23 March 2006 CRINMAIL 765
___________________________________________________________
- WORLD WATER DAY: Children Call for Action on Access to Safe Water [news]
- ITALY: Routine Detention of Migrant and Asylum-Seeking Minors [publication]
- DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO: Rebel Charged for Use of Child Soldiers [news]
- MOZAMBIQUE: Zambezi Bridge Work a Threat to Local Children [publication]
- EMPLOYMENT: ECPAT International [job postings]
___________________________________________________________
Your submissions are welcome if you are working in the area of child rights. To contribute, email us at [email protected]. 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.
___________________________________________________________
WORLD WATER DAY: Children Call for Action on Access to Safe Water [news]
[MEXICO CITY, 22 March 2006] – On World Water Day, as the 4th World Water Forum was drawing to a close, ten young water activists took the stage, side by side with over 30 ministers of water and environment at the global meeting, to discuss children's role in the world water crisis. They represented the 112 participants in the Children’s World Water Forum, a parallel event ending in Mexico City yesterday. And they spoke out for the hundreds of millions of children worldwide struggling to survive without safe drinking water.
Standing tall in their national costumes, the children from Africa, Asia and Latin America faced world leaders with dignity and the special unity of childhood. Ibrahim Adamu, 15, President of the Nigerian Children’s Parliament, opened the children’s “water manifesto” with a demand: "Governments must accept responsibility for children’s unacceptable suffering as a result of water deprivation. Today, 400 million children do not even have enough safe water to live healthy lives,” he said. “This is wrong. This is killing our future. We call on you to bring safe water to all the world’s children as our human right.”
For all the children at the Children’s World Water Forum, this was the crowning moment of a week filled with energy, excitement and, most of all, hard work. Throughout the forum, they have heard ideas from more than 30 cultures and discussed dozens of examples of child-driven water and hygiene projects. They have shared stories of courage and imagination, of children working for children to bring permanent change.
The children’s call to action says governments have no excuse for ignoring the water and sanitation needs of young people or failing to invest in child-focused solutions. In the week since the World Water Forum began, more than 31,000 children have died from waterborne diseases. Hundreds of thousands have become sick. And in every corner of the developing world, schools have been missing pupils because of illness or dirty facilities keeping children away – particularly girls.
“The World Water Forum has been about much more than water for development, industry and agriculture,” said Deputy Director Jean Gough of UNICEF’s regional office for Latin America and the Caribbean. “Nothing less than the survival of our children and the education of the next generation are at stake.”
Determined to keep adult decision-makers accountable for their water pledges, the Children’s Forum participants closed their meeting with an intergenerational dialogue between young people, ministers and water experts from around the world.
Visit: http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=7771
More information
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
ITALY: Routine Detention of Migrant and Asylum-Seeking Minors [publication]
The Italian authorities should stop their practice of routinely detaining minors, especially those seeking asylum and unaccompanied by a family member, Amnesty International said in a recent report entitled: Invisible children - The human rights of migrant and asylum-seeking minors detained upon arrival at the maritime border in Italy. In the report, the organisation calls on the authorities to reconsider the measures it is now applying, which appear to fall short of human rights standards.
"Children are the first victims of the failings of Italy's asylum and immigration policies," said Nicola Duckworth, Europe and Central Asia Programme Director at Amnesty International. "Made invisible by the lack of statistics and the general lack of transparency of the centres, they are forced to live sometimes for prolonged periods of time in unhygienic and unsuitable conditions without an opportunity to challenge the lawfulness of their detention."
During the past five years, approximately 80,000 migrants and asylum-seekers have reached Italy by sea after a hazardous journey, often onboard small, unseaworthy boats. Among them have been hundreds of children, generally very young, including infants, and some of them unaccompanied. They have come from Eritrea, Ethiopia, Somalia, Turkey and Iraq as well as from other countries in the Middle East and North Africa. In many cases, they have been detained upon arrival along with adults, though there is no domestic law that justifies this routine practice.
The right of detained minors to be kept separate from adults who are not members of the same family has in many cases not been respected. They, along with children, some less than five years old, have had to endure intense heat in summer and cold and humidity in winter living in mobile houses in detention centres.
Amnesty International has received more than 890 allegations and other information regarding the presence of minors in most detention centres in Italy in recent years. The organisation has a detailed knowledge of 28 unaccompanied minors who have been detained at some point between January 2002 and August 2005. Almost all were asylum-seekers from sub-Saharan African countries in which the human rights situation is very precarious.
For more information, contact:
Amnesty International
99-119 Rosebery Avenue, London EC1R 4RE, UK
Tel: +44 20 7814 6200; Fax: +44 20 7833 1510
Email: [email protected]
Website: http://www.amnesty.org
Visit: http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=7764
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO: Rebel Charged for Use of Child Soldiers [news]
The leader of a Democratic Republic of Congo militia has become the first war crimes suspect to face charges at the International Criminal Court (ICC). Thomas Lubanga was transferred to ICC custody on Friday from DR Congo. He appeared before the court, based in the Dutch city of The Hague, to face three charges relating to the use of children in armed groups. The charges include enlisting children under the age of 15 into armed groups, conscripting children under the age of 15 into armed groups, and using children under the age of 15 to participate actively in hostilities.
The ICC was set up in 2002 as a permanent court to deal with war crimes and genocide around the world. "For 100 years an international court was a dream, now it's becoming a reality," said chief prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo.
Mr Lubanga appeared on Monday before judges in a hearing that mainly dealt with administrative issues. Further charges are being prepared and are expected to be confirmed at the court's next session in June.
Mr Lubanga was arrested a year ago after nine Bangladeshi UN peacekeepers were killed in the volatile Ituri area. His ethnic Hema Union of Congolese Patriots has been battling rivals from the Lendu ethnic group, partly for control of Ituri's large deposits of gold. Several teams of ICC investigators have been sent in recent months to Ituri, where more than 50,000 people have died since the inter-ethnic war began in 1999.
Soldiers under his command are accused not just of murder, torture and rape, but also of mutilating their victims, says the BBC's correspondent. In one massacre, human rights groups say, Mr Lubanga's militiamen killed civilians using a sledgehammer. At different times, the UPC was backed by both Uganda and Rwanda - DR Congo's neighbours, which were closely involved in its conflict.
Rape and killings still continue in the east and for now the charges against Mr Lubanga are an exception, and impunity still the norm, he says. The ICC has also issued its first arrest warrants for the leaders of Uganda's rebel Lord's Resistance Army but they remain at large. It is also investigating alleged war crimes in Sudan's Darfur region. The existence of the court is strongly opposed by the United States, which fears its troops could face political prosecutions.
[Source: BBC News]
Visit: http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=7773&flag=news
More information
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
MOZAMBIQUE: Zambezi Bridge Work a Threat to Local Children [publication]
Save the Children UK recently released a report considering the impact that major infrastructure projects can have on children and their communities. The report, A Bridge Across the Zambezi: What needs to be done for children?, shows how workers’ compounds and illegal settlements that cater for stranded travellers and delayed truck drivers produce an unsafe and dangerous environment to which children are exposed.
In 2006, construction work will start on a bridge across the Zambezi River in central Mozambique linking the north and south of the country. The bridge will doubtless have positive consequences for the national economy, and local communities will also benefit from jobs and new investment. However, with large numbers of single male workers entering the area for the next three years, the risks of child prostitution and labour exploitation are very real. Based on recent evidence from the same area, Save the Children shares the concerns of local communities and children themselves.
Drawing on interviews and discussions with children, parents, teachers, community leaders and district and national level officials, the report identifies the problems that children may face and makes a number of practical recommendations aimed at construction companies, relevant government departments, donors, children's rights organisations and community leaders to reduce the risks to children.
For more information, contact:
Save the Children UK
1 St John's Lane, London EC1M 4AR, UK
Tel: + 44 20 7012 6400; Fax: +44 20 7012 6963
Email: [email protected]
Website: http://www.savethechildren.org.uk
Visit: http://www.crin.org/resources/infoDetail.asp?ID=7765
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
EMPLOYMENT: ECPAT International [job postings]
ECPAT International is a network of organisations and individuals working together to eliminate the commercial sexual exploitation of children. It seeks to encourage the world community to ensure that children everywhere enjoy their fundamental rights free from all forms of commercial sexual exploitation. ECPAT has vacancies for the following positions:
Campaigns Officer
The overall purpose of the job will be to strategise, plan and coordinate ECPAT International campaigns related to commercial sexual exploitation of children, as well as to provide technical support in advocacy, lobbying and campaigning to the ECPAT Secretariat and the network. The postholder will be based in Bangkok, Thailand. The contract is for two years (renewable).
Communications Officer
The overall purpose of the job will be to raise awareness and understanding about all forms of commercial sexual exploitation of children by sharing information and promoting the work of ECPAT International through liaisons with media, other agencies and the ECPAT Board, Secretariat and Network. The postholder will be based in Bangkok, Thailand. The contract is for two years (renewable).
Programme Officer, Child and Youth Participation
The overall purpose of the job will be to promote, coordinate, encourage, and support the integration of children and young people’s participation in the ECPAT network and among all partners committed to the work against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children (CSEC); to ensure the integration of children and young peoples’ views and opinions in all aspects of ECPAT’s work; to support projects by and for youth involved in combating CSEC; to develop the skills of youth in order for them to be able to participate meaningfully in the promotion of children’s right to live free of sexual exploitation; to document ECPAT experiences of child and youth participation in working to combat CSEC. The postholder will be based in Bangkok, Thailand. The contract is for two years (renewable).
Application deadlines: 18 April 2006
For more information, contact:
ECPAT International
328 Phaya Thai Road, Bangkok 10400, Thailand
Fax: +662 215 8272
Email: [email protected]
Website: http://www.ecpat.net/eng/index.asp
___________________________________________________________
The CRINMAIL is an electronic mailing list of the Child Rights Information Network (CRIN). CRIN does not accredit, validate or substantiate any information posted by members to the CRINMAIL. The validity and accuracy of any information is the responsibility of the originator. To subscribe, unsubscribe or view list archives, visit http://www.crin.org/email.
___________________________________________________________
