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In this issue:
Latest news and reports
- Health
- Education
- Juvenile justice
- Abuse and exploitation
Upcoming events
Employment
LATEST NEWS AND REPORTS
Health
A terminally ill child in Belgium has become the first under-18 to be helped to die under the country’s euthanasia law. The child, whose identity has been kept secret, was allowed a physician-assisted death as they fulfilled the law’s criteria of being in a “hopeless medical situation of constant and unbearable suffering that cannot be eased and which will cause death in the short term”. Belgium legalised euthanasia for adults in 2002 and two years ago became the first country to lift age restrictions on such procedures. Despite high profile opposition to the move from the church, an opinion poll taken a few months before parliament voted for the change suggested that 75 percent of Belgians supported the proposal. Under the law children must be interviewed by a paediatric psychiatrist or psychologist and the child's physician has to inform the child’s parent or legal representative of the outcome of their consultation. Any request for euthanasia, as well as the agreement by the child’s parents or legal representatives, must be delivered in writing, and the child and family must be given psychological care if it is needed.
Thousands of protesters have taken to the streets to oppose a proposed ban on all abortions in Poland. Abortions are already heavily restricted in the staunchly Catholic country, allowed only if there is severe and irreversible damage to the foetus, a serious threat to the mother's health, or the pregnancy is the result of rape or incest. However, under a proposed law, abortion could become punishable with a five-year prison term for both the patient and health professionals involved in the procedure, regardless of the reason for termination. Opponents of the Bill claim that the change would risk the lives of women and girls and force children as young as 11 who had been raped or subjected to incest to either give birth or face a custodial sentence. Poland’s restrictive abortion legislation has been repeatedly challenged in the European Court of Human Rights. The court found that in three cases there were unacceptable obstacles to accessing safe and legal abortions for women and girls, which breached Poland’s obligations under the European Convention on Human Rights.
A group of parents in Australia has claimed that their children experienced suicidal thoughts, psychotic episodes and depression after taking prescription asthma drug Singulair. While most of these symptoms were documented side effects for the drug, some parents are suggesting that they never received verbal or written warnings from their doctor or pharmacists, or information leaflets in boxes. While campaigners say they will fight for warnings on the outside of boxes, experts have asserted that the effects are still extremely rare, with only 16 cases of suicidal thoughts or depression reported out of an estimated 2 million prescriptions. In the United States in 2009 a similar set of complaints prompted the government’s Food and Drugs Authority to request extra information on the potential side effects of the drug, urging healthcare professionals and patients to report any side effects they noticed from the continued use of Singulair.
Education
Venezuelan children have had a rocky start to their school year with reports of ten percent attendance in the capital Caracas and 20 percent in Cojedes State. On top of the challenges brought by the ongoing socio-economic crisis and the inability for families to access school supplies, many have returned to find that their schools had been ransacked during the summer months, particularly affecting those children who relied on school meals to eat during the day. The government has also launched a new school curriculum for secondary school students with very little notice or consultation. The new plan was passed last June and teachers, who did not have the chance to discuss it with the authorities, only received training on it the week before the beginning of the school year. Many feared Mathematics was to be removed as a subject altogether, but instead Physics and Chemistry are to be taught as part of Natural Sciences in order to dedicate more school hours to subjects such as "Memory, Territory and Citizenship" and “Education for Work".
Austerity continues to impact children and their access to education in Spain, eight years after the start of the financial crisis. According to a recent report from Save the Children, 43 percent of school age children belonging to poorer families are being priced out of school, because of their lack of means to pay for items such as books or clothing. Spain has the highest rate of desertion in education after secondary school in the EU, with many children failing to progress onto higher education, and showing more concern for finding a job quickly to be able to help their family financially. Furthermore, the results of the latest demographic figures show a bleak picture for children in the country. There has been a sharp decline in the numbers of births in the country, with many experts pointing to the economic crisis as the main contributing factor and claiming that Spain will become a country of "old people".
A federal civil rights lawsuit has been filed in the United States city of Detroit, asserting a constitutional right to literacy and accusing the state of having disinvested in education in the city to the point that children lack the fundamental tools to learn. The complaint, believed to be the first of its kind in the country, states that the proficiency rates in core subject areas for the seven students named are near-zero at their schools, highlighting the systemic nature of the problem in Detroit. State lawmakers recently passed plans for a US$617 million plan to restructure the district, which has seen teachers wage large-scale protests over potentially working without pay and in subpar working conditions. Co-counsel Kathryn Eidmann says that this is the first federal case to argue that there is a right to access literacy under the 14th amendment of the US Constitution, noting, however, that this right is “very well grounded” in US supreme court precedent. The suit is asking for the federal court to provide relief including evidence-based literacy instruction, while addressing physical school conditions.
Rights groups in the United Kingdom are urging parents to boycott requests from schools to disclose their children’s nationality and country of birth. The request is part of the national school census carried out by the department for education, but there is concern that the data will be shared with other government departments to aid immigration enforcement. The department for education has denied that the information will be shared with the home office, the government department responsible for immigration, but information released under a freedom of information request last month revealed that data from the National Pupil Database has been shared with the home office 18 times since 2012 and that police had been granted access on 31 occasions. Bella Sankey, policy director of the civil liberties organisation, Liberty, has warned the data collection risks creating a chilling effect around school attendance causing children to be kept out of school for fear of attracting the attention of immigration authorities. There are also concerns that schools have been demanding pupils’ passport numbers and specifically targeting the parents of non-white children, singling out children from ethnic minorities and creating division.
Juvenile justice
Madagascar has enacted legislation to abolish life imprisonment for children as part of a new law on measures applicable to children in conflict with the law. Under the new legislation, children under 13 are not considered criminally responsible and the courts have discretion as to whether children between the ages of 13 and 18 can be held criminally responsible. In no case can a child be sentenced to more than half of the sentence that would be applicable for an adult. Previously, children over the age of 16 could be sentenced as adults, including to life imprisonment. The new law incorporates some of the provisions of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, requiring that "the deprivation of liberty is imposed on a child in conflict with the law as a measure of last resort, for the shortest possible time and subject to regular review".
An Israeli prosecutor has called for a 12-year jail term to be given to a Palestinian child for the attempted murder of two Israelis in a knife attack. The child and his 15-year-old cousin stabbed and seriously wounded a 20-year-old and a 12-year-old in the Jewish settlement of Pisgat Zeev, east Jerusalem. The boy’s cousin was shot dead by security forces, while the 12-year-old was hit by a car as he fled. He was the youngest Palestinian to be convicted by an Israeli civilian court in the current round of violence, though early last month Israeli lawmakers approved measures allowing the incarceration of children as young as 12 convicted of "terrorist offences". The Israeli government has said most of the Palestinians killed in recent months were carrying out knife, gun or car-ramming attacks, though others were shot dead during protests or killed in Israeli airstrikes on Gaza. The court is due to sentence the child on 7 November 2016.
In Australia, the Northern Territory’s supreme court has heard that the tear-gassing of four boys in Darwin’s Don Dale youth detention centre was “manifestly unnecessary and unreasonable” and had no authorisation from any government document. The teenagers involved in the incident inside the Darwin facility in August 2014 are suing the local government for injury, loss and damage, including extreme distress and humiliation, alleging that the treatment they were subjected to amounted to assault and battery. The case is one of two civil suits going before the courts relating to the Northern Territory’s controversial youth justice crisis. The court also heard allegations that three of the boys were given inadequate medical treatment for the effects of teargas, including one whose eyes were not examined because his spit-hood was not removed, and that a senior officer at the prison believed it was “actually not an issue” that teargas was used on children in a confined space.
Abuse and exploitation
Guam enacted legislation this month to end limitation periods for child sexual abuse claims, reforms that will enable children to bring complaints to court for historic sexual abuse. The changes come amid allegations from at least four former altar boys that Archbishop Apuron, the highest ranking Catholic cleric in Guam, sexually abused them when he was their parish priest in the 1970s. The Catholic Church has been conducting an investigation into the actions of Apuron for the past three months and has recommended that he be removed from office, though he is yet to be formally charged with a criminal offence. The head of the Vatican’s investigation, Archbishop Savio Hon Tai-Fai, has urged the Governor of Guam not to sign the bill, claiming that to do so would likely leave the church facing bankruptcy in the face of court claims for redress for historic sexual abuse.
Myanmar's National Human Rights Commission (MNHRC) is facing government scrutiny and a public backlash over its handling of a high profile case involving alleged child slavery and torture. The case of two girls, who were allegedly kept prisoner and tortured for five years while being forced to work in a tailor’s shop, was apparently reported to the MNHRC several times during their captivity. The girls’ parents claim that the MNHRC initially refused to get involved with the case despite repeated pleas from members of their families, and the police have also faced criticism for their inaction. After the story became front page news the police arrested the tailor and her two adult children on charges related to human trafficking, but critics have said that the £3,060 settlement negotiated by the Commission represented a system which promoted impunity for wealthy perpetrators of human rights abuses. As well as an investigation ordered by the president, members of the country’s legislature have heaped on the pressure, claiming that the Commission failed in its duty to protect citizen’s rights.
An 11-year-old girl from India who escaped domestic servitude has claimed she was sold by her family for as little as $15. After scaling a high wall to escape the girl told child welfare officials that she was made to work in two homes, given very little to eat and was not paid or allowed to continue her education. The man who allegedly exploited her registered the child as missing, and is expected to be investigated by police for human trafficking in relation to the incident. Data released by the Indian government this year showed that more than 40 percent of 9,127 registered human trafficking cases in the country last year involved children being bought, sold and exploited as modern day slaves. Similar cases of children escaping have also been reported recently, with the government of at least one state pledging to crack down on the use of children as slave labourers as a result.
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UPCOMING EVENTS
Request for information: Provision of support to persons with disabilities
Organisation: OHCHR
Dates: 28 September - 21 October 2016
Location: Global
Alternative care: International alternative care conference
Organisation: University of Geneva and Institut de droits l’enfant
Dates: 3-5 October 2016
Location: Geneva, Switzerland
Family separation: Exploring the Causes and Consequences of Children Separated From Their Families Across International Borders
Organisation: International Social Service
Date: 13 October 2016
Location: Maryland, US
Street children: Consortium for Street Children annual Research Conference
Registration deadline: 21 October 2016
Organisation: Consortium for Street Children
Date: 3 November 2016
Location: London, United Kingdom
Access to justice: National Conference on Child Wellbeing
Organisation: The President’s Foundation for the Wellbeing of Society
Dates: 21-22 October 2016
Location: Valletta, Malta
Separated children in judicial proceedings: Exploring the use and application of European and international mechanisms for the protection of vulnerable and separated children’s rights
Organisations: Child Circle; AIRE Centre; University College Cork; and ROSA
Dates: 27-28 October 2016
Location: Brussels, Belgium
Violence: 19 Days of Activism For the Prevention of Violence Against Children and Youth
Organisation: Women's World Summit Foundation
Dates: 1-19 November 2016
Location: Global
Education: Master of Advanced Studies in Children’s Rights
Application deadline: 1 November 2016
Dates: February 2017 - November 2018
Location: Sion, Switzerland
Education in Emergencies
Organisation: HREA
Dates: 2 November-13 December 2016
Location: online (e-learning course)
Children in War and Armed Conflicts
Organisation: HREA
Dates: 2 November-13 December 2016
Location: online (e-learning course)
Child in the City Conference
Organisation: Child in the City Foundation
Dates: 7-9 November 2016
Location: Ghent, Belgium
Child care: Children's Rights in Alternative Care - Walk the Talk!
Organisation: SOS Children’s Villages
Dates: 8-9 November 2016
Location: Paris, France
Right to work: Eliminating child labour and promoting decent work in agriculture
Organisation: The International Training Centre of the ILO (ITCILO)
Dates: 14-18 November 2016
Location: Turin, Italy
Child labour: Developing skills and livelihood training programmes for older children
Organisation: ITCILO
Dates: 21-25 November 2016
Location: Turin, Italy
Education: The Children's Rights Moot Court 2017
Organisation: Leiden University
Application deadline: 14 October 2016
Dates: 29-31 March 2017
Location: Leiden, The Netherlands Education: International Children’s Rights
Organisation: Leiden University
Application deadline: 1 April 2017 (non-EU) / 15 June 2017 (EU students)
Dates: September 2017 - Summer 2018
Location: Leiden, The Netherlands
EMPLOYMENT
Orchid Project: Chief Operating Officer
Application deadline: Rolling
Location: London, United Kingdom
Center for Reproductive Rights: Global Advocacy Adviser
Application deadline: Rolling
Location: Geneva, Switzerland
Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict: Partnerships Officer
Application deadline: 15 October 2016
Location: New York, United States
HURIDOCS: Executive Director
Application deadline: 15 October 2016
Location: Geneva, Switzerland
Oak Institute: Fellowship in film/photography and human rights
Application deadline: 2 December 2016
Location: Maine, United States
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THE LAST WORD
A group of children in Thailand had a memorable trip this week after they were invited by the local government to help destroy several tons of confiscated marijuana. Any children with high expectations were probably disappointed when they realised the event was stringently stage-managed, with the youngsters escorted away as soon as the pre-arranged photo opportunity had passed. While the half-baked scheme was arranged to show any budding drug dealers the error of their ways such a blunt approach might do less good than an honest, comprehensive education on the effects of such substances.
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