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Children

Conferences and Special Session on Children

• World Conference on Education for All (Jomtien, Thailand, 1990)
• World Summit for Children (New York, 1990)
• World Education Forum (Dakar, 2000)
• Special session of the General Assembly (New York, 2002)

Children and Development

• Specific, attainable targets for children in the 2000 Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
• Children and the Millennium Development Goals (UNICEF, December 2007).

Children and Education

• Education initiatives of the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
• Programmes on basic education and gender equality and basic education in life skills of the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
• Education programme of the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA).

Children and Health

• Programmes on midwifery, newborns, nursing, infant nutrition, tetanus (including neonatal tetanus), child development, child health, school health promotion, immunizations, measles, mumps, rubella, child abuse, adolescent health, diptheria, pertussis (whooping cough), hepatitis B and sexually transmitted infections of the World Health Organization (WHO).
• Programmes on health, young child survival and development, early childhood, HIV/AIDS and children, immunization, pandemic influenza, adolescence, nutrition, and procuring supplies for children, among others, of the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF).
• The Global Polio Eradication Initiative.  When it was launched in 1988, there were 350,000 cases of polio worldwide — paralysing more than 1,000 children in more than 125 countries on 5 continents every day. By 2007, there were only 1,315 reported cases, and only four countries in the world remained endemic for the disease — Afghanistan, India, Nigeria and Pakistan.
• Immunization against polio, tetanus, measles, whooping cough, diphtheria and tuberculosis, between 1980 and 1995, raised immunization coverage against these killer diseases from 5 to 80 per cent, saving the lives of some 2.5 million children a year.
• The Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization (GAVI) — extends immunization protection to include hepatitis B, which kills more than 521,000 people a year, and haemophilus influenza type B, which kills 450,000 children under age five each year.
• GAVI was launched in 2000 with initial funds from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.  It incorporates the WHO, UNICEF, the World Bank and private sector partners.
• Global Strategy for Women’s and Children’s Health

Children and Human Rights

• The Committee on the Rights of the Child — monitors implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child
• The Convention’s Optional Protocol on the on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography, adopted in 2000.
• The Convention’s Optional Protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflict, also adopted in 2000 — prohibits the recruitment of children under 18 into armed forces or their participation in hostilities.
• Special Rapporteur on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography (reports to the Human Rights Council).
• The Programme of Technical Cooperation for Human Rights, supervised by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights — encourages ratification and supports implementation of international human rights instruments relating to the trafficking of women and children and the rights of the child in general.
• An Independent Expert for the Secretary-General on Violence against Children — reports to the General Assembly, makes specific recommendations for action.
• The Second International Decade of the World’s Indigenous People (2005-2015), declared by the General Assembly.
• The General Assembly’s International Convention on the Protection of the Rights of All Migrant Workers and Members of Their Families (1990) — grants children of migrant workers the right to registration of birth and nationality, and access to education.

Children and War

• The Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict, adopted in 2000 — prohibits the recruitment of children under 18 into armed forces or their participation in hostilities.
• Article 8 (2) (b) (xxvi) of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court classifies conscription, enlistment or use in hostilities of children under 15 as a war crime.
• The Secretary-General’s Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict — works to mobilize the political support of governments and civil society to address the plight  of children in war zones, both as targets and as soldiers.
• UNICEF works with governments and rebel movements to demobilize child soldiers, reunite them with their families and foster their social reintegration.

 

Children and Work

• The child labour initiatives of the International Labour Organization (ILO) aim at the progressive abolition of child labour.  ILO has played a key role in the enactment of child-labour laws
• ILO’s Minimum Age Convention (1973) — aims at the abolition of child labour, stipulating that the minimum age for employment shall not be less than the age of completion of compulsory schooling.
• ILO’s Worst Forms of Child Labour Convention (1999) — prohibits child slavery, debt bondage, prostitution and pornography, dangerous work, and forcible recruitment for armed conflict.
• ILO’s International Programme on the Elimination of Child Labour — seeks to raise awareness and mobilize action by providing technical cooperation.  Its efforts include a focus on the search for alternatives, including decent employment for parents, as well as rehabilitation, education and vocational training for children.