity to share their experiences with others.
This CRINMAIL will be sent out once a month. For regular news and updates, visit: www.crin.org.
Committee on the Rights of the Child (CRC)
CRC Session 61
The following 8 States, Albania, Andorra, Austria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Canada, Liberia and the Philippines are currently being reviewed by the Committee in Geneva. You can view the full list of alternative reports submitted by NGOs or follow the session here. The Committee will release Concluding Observations for each of the States reviewed at the close of the session. Find out how to engage with the Committee here.
Election time
On 18 December, States parties will elect nine Members of the Committee to fill the vacancies that will expire on 28 February 2013. As part of CRIN's transparency campaign, we are currently interviewing the candidates to find out whether they are up to the job. Read about the candidates here.
With the adoption of the General Comment on Child Rights and the Business Sector set for January 2013, the Committee is busy looking through submissions received from civil society further to its call for contributions. More here.
"The rights of children in the context of international migration" is the theme for this year's Day of General Discussion, taking place on 28 September. CRIN will be reporting live from Geneva. Read more about the day here.
A Countdown?
News reaches us that the first ratification of the new complaints mechanism under the Convention on the Rights of the Child is imminent. Thirty-one States have so far signed the third Optional Protocol to the CRC (OP CRC) but we need ten ratifications before the mechanism enters into force. Civil Society efforts are focusing on getting as many ratifications as possible.
CRC in Court
In 2010, we launched a Children in Court CRINMAIL to encourage children and their advocates to think about bringing violations of the CRC to the justice system. The CRINMAIL highlights latest case law where courts have used the CRC in their decision-making process. The CRC has not always fared well in legal decisions, but we hope that reviewing CRC case law will prove to be inspirational and help us learn about the potential for (and limits of) advancing children's rights through litigation.
- You can subscribe to receive these CRINMAILS. As always, please contact us at [email protected] to share news, resources and suggestions.
Children's rights and other treaty bodies
Some of our readers might be aware that we have been extracting mentions of children's rights from other treaty bodies and posting these on our website - but we have not necessarily been consistent in highlighting opportunities for participation or contributions. This is what this section will do!
Liberty and Security of Person - deadline for contribution
The Human Rights Committee is seeking contributions ahead of a general discussion on the preparation for a General Comment on Article 9 (Liberty and Security of Person) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The deadline for contributions is 28 September. More here.
The recent Paralympic Games in London, which we covered in a special edition of our weekly CRINMAIL, has put disabilities firmly in the spotlight. Why not take advantage of this focus by seeing which States are scheduled to be examined under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. More here.
Back in June, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Ms Pillay, published her long awaited report on the strengthening of the human rights treaty body system. The report follows a series of consultations. More here.
For More Information
For now, if you want to find what other treaty bodies are saying - or not - about children’s rights in your country, type your country name at the end of www.crin.org/ ; for example, for India, type: www.crin.org/india.
Human Rights Council (HRC)
Session 21
The 21st session of the Council is currently taking place in Geneva. Syria has once again been in the spotlight with Paulo Sergio Pinheiro, a long-term children’s rights advocate and now Chair of the Commission of Inquiry, reporting continuing violations of children's rights by Government forces and anti-Government armed groups. More here.
Article 19 has called on UN Members to reject a draft resolution proposed by Russia on “traditional values” as the concept may be abused to legitimise discrimination against minority groups, to silence dissent, and violate people’s human rights. More here.
Other topics on the agenda have included human rights defenders, and children and armed conflict.
Special Procedures
A number of new Special Procedure visits have been announced, including the UN Working Group on business and human rights' first country visit (to Mongolia from 8 - 19 October), the Special Rapporteur on human rights defenders' visit to Tunisia (27 September – 5 October), and the visit to the United Kingdom of the Working Group on African Descent (1 - 5 October 2012). Find out how to engage with Special Rapporteurs here.
As with the treaty bodies, we continue to extract mentions of children's rights from all Special Procedure reports. You can view these reports on our Wiki. You can also look at our reports analysing individual mandates to assess the extent to which children's rights are being addressed, here.
Universal Periodic Review (UPR)
Despite the lack of positive reform to the UPR in the recent HRC Review, one major breakthrough was the introduction of a new way of participating in the review process for civil society: NGOs can now submit video statements at the plenary sessions. This represents a huge step forward in making the UN more accessible to organisations on the ground who can simply not afford to travel to Geneva. It is important to remember, however, that organisations still need to have ECOSOC status to make oral contributions - whether in person or via video link. More here.
Fourteen States, including the United Kingdom and India, this week had their UPR reports adopted. We will be extracting children's rights mentions from the final recommendations as soon as they become available.
UN Thematic Studies - your chance to contribute
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Further to this year's Annual Day on the Rights of the Child, on "children and the administration of justice", the High Commissioner launched a report which highlighted implementation gaps in States' approaches. A further UN report focused on violence against children in the juvenile justice system.
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Find out more about our inhuman sentencing campaign.
UN Security Council
The Security Council (SC), based in New York, is made up of 15 member States, of which five are permanent (China, France, Russia, United Kingdom, United States) and ten rotating. Its main role under the UN Charter is to help maintain international peace and security.
The Council began to examine the issue of children and armed conflict when it realised the serious consequences this had for peace and stability.
A major report by Ms. Graça Machel in 1996 on the impact of armed conflict on children led to the establishment of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict (SRSG).
In 2005, it passed Resolution 1612, which called for the creation of the Working Group on Children and Armed Conflict, as well as the creation of a monitoring and reporting mechanism on six grave violations of children's rights. (More here). The SC now holds an annual debate on children and armed conflict in New York, with the participation of the SRSG.
This year’s annual debate took place last week with the participation of the newly appointed SRSG, Leila Zerrougui. The Council adopted a resolution strongly condemning violations of international law against children in armed conflict, calling on States to bring persistent perpetrators of violations to justice, including those who recruit and use children, kill and maim, commit sexual violence or attack schools and hospitals, and reiterating its readiness to take targeted and graduated measures against such perpetrators. Read more.
Useful Resources and Contacts
Useful Resources
Contacts and Organisations
If you have any feedback on our new CRINMAIL, please write to us at [email protected].
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