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The Advocacy Project seeks to help community-based advocates produce, disseminate and use information, and so become more effective advocates for human rights and social justice

New Series of On the Record From The Advocacy Project, January 24, 2001

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On the Record to Profile the Struggle for Child Rights

A new series of our email newsletter 'On the Record' will profile the global struggle to protect children against poverty, exploitation and violence.

The series will offer daily coverage of a meeting of the UN General Assembly in New York next week (January 29-February 2, 2001) that will prepare for a special session of the Assembly on children later in the year.

This series of 'On the Record' will be produced in partnership by The Advocacy Project, the Child Rights Information Network (CRIN), and Children's Express, under the auspices of the NGO Committee for UNICEF.

The goal of the Special Session will be to review progress on meeting the goals that were set out by the World Summit for Children in 1991.

A new report from UNICEF, which will form the basis for next week's debate, says that since 1991 'millions of young lives have been saved, more children than ever are in school and important treaties have been concluded to protect children from exploitation.'

But the report also paints a grim picture of abuse. It notes that ten million children under the age of ten die each year 'from the overwhelming effects of external debt, poverty, weak infrastructure, and services of poor quality.'

According to the report, two million children died in conflict during the 1990s and at least 300,000 have been recruited to serve in recent armed conflicts. Over 100 million children work in dangerous circumstances, included bonded labor and forced prostitution.   More than 3,500 nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have been invited to next week's meeting, and many will be pressing governments to view the needs of children as a violation of rights rather than an argument for more aid. The Convention on the Rights of the Child is the most widely ratified of all human rights treaties, but still lacks teeth.

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About the sponsors of this series:

The NGO Committee on UNICEF was established in 1952 to encourage cooperation between nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) and UNICEF, with a view to improving the wellbeing of children everywhere. It currently comprises 125 organizations, and is run by an elected board with headquarters in New York. The Committee publishes a newsletter and will open a website for the special session on Saturday, January 27, 2001. For more information email the Committee.

The Advocacy Project was established in 1998 to support advocates working for human rights and peace. Visit the website at  or email AP.

The Child Rights Information Network (CRIN) was established in 1995 to distribute news and information about child rights and to assist in the development of a global child rights community. The network has a membership of over 1,100 organizations in over 100 countries. For more information, email CRIN.

Children's Express was established in 1975 to help young journalists (aged eight to 18) to cover the news from the perspective of children. Its teams have won numerous awards and been nominated for a Pulitzer Prize. CE has bureaus in Washington, New York, Belfast and Tokyo.

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