Submitted by CRIN on
This policy paper addresses the protection of children’s rights by covering the unregulated residential childcare institutions currently functioning in Georgia. These institutions expose children to physical and psychological violence in violation of both international and local law. Because the children placed in these institutions are not official registered by the state, neither the local nor international community have any information about these children. The parents, when present, do not or cannot protect their children’s rights because they are mostly unaware of the conditions in these institutions and the needs of their children after they have been placed in them. The Public Defender of Georgia, the only agency with access to these unregulated childcare institutions, has carried out monitoring only once within the last ten years. The findings of that monitoring revealed grave violations of children’s rights in contravention of the internationally recognised principles and standards for the protection of children’s rights established by the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.
This policy document offers recommendations to the central and local authorities to ensure the protection of children’s fundamental right to grow up in a family environment through systemic reforms supported by the provision on the protection of children’s rights in the Association Agenda between Georgia and the European Union.
