Child rights and national plans of action

The Convention on the Rights of the Child was one of the most central and unifying themes among most NGO discussions during the Special Session.

Kul C. Gautam, Deputy Executive Director of UNICEF, praised NGOs for their scope of activities, commitment and their historic and essential role in building the worldwide movement for the rights of children over the past 30 years. He said that NGO action led to the landmine ban and debt relief, adding "and now it is playing a big and growing role in the Global Movement for Children. NGO perspectives are very important in the alternative reports submitted to the Committee on the Rights of the Child. They bring attention to governments working hard for children as well as to those who fall short."

Formed in early 2000, the Child Rights Caucus is a group of more than 100 national and international NGOs from around the world committed to protecting and promoting the human rights of children. The Caucus served as a lobby group pressing for a strong rights-based focus to the Special Session and its outcome document. Since 2000, it has prepared several versions of an alternative outcome document called, 'A Children's Rights Agenda for the Coming Decade'. During the SSC, the Caucus was a major force in efforts to prevent what it saw as "watering down" of the outcome document in areas related to child rights, including sexual and reproductive health, child labour and juvenile justice. The Caucus issued several position papers, held a press conference and delivered an open letter to the US delegation.

"The Convention remains a binding standard for the 191 countries who have ratified it", said Ms. Jo Becker, spokesperson for the Caucus. NGO members of the Caucus and others pledge to work with governments to ensure that the national plans of action (NPAs) will contain concrete steps towards the full implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child. The Child Rights Caucus will remain active during the next year while NPAs are being developed.

"Governments must recognize that civil society needs to be present and consulted," said Mary Diaz, Director of the Women's Commission on Refugee Women and Children and Co-Chair of the NGO Steering Committee. "Citizens are asked to participate in building strong societies and holding their governments accountable. [But] in order to do that we must have access to policy-making work and negotiations like this one."

Throughout the Session NGOs recognized their responsibility and their unique position to help elaborate NPAs and to develop tools and guidelines for a monitoring process linked to monitoring the CRC. As governments returned home to develop their National Plans of Actions, NGOs were certain not to be far behind, for NPAs are due in only one year's time. NGOs said that the criteria for the NPAs being developed should include a strong statement that backs up paragraph 59 of the outcome document urging the inclusion of civil society.

For more information on the CRC in the follow-up to the Special Session, see Follow-up: CRC - A cornerstone.

For more information on national plans of action, see Follow-up: National plans of action.