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Summary: Statement by the United Nations Special Representative of the Secretary General on Violence against Children to the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child, March 2010.
[...] Madame Chairperson, In all these areas, the voice of the African Committee will be critical and indeed indispensable to help achieve progress. I would warmly welcome joining hands with you in transforming this critical child rights concern into a visible priority for all countries within the African continent. And I would very especially like to submit to your consideration the following suggestions: a)Building upon the important discussions held with the Chairperson and the strategic debate held today with the Committee, I would welcome developing a strategic agenda of collaboration with the African Committee to help consolidate an African fit for Children where violence has no place; b)Guided by your important monitoring role, I would like to encourage you to include the protection of children from all forms of violence as a systematic and core section of your review of States Parties reports on the implementation of the African Charter, and also as a visible focus of your concluding observations – in this regard, the recommendations of the UN Study may be used as a significant tool to support the promotion and assessment of progress within the African continent; c)In view of the critical importance of law reform to unequivocally prohibit all forms of violence, to protect child victims and witnesses and provide means of redress, as well as to support information and social mobilisation campaigns towards violence abandonment and elimination, I would welcome joining hands with you in an advocacy campaign to call for an explicit legal ban on all violence against children, including corporal punishment; the announcement of such an advocacy campaign could be a tangible outcome of today’s strategic debate; d) I would also like to encourage the African Committee, in close collaboration with key partners, including UNICEF and the African Child Policy Forum who are joining hands with us today, to promote the development of an African report on national follow up to the recommendations of the UN Study on Violence against Children; such a Pan African report can become a critical advocacy tool for promoting progress in the region, and also a powerful source of information on good practices to support the scaling up of positive initiatives, within and beyond the region; e)Finally, Madame Chairperson, I would like to seek your support in placing violence against children high in the policy agenda of the African Union and its Member States; African leaders have been vocal in their commitment to the protection of children’s rights, including through their strong call for action at the Pan-African Forum on Children; I therefore look forward to working together with you to promote the inclusion of the protection of children from all forms of violence in a future Summit of African Heads of State and Government. Madame Chairperson and distinguished Members of the Committee, Let me thank you once again for your strong commitment to children’s rights and for your decisive support to building a world fit for children, a world where violence has no place. Let me thank you very especially for the opportunity of joining you in this important special session on violence against children. I look forward to collaborating very closely with you in moving this agenda forward and to supporting the future steps the Committee will promote to protect children from all forms of violence. Read the full statement here. Further information: