BACKGROUND RELEASE

24 May 2012

Situation of Children’s Rights in Cyprus, Viet Nam, Turkey, Nepal, Australia, Greece and Algeria to be Reviewed

The Committee on the Rights of the Child will meet at the Palais Wilson in Geneva from 29 May to 15 June to review the promotion and protection of children's rights under the provisions of the Convention on the Rights of the Child and its two Optional Protocols in Cyprus, Viet Nam, Turkey, Nepal, Australia, Greece and Algeria.

The Committee is a body of independent experts formed in 1991 to monitor the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child by its State parties. The Convention gives a comprehensive collection of children's rights the force of international law. The Committee also monitors implementation of two Optional Protocols to the Convention: the first on the involvement of children in armed conflict and the second on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography. A third Optional Protocol on a Communications Procedure was recently approved by the United Nations General Assembly on 19 December 2011. It will allow individual children to submit complaints about specific violations of their human rights under the Convention and its first two Optional Protocols. The Protocol opened for signature on 28 February 2012 and will enter into force upon ratification by 10 United Nations Member States.

To date 193 countries have ratified or acceded to the Convention, making it the most widely accepted international human rights instrument. Only Somalia and the United States have not ratified it. States parties to the Convention are expected to send representatives to the Committee to present reports on their efforts to implement children's rights. States must report initially two years after acceding to the Convention and then every five years. The Committee examines each report and addresses its concerns and recommendations to the State party in the form of “concluding observations”.