CRINmail 1484:

In this issue:

LATEST NEWS AND REPORTS  

Elections, football and child labour

At the end of this month the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child will be holding elections for nine new members, to replace those whose mandate will expire in February 2017. Committee members are elected for a term of four years and elections take place every two years, though there is currently no limit to the number of times a candidate can be re-elected to the Committee. This year there are 19 applicants for the nine available seats, with two of the potential members also nominated for other UN committees, despite States usually only receiving a seat on one committee at a time.

CRIN has prepared a short profile for each of the candidates this year, highlighting their experience in the field of children's rights, why they want to join the Committee and what they think about key emerging children’s rights issues. To read these profiles and view the CVs of those standing for election click here.

This week also included the Global Day Against Child Labour, celebrated on 12 June, with this year’s focus on child labour and supply chains. The International Labour Organization (ILO) estimates that 168 million children are potentially involved in the supply chains of industries including agriculture, construction, manufacturing and more with potential for rights violations in every sector. At an event in Geneva Human Rights Watch called on delegates to begin drafting a set of binding rules and released a new report on protecting human rights in global supply chains, detailing labour rights abuses and anti-union tactics employed around the world. To mark the day The Guardian also released a roundup of products potentially involving child labour, including tea, coffee, chocolate and consumer electronics, demonstrating the extent to which child labour is still used to bring us everyday items.

Across Europe football fever took hold this week as the continent kicked off UEFA Euro 2016, and in the spirit of the competition CRIN has published an article ranking each of the teams in the group stages according to how well they treat children within the juvenile justice system. By comparing each country on its access to justice for children, minimum age of criminal responsibility and provision for life imprisonment of children, guest writer James Mehigan, a Lecturer in Criminology at the Open University and a Barrister at Garden Court Chambers, found out which country would come out as the children’s rights champion of Euro 2016.

Sexual exploitation and physical abuse

South Africa’s first nationwide study on sex abuse has found that one in three young people will experience some form of sexual abuse before the age of 17, with boys at a higher risk than girls. The report, released by the Centre for Justice and Crime Prevention and the University of Cape Town, found that 784,967 teenagers between the ages of 15 and 17 had been sexually abused. Of that number, no boys reported these incidents while just 31 percent of girls told the police or an authority figures about their experiences. In assembling data for the report, researchers interviewed more than 10,000 children, conducted focus groups with community representatives, and held discussions with care workers. One of the study’s authors, said girls were found to be more likely to suffer contact abuse, while boys were more frequently victims of exposure abuse.

Nearly 60 percent of the 50,000 victims of sex trafficking in Guatemala are children with the industry said to be worth $1.6 billion a year, according to a report by UNICEF. Girls as young as 12 were found to be working in brothels and were being forced to have sex with up to 30 customers a day. Sex trafficking is said to be fuelled by a "social tolerance" of children being sold into sexual slavery, with poverty listed as one of the biggest drivers of sex trafficking in the country. Traffickers often target poor, uneducated and unemployed women and girls, luring them with false promises of earning money as a waitress or model, the report explains. Guatemala has introduced several initiatives and laws to tackle human trafficking, including a 2009 anti-trafficking law, a protocol implemented in 2014 to guide officials when assisting victims, and greater focus on combating the online child sex trade. Despite these efforts, there are just two prosecutors working on sex trafficking cases across the country, with the number of trafficking convictions remaining relatively low.

In the United States, a member of the Native American Navajo Nation filed a lawsuit this week against the Mormon church for inadequately protecting him from sexual and physical abuse he allegedly experienced during his participation in a foster programme for Native American children. He is the fourth Navajo in recent months to sue the Mormon church for its neglectful lack of oversight —and more victims may still come forward. The Indian Student Placement Services began in the 1940s and allowed Native American families to send their baptised children to live with white Mormon families during the academic year, where they had access to better education. By the time the programme ended in 2000, approximately 40,000 Native Americans from 60 different tribes, predominantly Navajos, had participated in the programme.

Education, discrimination & freedom of expression

Students caught cheating in this year’s university entrance exams in China now face up to seven years in prison and a ban on taking other national education exams for three years, under an amendment to the criminal law. School leavers are assessed on their competence in Chinese, mathematics, English and another subject of their choosing in exams known as the gaokao, but reports of mass cheating have proliferated in recent years, allegedly involving organised syndicates between teachers and pupils. Drones and metal detectors are already deployed to catch those smuggling in radio equipment, while iris and fingerprint scanners detect people paid to sit the test in students’ place. Pressure on Chinese students is immense, with an estimated 9.4 million high school students competing for some three million undergraduate places. Students lacking a good gaokao score generally find themselves trapped in low paying jobs. Also on education in China, an extract from the Bible in secondary school textbooks in Beijing has been removed following criticism that it was spreading "western values". The country is officially an atheist state but Christianity has been attracting more follower in recent years.

In Burundi eleven students remain in police detention for allegedly defacing a photo of President Pierre Nkurunziza in their school textbooks. The students, aged between 14 and 19, are charged with insulting the head of state, a crime punishable by up to five years in prison and a fine of up to fr.50 ($31). They allegedly depicted the President with stubble and enlarged his nostrils and eyes with felt tip pens. In the margin they wrote ‘Ruhara’, which in the Kirundi language means ‘bald-head’, and ‘intumva mu Burundi’, which translates as ‘Burundi's obstinate one’, and finally ‘Nkurumbi’ - a play on the president's surname meaning "bad news." Last year Nkurunziza won a third term in office which critics say is unconstitutional. His return to power has caused turmoil in the country leading to more than 400 deaths, according to the UN. Hundreds have fled the country fearing persecution or assassination for opposing his rule. Burundi ranks consistently low on Reporters Without Borders’ World Press Freedom Index, which provides an authoritative gauge of freedom of expression in a given country, this year coming in at 156 out of 180.

In the United Kingdom boys will be allowed to wear skirts at school while girls can wear trousers under new gender neutral uniform policies. Eighty state-run institutions, including 40 primary schools, have so far removed references to girls and boys in their dress codes or rewritten their uniform policy. The new rules are part of government-funded efforts to make schools more inclusive of children questioning their gender identity. A spokesperson for LGBT rights organisation Stonewall welcomed the move, saying "No trans person should be forced to present in a way that makes them feel uncomfortable. When this happens, it can be deeply damaging, particularly for young people.” The policy’s benefits also extend to children who do not want to conform to stereotypes about what they should wear. In 2011 a 12-year-old boy was shortlisted for Liberty’s Human Rights Award for a campaign that began when he wore a skirt to lessons to protest his school's “discriminatory” uniform policy, which required boys to wear long trousers in summer but allowed girls to wear skirts.

However, on a darker note, experts in the UK told the Women and Equalities Commission that girls are wearing shorts under their school skirts to avoid sexual harassment. Sophie Bennett, co-director of UK Feminista, told the committee: “... there is that sense of a normalised culture of sexual harassment in schools where girls don't feel able to report it and instead change their own behaviour such as wearing shorts under their skirts.” Experts attribute this environment to online pornography which they say confuses perceptions of consent, and highlighted the need to improve the quality of sex and relationships education, and other school policies to ensure a safe school environment.

Right to health

Thailand is the first country in Asia to eliminate mother-to-child transmission of HIV and syphilis, the World Health Organization (WHO) announced last week. Elimination of transmission is defined as a reduction of transmission to such a low level that it no longer constitutes a public health problem. In the 1980s and 90s, Thailand struggled with a huge HIV epidemic, with an estimated 143,000 new infections in 1991. But awareness campaigns and promotion of condom use, as well as giving free access to antiretroviral (ARV) treatment, have helped to cut the estimated number of new infections to 8,100 in 2013. Mother-to-child transmission also dropped from about 1,000 children infected with HIV in 2000 to 85 children in 2015. Untreated women living with HIV have a 15-45 percent chance of transmitting the virus to their children during pregnancy, labour, delivery or breastfeeding, according to the WHO. But that risk drops to just over 1 percent if ARVs are given to mothers and children throughout the stages when infection can occur.

A study in Sweden suggests that children’s long-term exposure to air pollution, especially vehicle emissions, may be a cause of mental health disorders. The findings are based on comparisons of data on medical prescriptions given to more than half a million children for a range of psychiatric disorders with data on the concentration of particulate matter and nitrogen dioxide - a harmful gaseous compound emitted by vehicles - in four different counties. Researchers found that the risk of developing a psychiatric disorder increased by nine percent for every 10 microgram increase per cubic metre rise of nitrogen dioxide in the air. They say the findings are consistent with prior studies that have linked air pollution to  neurological disorders and mental health problems, including depression and anxiety, in adults. Air pollution has also been linked to decreased cognitive function and increased risk of autism spectrum disorders in children.

The right to health featured in a number of hearings at the 158th session of the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, in which access to medication and the impact of oil spills and mining activity were discussed. Organisations from Venezuela drew on the country’s public health crisis, recounting how sick children have died after not being able to access medicine and timely care. NGOs from Peru reported that there have been 40 oil spills in the last 20 years, with 20 of them in the last four years alone affecting the Amazon territory. These spills have poisoned water and forests, leaving communities to suffer multiple illnesses as a result, in areas where there is often a lack of medical care. Other hearings looked at the lack of access to justice and reparation for victims of human rights violations caused by the actions of corporations in South America, including death and illness caused by exposure to toxic waste. The rupture of the Mariana Dam in Brazil in 2015, owned by a mining company and which contained toxic waste was cited as an example.

Back to top

CASE STUDY: State on trial over killing of Paraguayan child soldier
 

After a child soldier was shot in the back and killed at a military base in Paraguay his parents spent 16 years asking why there was not a timely or effective investigation by the State. After bringing their case to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights they finally got answers, an apology and changes to the country’s recruitment practices.

Read the full case study here.

CRIN’s collection of case studies illustrates different approaches to using the law in children’s rights advocacy. Throughout the world advocates are changing legislation and societies for the better through what is known as strategic litigation - when a case seeks broader impact than simply bringing justice in a case at hand. Looking at how these efforts work in practice, CRIN is interviewing those involved in cases and looking at their outcomes and the impact they have had. We will highlight both successful cases and less successful ones - which have still had an impact - to allow advocates to learn from previous efforts to challenge children’s rights abuses.

Back to top

UPCOMING EVENTS

Investment: Why Europe needs to invest in children
Organisation: Eurochild
Date: 5-7 July 2016
Registration deadline: 24 June 2016
Location: Brussels, Belgium

Statelessness: StatelessKids Youth Congress
Organisation: European Network on Statelessness
Dates: 11-13 July 2016
Location: Brussels, Belgium

South Asia: Submissions for journal - ‘Institutionalised Children: Explorations and Beyond'
Organisation: Udayan Care
Abstract deadline: 15 July 2016

Digital rights: Children & young people's rights in the digital age pre-conference
Organisation: Int’l Association for Media & Communication Research
Event date: 26-27 July 2016
Location: London, United Kingdom

Violence: 21st ISPCAN International Congress on Child Abuse and Neglect
Organisation: International Society for the Prevention of Child Abuse and Neglect (ISPCAN)
Dates: 28-31 August 2016
Location: Calgary, Canada

Participation: Young Citizens & Society - Fostering Civic Participation
Organisation: University of Strathclyde
Dates: 2-3 September 2016
Location: Glasgow, Scotland

Alternative care: International alternative care conference
Organisation: University of Geneva and Institut de droits l’enfant
Event dates: 3-5 October 2016
Location: Geneva, Switzerland

Back to top

 

EMPLOYMENT

Council of Europe: Policy Adviser (child rights)
Application deadline: 24 June 2016
Location: Strasbourg, France

Back to top

LEAK OF THE WEEK

Back to top