Rights of the Child

Calls upon States Parties to increase their efforts and undertake all appropriate measures for the full and effective implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and underlines that this includes the rights of the child in relation to early childhood development;

Urges States that have not yet done so to consider becoming Parties to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Optional Protocols thereto as a matter of priority and to implement them effectively, and encourages further efforts by the Secretary-General in this regard;

Urges States Parties to withdraw reservations that are incompatible with the object and purpose of the Convention on the Rights of the Child or the Optional Protocols thereto and to consider reviewing regularly other reservations with a view to withdrawing them in accordance with the Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action;

Urges States to review, adopt and update national legislation in line with their international human rights obligations and commitments to ensure that policies related to early childhood development are compatible with the rights set out in the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Optional Protocols thereto and other relevant human rights instruments;

Calls upon States to ensure the enjoyment by all children of all their civil, political, economic, social and cultural rights without discrimination of any kind;

Encourages States to promote the rights of the child in the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development,⁴⁰ in accordance with their obligations under international law and in the best interests of the child;

Also encourages States to adopt comprehensive, coordinated and adequately resourced policies, laws, programmes and services on early childhood development that integrate a family perspective, where relevant, to ensure that all children, including those in vulnerable situations, experience healthy and holistic early childhood development; to invest in policies and programmes that promote health, nutrition, responsive caregiving, safety and security, and early learning to ensure that children receive nurturing care; to incorporate early childhood development strategies into emergency preparedness and peacebuilding frameworks as appropriate; and to track and monitor progress through effective multisectoral approaches, prioritizing public financing for early childhood development as a national priority;

Urges States to ensure that children have access to clean water, sanitation and hygiene, including toilets, proper handwashing facilities and clean drinking water, to prevent the spread of waterborne illnesses in homes and childcare settings, and in this context expresses concern over water scarcity, particularly in remote and rural areas;

Also urges States to strengthen efforts towards poverty eradication for children in early childhood and their families, enabling access to employment opportunities and decent work for parents and legal guardians, and improve the situation of children living in poverty, in particular extreme poverty, deprived of adequate nutritious food, clean and safe drinking water and sanitation facilities, including for menstrual health and hygiene management, with limited or no access to essential physical and mental healthcare services, adequate shelter, education, participation and protection, taking into account that, while a severe lack of goods and services hurts every human being, it is particularly threatening and harmful to children, leaving them unable to enjoy their rights, to reach their full potential and to participate as full members of society, and exposed to conditions that lead to increased violence;

Calls upon States to increase investments in nutrition as a key part of a comprehensive essential healthcare package, including through essential nutrition programming, services and practices, that incorporates early stimulation, responsive caregiving and play-based interventions, and to support maternity and breastfeeding policies to foster young children’s healthy nutrition, growth and brain and cognitive development, bearing in mind the vital importance of good nutrition for child survival and development, particularly during early childhood, and in this regard underscores the need to address child stunting, which remains unacceptably high;

Urges States to take measures to improve prenatal, perinatal and postnatal mental and physical healthcare services for mothers and newborns, ending preventable maternal, newborn and child death, such as improving the access to healthcare systems, including for sexual and reproductive health, emergency obstetric and newborn care, the distribution and use of insecticide-treated nets, vaccination and immunization campaigns, the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV and the strengthening of international cooperation and technical assistance urgently required in developing countries to reduce maternal and child mortality and morbidity and improve maternal, newborn and child health;

Encourages Member States to coordinate a multisectoral strategy that aims at promoting mental health for new parents, legal guardians and other individuals legally responsible for the child, through home- and health facility-based prenatal and postnatal care for new mothers, the provision of early childhood programmes that address the cognitive, sensory-motor and psychosocial development of children and the promotion of healthy child-caregiver relationships, and by introducing or strengthening community protection networks and systems;

Calls upon States to scale up scientifically accurate and age-appropriate comprehensive education that provides adolescent girls and boys and young women and men, in and out of school, consistent with their evolving capacities, and with appropriate direction and guidance from parents and legal guardians, with the best interests of the child as their basic concern, with information on sexual and reproductive health and HIV prevention, gender equality and women’s empowerment, human rights, physical, psychological and pubertal development and power in relationships between women and men, to enable them to build self-esteem and foster informed decision-making, communication and risk reduction skills and to develop respectful relationships, in full partnership with young people, parents, legal guardians, caregivers, educators and healthcare providers, in order to, inter alia, enable them to protect themselves from HIV infection and other risks;

Also calls upon States to create opportunities for children’s inclusive and meaningful participation in decision-making processes in line with their evolving capacities, including girls and adolescent girls, children with disabilities, children belonging to national or ethnic, religious and linguistic minorities, children of African descent, migrant children, Indigenous children, and children in vulnerable situations and those who are hardest to reach, in all matters affecting them, and for children to become agents of change within their communities, taking into account the importance of involving children’s organizations and child-led initiatives, by creating inclusive consultative mechanisms and ensuring that policy measures are developed on the basis of participatory, evidence-based decision-making processes that take into account the views of children and the best interests of the child;

Urges all States to respect, protect and fulfil the rights of the child, including for children with disabilities and children in vulnerable situations, to express themselves freely and to be provided the opportunity to be heard in any proceeding affecting them, and to ensure that they have access to inclusive and equitable quality education, including pre‑primary education, and information in child-friendly and accessible formats, that their views are given due weight and that they are included in decision-making processes, in accordance with their age and maturity, in all matters affecting them;

Urges States to respect, protect and fulfil the right to education for all children under their jurisdiction, without discrimination of any kind, including based on age, and to ensure access to inclusive early childhood care and education and parenting programmes that improve the quality of children’s early learning, and encourages States to reduce or remove fees and indirect costs associated with access to childcare and pre‑primary education;

Encourages States to adopt and implement sustained and inclusive child-empowering, age-appropriate, disability-inclusive and gender-responsive non‑formal and formal education programmes, providing children, parents, legal guardians and other individuals legally responsible for the child, caregivers, teachers and other professionals working with and for children with skills relating to digital and data literacy, to promote awareness among children of the forms of violence that occur through or are amplified by the use of technology, and online harms and risks; and in this regard commits to address these challenges and spread the benefits of digitalization including by expanding the participation of all countries in the digitalization, in particular developing countries, among others through enhancing their digital infrastructure connectivity as well as building their capacities and access to technological innovations through stronger partnerships and improving digital literacy;

Urges States to take measures, including in collaboration with the private sector and other relevant actors, to ensure that early childhood development policies and programmes support the inclusion of children in vulnerable situations, including children with disabilities, in inclusive early childhood education and pre‑primary education settings with the provision of individualized support and reasonable accommodations;

Calls upon States to ensure that rest, play and leisure are integrated into school structures and curricula, and enjoyed from early childhood by all children equally, including children in the most vulnerable and marginalized situations, and reaffirms the role of play in building essential and transferable physical, social, cognitive, communication and emotional life skills at all ages, and its positive impact on promoting tolerance and resilience and facilitating social inclusion, conflict prevention and peacebuilding;

Also calls upon States to promote the provision of accessible, gender-responsive and age-appropriate information to children, including children with disabilities, on their rights, including through human rights education programmes as well as equal access to technologies that provide them with information and material from a diversity of national and international sources, especially those aimed at the promotion of their social, spiritual and moral well-being, and physical and mental health, and the protection of their rights;

Further calls upon States to accelerate efforts to eliminate all barriers to the equal enjoyment by girls of their right to education, to address gender-based discrimination, gender stereotypes and negative social norms in education systems, including in curricula, textbooks and teaching methodologies, and to fight all forms of violence, including sexual harassment and school-related sexual and gender-based violence, in and out of schools and other educational settings;

Calls upon States to scale up programming for girls, including education and skills development training for adolescent girls; to address gender-specific barriers to the equal enjoyment by girls of their right to education and access to quality education; to ensure access to gender-responsive support services, including psychological, social and sexual and reproductive healthcare services, and education, including in emergencies; and to ensure that girls’ opinions are heard, and that measures are taken to enable young women and girls to successfully grow into leadership positions in public and private spheres by ensuring their full and equal access to education, technology and skills development, leadership and mentorship programmes, increased technical and financial support, and protection from violence and discrimination;

Also calls upon States to ensure that child protection, including social protection and gender-sensitive mental health services, is recognized as essential and that it continues to be provided and be accessible, affordable and available to all children, at all times;

Urges States to ensure sustainable and equitable financing for child-responsive social protection and other social sectors as appropriate, including through the provision of social safety nets, such as cash transfers, food transfers, fee waivers and subsidies to enhance child development outcomes, contribute to gender equality and protect young children from poverty, fragility and social exclusion;

Calls upon States to commit to the improvement of child protection care systems and pursue policies that address the root causes of child abandonment, neglect, relinquishment and separation from their family;

Calls upon States, the United Nations system, the private sector and other relevant actors to commit to comprehensive child and family-friendly policies, including paid parental leave, maternity benefits, support for breastfeeding, affordable, accessible and quality childcare, child benefits and tax credits, as well as parenting and violence prevention programmes that are inclusive and non‑discriminatory, all of which contribute to ensure responsive caregiving, promote work-life balance, and support the well-being of children and their families, prioritizing those most in need, including those engaged in the informal economy, while generating broader benefits for poverty eradication, gender equality and sustainable development;

Urges States to take all appropriate legislative, administrative, social and educational measures to protect children from all forms of violence and abuse, including sexual and gender-based violence, online and offline, address the lack of child-responsive reporting mechanisms and inadequate data collection on violence, and support violence prevention programmes in early childhood, including through parenting support;

Also urges States to take comprehensive, multisectoral, coordinated, effective and gender-responsive measures to prevent, eliminate and respond to all forms of violence and discrimination against all children and to address structural and underlying causes and risk factors, including through enhanced prevention measures, research and strengthened coordination and monitoring and evaluation, implementing, in partnership with all relevant stakeholders, effective violence prevention and response activities in schools and communities, including training for parents, legal guardians and caregivers, capacity-building for professionals working with and for children, and educating children from a young age regarding human rights and the importance of treating all people with dignity and respect, and designing educational programmes and teaching materials that support consent, non‑violent behaviour, respect for boundaries and what constitutes unacceptable behaviour and how to report it, that eliminate gender stereotypes and negative social norms, as well as racism and racial discrimination, build self-esteem and informed decision-making and communication skills and promote the development of respectful relationships based on gender equality, non‑discrimination, inclusion and respect for human rights;

Further urges States to take immediate and effective measures to end child labour in all its forms;

Urges States to provide children whose rights have been violated or abused with access to effective and appropriate remedial victim support, as well as reparation and guarantees of non‑repetition; and calls upon States and businesses to ensure the availability and accessibility of free-of-charge, safe, confidential, responsive and child-friendly reporting mechanisms;

Strongly encourages States to adopt effective measures to prevent and respond to all forms of violence against children, particularly those in situations of violence stemming from transnational organized crime, including trafficking in persons, recruitment and use of children for criminal activities, and other forms of criminality that undermine their integrity and well-being, in accordance with the Convention on the Rights of the Child and other relevant international instruments;

Urges States to take measures to protect children from all forms of violence in the digital environment, to ensure that national legislation on data protection and privacy is in accordance with their international human rights obligations and allows law enforcement, social welfare and judicial authorities to conduct effective and appropriate investigations and prosecutions with the aim of holding accountable and bringing to justice all those responsible for or who attempt to commit such crimes against children, taking into account that such crimes are often multi-jurisdictional and transnational in nature, and to consider adopting legislation, regulations or policies to ensure that businesses address their responsibilities to respect children’s rights, safety and well-being during the design, engineering, development, operation, distribution and marketing of their technological products and services and putting in place adequate safeguards that seek to prevent or mitigate adverse human rights impacts on children that are directly linked to their operations, products or services;

Calls upon States to address prevailing challenges to bridge the digital divide within and among countries, the age, disability and gender digital divides and the divide between rural and urban areas, including between developing and developed countries, and highlights the importance of promoting and protecting the right of the child to enjoy the benefits of scientific progress and its applications, and to this end notes the importance of promoting digital literacy from an early age, as well as public awareness and understanding of new and emerging digital technologies, promoting risk awareness and self-protection training and guidance, and supporting capacity-building initiatives to ensure that children, as well as their parents or legal guardians, teachers and educators, are given the opportunity to develop the understanding, knowledge and skills needed to engage safely and meaningfully in the digital environment, including through international cooperation, to ensure that children, especially children in vulnerable situations, are able to connect to and access the Internet in a safe and secure way;

Also calls upon all States to respect, protect and fulfil the rights of the child and to ensure, for children belonging to national or ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities and migrant children, children affected by armed conflict, Indigenous children, children of African descent, internally displaced children and children with disabilities, the enjoyment of all their rights as well as access to healthcare services, social services, social protection and accessible and inclusive education on an equal basis with others, and to ensure that all such children, in particular unaccompanied migrant children, internally displaced children and those who are victims of violence and exploitation, receive special protection and assistance and that the best interests of the child are a primary consideration in their policies of integration, return and family reunification;

Calls upon States to ensure the legal protection of children from violence, both online and offline, in a manner consistent with their obligations under international law, including international human rights law, and to criminalize relevant conduct related to violence against children online and offline, including but not limited to forms of sexual exploitation and abuse of children, such as child grooming, sexual extortion, the streaming of child abuse, the possession or distribution of, access to, or exchange or production of or payment for child sexual abuse material and the viewing, conducting or facilitation of children’s participation in live sexual abuses or exploitation transmitted through digital technologies, in addition to the use of digital technology in the recruitment or use of children by armed groups and in the context of child trafficking;

Also calls upon States to develop coherent and coordinated protection systems and to provide universal access to quality comprehensive social, physical and mental health, including sexual and reproductive health, and legal and counselling services for all victims and survivors, to ensure their full recovery and reintegration into society, and to strengthen social welfare systems and effective service delivery for children affected by violence, in particular in the justice, education and health sectors;

Urges States to promote and protect the rights of the child against sexual exploitation and sexual and gender-based violence, including in digital contexts, through the adoption of relevant legislation to prevent these acts as well as combat them through the detection of child sexual abuse material and its immediate removal from the Internet, emphasizing the importance of a coordinated and multi-stakeholder global-level response;

Calls upon the relevant entities, funds and programmes of the United Nations system, donor institutions, including the international financial institutions, and bilateral donors to support, upon request, inter alia, national initiatives, including early childhood development programmes, financially and technically, as well as to enhance effective international cooperation and partnership to strengthen knowledge-sharing, capacity-building and skills transfer for early childhood, in terms of policy and programme development and implementation, research and professional training;

Urges all States, requests United Nations agencies, funds and programmes and invites regional organizations and civil society, including non‑governmental organizations, to cooperate with the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Violence against Children in promoting the further implementation of the recommendations of the United Nations study on violence against children and in supporting Member States in the context of the implementation of the 2030 Agenda, encourages States to provide support to the Special Representative, including adequate voluntary financial support for the continued, effective and independent performance of her mandate, and invites organizations, including the private sector, to provide voluntary contributions for that purpose;

Recommends that the Secretary-General extend the mandate of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Violence against Children, as established in paragraphs 58 and 59 of its resolution 62/141 of 18 December 2007, for a further four years, and maintain support for the effective and independent performance and sustainability of the mandate of the Special Representative, funded from the regular budget;