WITH International Children’s Day approaching on June 1, what about the children who do not have the chance to enjoy their childhood? Some children are still forced to act as ‘parents’ – to care for their younger siblings in the home and sacrifice their own education and childhood to do so. 

This is a problem highlighted by many of the NGOs in Mongolia. For example, Save the Children’s 2006 study on children living in difficult circumstances in Mongolia cites more than one case of children being pressured to undertake household chores and care for younger siblings or other family members in the home. The report was ‘child-led’, meaning that the research was structured and collected by child researchers who had themselves experienced life in difficult circumstances – for example, former street children or child labourers.

“When I was small, I looked after the children and did the family’s housework. At the time, I got very tired and was pressured much. Now, when I think of how much I suffered then, I feel like a knife is cutting through my heart,” said one of the children interviewed for the study, a girl now aged 18.

World Vision and UNICEF also state cases of children being forced to care for young or old members of the family. Work within the family is often not as obvious as other forms of child labour, but it is still child labour. According to official figures at the moment 60,000 Mongolian children work, around 35% of the country’s population aged between 5 and 14. The real issue here is changing the attitudes of parents, both in this particular case and to child labour and abuse as a whole. As a child researcher for the Save the Children report, T.Delgertsetseg, said “Only parents can provide their children with opportunities for a happy life and to be good people.”

It is a basic human right to not be forced into forms of child labour in the home. One-third of all Mongolian children live in poverty, and this leads to children ending up with the responsibility of caring for relatives or siblings.

“When I interviewed an 8-year-old child, I felt very sad. The mother of this girl had been sick and unemployed. Her father was unemployed too. The girl had not had a good life. She helped Dad buy medicines for Mom. They collect wood, bottles, glasses and recyclable metals. Her father cannot get a job even though he tries. I feel pity for this little girl for not studying at school and spending her childhood in the struggle to take care of her sick mother,” said child researcher Ch.Nasan-togtokh.

International Children’s Day should serve as a wake-up call to remind everyone of the problems of child labour in the home and the importance of rights for children. Children are not adults, and should not be treated as such. In taking away their childhood, they are robbed of their right to education, their right to freedom and, quite simply, their opportunity to be happy children.

The 96th session of the International Labour Conference (ILC) started off on an unusual note in Geneva, Switzerland on Wednesday - without a president. In the interim Membathisi Mdladlana, the South African labour minister, was asked to chair the conference, Zolisa Sigabi, the department of labour spokesperson, said.

More than 3 000 government, worker and employer delegates converged for the annual conference of the International Labour Organisation, which will continue until June 15.

Yesterday, the African government group failed to reach consensus on Congo's candidacy to chair the conference, resulting in South Africa, as chair of the governing body, being asked to chair the ILC on an interim basis until the election of a president was finalised, Sigabi said.

"In accordance with the principle of rotation for regions and consensus on candidacy, (labour minister Membathisi) Mdladlana called for nominations from the floor. Albania received the most votes at 198, while Congo was supported by 90. But the quorum of 300 votes was not obtained, and the results were nullified. A further attempt to elect a president of the conference will be made at a future plenary session of the conference," she said.

Focus on child labour
During this session of the ILC delegates will discuss issues ranging from work in the fishing sector, equality at work, forced labour and the promotion of sustainable enterprises.

There will also be a focus on child labour in agriculture on the occasion of World Day against Child Labour on June 12.

"Six heads of states and governments as well as two princes will honour the conference with their presence this year," said Sigabi. - Sapa

The Islamic Development Bank has launched a USD 10b fund to fight poverty in developing Muslim states in Africa and other parts of the world.

The fund, which has an initial endowment of USD 1.4 b, will be dedicated to alleviating poverty, promoting health and universal education, and empowering women in the bank's 56 member countries, Reuters reported.

"This launching ceremony of the IDB's Poverty Alleviation Fund symbolizes a revitalization of the Islamic community in a world where unmatched wealth abides next to absolute poverty," the host of the bank's annual meeting, Senegalese President Abdoulaye Wade, told delegates on Wednesday.

Saudi Arabia has already pledged to contribute USD 1b, Kuwait USD 300m, Iran USD 100m and Senegal USD 10m, bank officials said.

The aim of the fund is to help meet the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), proposed by then-Secretary-General Kofi Annan and approved by world leaders in 2000.

They include halving extreme poverty, ensuring universal primary education, and stemming the AIDS pandemic, all by 2015, among the world's states.

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WHEN, in 1954, the United Nations (UN) General Assembly recommended that all countries should institute a Universal Children's Day to be observed as a day to celebrate children and draw attention to their problems, it could not have imagined that 53 years after, the challenges facing this most vulnerable class of people, would still be staggering, especially in African and other third world countries.

Nigeria adopted today, May 27 of every year, as its Children's Day and has remained faithful to the observance of the day. But children's issues go far beyond observance of Children's Day.

The UN General Assembly, realizing that all is not well with the world's children and recognizing that children have rights that must be documented, adopted by member states, promoted as well as enforced, adopted in 1959, the Declaration of the Rights of the Child, which addresses the rights of children and youths under 18 years of age, and in 1989, adopted the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which covers, in its 54 articles, every of the rights of children, from health care to education, to the freedom from exploitation and the right to hold opinion.

Notwithstanding that most member states of the UN are signatories to the Convention, however, the basic rights enunciated in this convention are still being violated with impunity in these countries that have adopted the Convention. Children are still flagrantly being abused and neglected, both at the family, community and governmental levels.

Apart from being a signatory to the Convention on the Rights of the Child, Nigeria has domesticated the Convention in the Child Rights Act which the National Assembly passed after much prevarication occasioned by opposition to its passage by some members based on perceived incompatibility of some provisions of the law with their religious and cultural beliefs.

In spite of both the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Child Rights Act, however, the rights of the children of Nigeria, to a large extent, are still being violated at the family, community, state and federal levels.

For instance, such basic rights as the right to education, healthcare, protection from child labour, trafficking, sexual and other forms of exploitation and drug abuse, right to rest and leisure, play and recreation, right to a decent standard of living, right to protection from abuse and neglect, protection from illicit transfer and illegal adoption, right to survival and development and the right to non-discrimination are scarcely respected or enforced.

In diverse forms, children are being discriminated against. In some states of the country, discriminatory school fees are being charged while in some others, children from some parts of the country are not admitted, all based on ethnicity or religion. Also in some parts of the country, the girl-child is still being discriminated against especially when those to be sent to school are being considered.

In spite of the efforts of the outgoing government through the Universal Basic Education (UBE) scheme, many school age children are still out of school. Indeed, some statistics have it that about 40 per cent of school age-children are out of school in the country. The basic right to education is thus denied this staggering percentage of the country's children from among who could have arisen the great men and women of, tomorrow's Nigeria.

The right to survive and thrive is also a tall dream for many of these hapless children. It is estimated that about 25 per cent of them die before they are five years of age, due mostly to avoidable causes. Indeed, statistics have it that the level of immunization coverage for the child killer diseases that was once as high as 80 per cent has dropped to as low as less than 20 per cent.

Those children that survive beyond their fifth birthdays in the country still have the tough task of developing their potentials in an inclement environment where their basic rights as children would be respected and enforced by government through the relevant agencies.

On a daily basis, the media is awash with stories and pictures of different forms of child abuse, child trafficking for purposes of forced, sometimes, hard labour or for child prostitution, of torture and deprivation of the liberties of children, of child marriages, most resulting in VVF, of female genital mutilation (FGM), of people using children for ritual purposes or for begging on the streets or of children hawking all manner of wares when they should be in school.

Many cities have the challenge of street children, some sleeping under the bridges, in the markets, in school buildings where they are exposed to all manner of abuse and are easily indoctrinated into criminality. There is also the increasing cases of HIV/AIDS orphans who are often left to fend for themselves in the harsh economic environment of the country. Most of these also graduate to become the area boys and area girls that are today part of the problems of the society.

Why are children faced with these challenges in spite of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and in spite of its domestication in the country in the form of the Child Rights Act? One of the reasons may be that though the National Assembly has passed the Child Rights bill and outgoing President Olusegun Obasanjo has signed it into law, only 14 out of the 36 states of the federation and Abuja have passed it into law in their respective states, meaning that in 22 states of the federation, the Child Rights Act is not law.

LATEST developments in child education and early learning came into focus at a two-day conference at Beit Al Quran.

Keynote speakers from Bahrain, the UK and US addressed an international audience of about 160 professionals, parents, educators and scholars.

The First International Early Childhood and Montessori Conference was organised by the Mother Child Home Education Programme (MOCEP) in co-operation with the Bahrain Montessori Centre (BMC).

It was held under the theme: Childhood An Evolutionary Vision - Celebrating 100 years of Montessori.
The four speakers were MOCEP and BMC founder and director Dr Julie Hadeed; Harvard Graduate School of Education, Project Zero educational researcher Mara Krechevsky; Cambridge University early years scholar Mary Jane Drummond; and Montessori Centre International, London, chief executive Barbara Isaacs.

They discussed topics on early learning, a Montessori approach to education versus a traditional one, multiple intelligences and related topics.

Montessori education is a scientific way of observing children to discover and support their true nature.
The teaching views each child as having its own inborn inner guidance for self-directed development.
The Montessori environment provides an order and arrangement of self-teaching materials that children use according to their free choice for independent learning and intellectual development.

The conference celebrated the honorary legacy of Dr Maria Montessori, who founded the Montessori approach 100 years ago, and some leading research and practice in the field of early education and development.

The conference was sponsored by Esterad and Gulf Finance House.

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As one walks through the corridor of every upper, middle or lower class home, one would come across either a male or a female child who can be said not to be a part of that family.

The signs are often clear. He or she is either cutting the hedges in the compound; fetching water; cooking; washing; scrubbing; cleaning shoes; bathing and feeding the dogs among other things while biological children of owners of such homes would be doing home work from school; playing with friends at the playground or watching television.

Such children are often bombarded with whole lots of household chores that, they least have time for themselves. Their social life then becomes a life of sorrow, depressive and grief.

The question, which always comes to mind at this point, is why are these children left to suffer at the hand people who seem to care less about humanity? Why are people, who treat their own children as angels from heaven, providing them with comfort and care to ensure their social and psychological well being be so callous to the children of others?

These children continue to labour and do all sorts of hazardous work both home and outside which affects their health.

Poverty has been recognized as one major factor, which allows some families to willingly give out their children to people whom they believe would take good care of them.

The promise by these people to send such children to school, take good care of them and help in their total development are always less realised as against inhuman and hard treatment.

In Ghana the practice of domestic servants had gain root and had now become a business venture for some unscrupulous men and women, who act as middlemen in the trade.

Most children in child labour now can be linked with internal trafficking by such middlemen, who give them out to somewhat rich individuals to engage them in exploitative business.

A document made available to the Ghana News Agency by Child Labour Unit of the Ministry of Manpower Youth and Employment said an estimated total of 1,273,294 (20%) of children in Ghana are engaged in child labour.

Out of the 2,474,545 (39%) of children engaged labour, 6,361,111 are into economic activity with over 1,031,220 children under 13 years.

In Ghana, the largest proportion (57%) of working children are in agriculture, hunting and forestry; 20.7 per cent in sales; 9.5% into production and 11 per cent in other general workers such as porters, truck pushers and driver-mates.

The records showed that 242,074 children engaged in Worst Forms of Child Labour work in dangerous and hazardous environment, exposing them to injuries, toxic substances, sexual abuse, violence and even death.

This revelation is a sure contradiction of what is stipulated in the Children's Act of 1998, which vehemently frowns on such practice.

The Acts stipulated to ensure the rights of children especially children of school going age has not been enforced strictly to deal with perpetrators of this crime.

The figures also indicated that boys dominated sectors like fishing; commercial agriculture; mining and quarrying while girls were used in domestic work, as potters, Kakayes, selling, chop bar workers and prostitution with its attendant diseases.

About 91 per cent of both parents of working children, according to the document were alive, which showed a gross shirking of responsibility or the state of poverty among parents especially rural parents, who often gave their children out.

The child trafficking has become so lucrative that it is now rated as the third most profitable business aside drugs and small arms. The practice has gained an international recognition according to an expert with UNICEF, Mr Eric Okrah.

He said children are exported to as far as Ivory Coast, Nigeria and United Kingdom among other places. These children according to him were 'packed' into specially made cars and injected with drugs, which made them lose contact with their environment. In effect they fall into deep sleep till they get into their destinations.

He stated that children according to the Acts were expected to only engage in light and normal works till they are above 16 years but often times these trafficked children engaged in hard, hazardous and exploitative work.

Looking at child trafficking from two main perspectives, he gave it criminal and human right dimension, which makes it an offence for one to engage in the practice and at the same time trampling upon the fundamental human rights of the affected person.

Nike, the official supplier of soccer balls to the English Premier Football League, is to resume making hand-stitched leather balls in Pakistan, six months after it stopped production there amid child-labour concerns.

The company has signed a new contract with Silver Star, a leather processor based in Sialkot, after a tender process that Nike says was designed to promote a broader modernisation of the sector centred around the city in northern Punjab.

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The case has highlighted the challenges facing brands in the clothing and footwear industry over how to respond to persistent breaches of their codes that set minimum conditions for workers in their supply chains.

Nike's decision in November to end production at Saga, its former supplier in Sialkot, followed what Alan Marks, a company spokesman, said was "primarily a fundamental breach of trust" in its management over failures to remedy problems with labour conditions.

Nike was the factory's main client, taking around 80 per cent of its production, and many of the estimated 3,000 workers at the factory have subsequently lost their jobs. Saga was producing 6m of the 40m leather soccer balls produced in Pakistan annually.

Unlike the global clothing business, where contracts can be moved relatively rapidly between factories and companies, the quality and scale of the leather industry in Sialkot is globally unique, leaving Nike with a significant shortfall in its supply of hand-stitched balls.

The city's leather stitching industry is largely informal and household based. This has combined with a lack of organised local labour groups and a repressive local political environment to stymie a decade of efforts by international buyers to eliminate child labour through monitoring programmes.

Nike says Saga had originally agreed to use factory rather than home-based workers, but that local factory monitoring groups reported persistent child labour problems last year.

The new contract requires the new supplier to use only registered full-time employees paid hourly wages to work on its premises, rather than piece work. It also stipulates that its workers be able to form or join trade unions.

However, the initial contract is for a fifth of the volume of balls originally produced for Nike by Saga, although Nike says it will buy more as Silver Star's capacity develops.

Ineke Zeldenrust, a labour rights advocate at the Clean Clothes Campaign, said Nike needed to "provide the prices and volume and long-term relationship" to support the new contractor, and that the impact of its efforts on the rest of the sector depended on the involvement of other brands.

"If you want to do this, you need the other brands to be brought into the loop," she said.

The terms of the tender, drawn up in consultation with a range of local and international labour rights groups, also requires Silver Star to pursue the gradual automation and mechanisation of the ball manufacturing process in Pakistan.

Nike points to the use of an Adidas machine-stitched ball at the last World Cup finals as an indication that the game's use of hand-stitched balls is set to decline, creating future problems for Sialkot unless the industry modernises.

Amsterdam - Top cocoa producer Ivory Coast is confident it will stop the abuse of child labour on its farms by a deadline of July 2008 to avoid US sanctions, the campaign's co-ordinator says.

"For us it's not a deadline, it's just a milestone. We will meet this milestone," Youssouf N'Djore, national co-ordinator of Ivory Coast's Child Labour Monitoring System Project, said this week.

Ivory Coast, the world's number one cocoa producer, which has been racked by instability since a brief 2002-2003 civil war, has been the target of allegations by international rights groups that children are working as slaves on its plantations.

The Ivorian government, cocoa sector and foreign multinationals who export and process Ivorian cocoa have all come under increasing scrutiny from rights and consumer groups who are campaigning for "Fair Trade" foodstuffs untainted by violence and child slavery.

Chocolate makers missed a 2005 deadline to certify labour conditions on cocoa farms but are now working to meet a July 2008 deadline to monitor conditions on 50% of West African farms.

"It is not important for us to simply say that we have completely eliminated child labour," N'Djore said at the end of a two-day cocoa conference in Amsterdam.

Setting 'strict criteria'
"It is important that whenever a case (of abusive child labour) is registered, we solve it successfully and we find ways to prevent such cases in the future," he added.

Ivory Coast faces sanctions on its exports to the United States if it misses the 2008 deadline, set by US lawmakers.

Two US politicians brought to world attention the issue of child and slave labour on West African cocoa fields when they set a deadline for chocolate makers to certify their products were free of abusive labour practices.

There have been widespread accusations that children, some as young as five, work on farms in Ghana and Ivory Coast.

Ghana, the world's number two producer, said last month it was on track to meet the 2008 target.
The Ghanaian government was now working to amend its legislation and set strict criteria about the conditions and age at which children can work, said Rita Owusu-Amankwah, the national programme manager in Amsterdam.

Cultural differences
Ivory Coast officials said they would follow Ghana's example and come up with measures after a pilot labour survey was expected to be completed in the coming month.

The survey focuses on working conditions for both children and adults on Ivorian cocoa farms.

Farmers and local authorities in Ivory Coast, while recognising the problem of child trafficking, insist there is no widespread use of forced child labour on farms.

They instead point to cultural differences and the need to pass on skills to enable their children to earn a living as an adult.

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The Committee on the Rights of the Child this morning reviewed the initial report of Sudan on how that country is implementing the provisions of the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography.

In opening remarks to the Committee, Sami Abd Eldaim Yassin, State Minister with the Ministry of Social Welfare and Women and Child Affairs of Sudan, said a legal workshop had been held to harmonize domestic law with Sudan's obligations under the Optional Protocols to the Convention on the Rights of the Child, and the resulting draft bill on children was now before Parliament. Among new developments, the National Council for Child Welfare, responsible for coordination and monitoring of efforts to implement the Convention on the Rights of the Child and its two Optional Protocols had been established; a unit for the protection of the family and the child had been set up 15 months ago; two weeks ago, approval had been given to establish a special unit on children's protection within the army; an action plan on violence against children had been adopted; and there was a Working Group on the protection of children from sexual abuse in conflict areas, which was being conducted in partnership with the United Nations, the African Union, and civil society institutions.

In preliminary concluding remarks, Joyce Aluoch, the Committee Expert serving as Rapporteur for the report of Sudan, observed that things were looking bright for Sudan. It appeared that the national will was in place, both at the national level, and on the part of the Government of Southern Sudan, to put all the new laws in place for the better protection of children in Sudan. Concluding recommendations from the Committee would centre on issues of monitoring, budgetary allocation, implementation of existing programmes and laws, and ratification of related international human rights instruments by the Government. Indeed, the most important priority for Sudan now should be implementation of the laws, policies and peace agreements that it had concluded.

Other Experts raised a series of questions during the discussion, including what resources had been allocated over the past few years to implement the Protocol; why there was no specific law criminalizing the sale of children in Sudan; whether there were any exceptions to the prohibition against the death penalty for children in Sudan; why Sudan had not criminalized the use of child camel jockeys; whether there were functioning courts that had the capacity and capability to prosecute and penalize the crimes set out in the Protocol; what was being done to address raids carried on villages to abduct children for forced labour; and what was being done to address reports of child slavery in the country. An Expert was particularly concerned about the provision regarding forced child labour in the Sudanese penal code, whereby anyone who pressed a person into labour by illegally forcing them to work against their will was subject to a penalty of up to one year in prison and/or a fine. That left the door open for imposing just a small fine for what was a very serious crime.

The Committee will release its formal, written concluding observations and recommendations on the report of Sudan towards the end of its three-week session, which will conclude on 8 June.
Also representing the delegation of Sudan was Ibrahim Mirghani Ibrahim Mohamed Kheir, Permanent Representative of Sudan to the United Nations Office at Geneva, as well as other representatives from the Permanent Mission of Sudan in Geneva; Amira Elfadil Mohamed Elfadil, Secretary-General of the National Council for Child Welfare of Sudan; and representatives of the Government of Southern Sudan, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Sudan, the legal system and the Police Force of Southern Sudan.

As one of the States parties to the Convention, Sudan is obliged to present periodic reports to the Committee on its efforts to comply with the provisions of the treaty. The delegation was on hand to present the report and to answer questions raised by Committee Experts.

When the Committee next reconvenes in public, at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, 30 May, it will take up the combined second and third periodic reports of Kazakhstan (CRC/C/KAZ/3).

Report of Sudan
The initial report of Sudan on the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography (CRC/C/OPSC/SDN/1) says it is prohibited to employ children in forced labour, sexual exploitation, pornography, or illegal trafficking, or to use or employ them in armed conflict in Sudan. The offence of selling children is a new offence that is not known in Sudanese society. There have been no cases of this kind, since the Sudanese social heritage and prevailing customs and traditions forbid this practice. It is very difficult to commit this kind of offence in Sudan. Sudanese law does not mention this offence as a primary offence, but rather as an adjunct to other offences such as forgery, deception or enticement. These offences are contained in the Sudanese Criminal Code of 1991 and carry heavy penalties. With regard to pornography, this is indecent material and performances as defined in the Criminal Code, as well as in the 2004 Children's Act, which prohibit the publication, offer, distribution, reproduction or possession of any printed matter or audiovisual work of art that panders to children's basest instincts, projects an attractive image of behaviour that contravenes social values or traditions, or encourages juvenile delinquency. Article 30 of the Children's Act requires managers of cinemas and similar public facilities to use every possible advertising method to display prominently, in Arabic, announcements about performances that children are not permitted to see. Anyone who breaches articles 28 and 30 of the Act shall be liable to a term of up to one month in prison and/or a fine. The Criminal Code of 1991 makes no mention of what is known as trafficking in human organs and therefore does not criminalize or prescribe penalties for this offence.

The National Council for Child Welfare set up a committee to combat the exploitation of children in camel racing. The committee members include government institutions and some civil society organizations. As part of its plans, the committee demanded the enactment of laws and regulations and the introduction of tighter controls on children travelling abroad; organized awareness-raising workshops in several states on the employment of children in this work, which violates their rights; and involved local community leaders and families in community awareness-raising programmes about these practices.

Presentation of Report
SAMI ABD ELDAIM YASSIN, State Minister with the Ministry of Social Welfare and Women and Child Affairs of Sudan, said, with regard to legislative measures, that Sudan had ratified all regional and international instruments related to children, beginning with the Convention on the Rights of the Child and its two Optional Protocols. It had also ratified all the international human rights instruments from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights up to the two protocols to the Four Geneva Conventions. Those had become part of the legislation in Sudan, and national laws had also been harmonized with the international protocols and conventions that had been ratified. In addition, a legal workshop had been held to harmonize domestic law, including the 2004 Children's Act, with Sudan's obligations under the Optional Protocols. That workshop had been made up of jurists, civil society organizations working on children's issues, and State institutions operating in the children's domain, and led to a draft bill on children in 2006 that was now before parliament for ratification.

Mr. Yassin noted that Sudan's Penal Code already provided clear legal protections for the children in line with the Protocol. In addition, the Military Code criminalized such acts, and the El Fasher, Abuja and Darfur Peace Agreements all included provisions to protect the rights of the child. Moreover, the Constitution of 2005 provided that all international human rights instruments to which Sudan was a party formed part of its law, and state constitutions had similar provisions. Thus, Sudan was taking very active steps at both the State and federal level to protect children.

It was true that data and statistics were few, Mr. Yassin said. However, with the ratification of the Protocol, Sudan now intended to set up a statistical centre on children's issues, with the help of UNICEF and others, to create an up-to-date database on children.

Mr. Yassin then drew attention to a number of new programmes and developments for the promotion and protection of children's rights in Sudan. To start, the former Social Welfare Ministry had become the Ministry on Social Welfare of Women and Children. A National Council for Child Welfare had been established, responsible for coordination and monitoring of efforts to implement the Convention on the Rights of the Child and its two Optional Protocols, as well as all on all issues to do with children's rights. A unit for the protection of the family and the child had been set up 15 months ago, in accordance with the provisions of the Optional Protocols. So far, it had offices in Khartoum and Southern Sudan, but it was planned to establish offices in all areas of the country, with the help of UNICEF. Just two weeks ago, approval had been given to establish a special unit on children's protection within the army, and the first group of trainees had already been sent to Kenya for training. A group had been established to provide assistance to children without families, to help find their families, and to place them in temporary care until they could be found. (There were some 1,600 children in foster care in Khartoum.) There was also a programme to protect children who had been displaced and to voluntarily return them, in cooperation with UNICEF, which was established in February 2007. There was a year long, country-wide media campaign to raise awareness on children's rights, in partnership with UNICEF. Finally, an action plan on violence against children had been adopted, and there was a Working Group on the protection children from sexual abuse in conflict areas, which was being conducted in partnership with the United Nations, the African Union, and civil society institutions.

In conclusion, Mr. Yassin wished to highlight that, since the mid-1980s, Sudan had been suffering from natural disasters, such as drought, coupled with civil wars and conflicts, which had had very adverse effects on children in the country. Nevertheless, Sudan had been able to establish a community base capable of protecting children in all aspects. Following the signing of the El Fasher, Arusha and Darfur peace agreements, the conditions were in place for furthering and enhancing of the rights of the child in Sudan.

Questions by Experts
JOYCE ALUOCH, the Committee Expert serving as Rapporteur for the report of Sudan, noted the very many new developments and programmes Sudan was putting in place to protect children's rights. Like many developing countries, Sudan suffered from problems caused by poverty, instability and insecurity, and a high national debt burden. It was good news that Sudan had managed to turn its economic situation around recently, but they still faced economic difficulties. In addition, there were a number of conflict areas in Sudan, which had obviously impacted negatively on Sudan's human rights obligations. In that regard, negotiations, which had led to a peace agreement in Darfur, Abuja and elsewhere were welcome news and a step forward.

Turning to the Optional Protocol, Ms. Aluoch recalled the Committee required non-governmental organizations to be included in the drafting of periodic reports, and she wondered if that had been done in this case; the report did not really follow the guidelines set out by the Committee.

Ms. Aluoch was also concerned to know what was the status of the Optional Protocol in Sudan until the bill regarding children mentioned in the presentation was in place. It was her understanding that, until those measures had been adopted, the Optional Protocol could not be implemented directly in Sudan.
Ms. Aluoch was further concerned that the report itself noted that there was a "confusion" on the age limits for criminal liability of children, and it had not been stated at what age a child could be recruited into the armed forces.

While the delegation had affirmed that it was a party to all of the regional and international human rights conventions, Ms. Aluoch would appreciate clarification as to whether Sudan had taken any action to ratify the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, the UN Convention against Torture, the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights, and the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child. As far as she knew, Sudan was not a party to those instruments.
NEVENA VUCKOVIC-SAHOVIC, the Committee Expert serving as Co-Rapporteur for the report of Sudan, welcomed the many prevention measures, training and education programmes related to the Optional Protocol that had been implemented by Sudan. However, there had been very limited data on those programmes, in particular with regard to child prostitution. How was it possible for Sudan to draft legislation to prevent the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography without any statistics on those crimes? She was particularly concerned to know the extent of child prostitution, with special regard to Darfur and Southern Sudan.

Other Experts raised a series of questions, including, what resources had been allocated over the past few years to implement the Protocol; why there was no law criminalizing the sale of children in Sudan; were there any exceptions to the prohibition against the death penalty for children in Sudan; concrete cases of implementation of the Protocol; why Sudan had not criminalized the use of child camel jockeys; effective impunity for those committing crimes proscribed by the Optional Protocol in Sudan, and whether there were functioning courts that had the capacity and capability to prosecute and penalize the crimes set out in the Protocol; what was being done to address raids carried on villages to abduct children for forced labour; efforts to address reports of child slavery in the country; and what was known about the foreign children, reportedly abducted by militias and used for fighting in Sudan.

An Expert was particularly concerned about the provision regarding forced child labour in the Sudanese penal code, whereby anyone who pressed a person into labour by illegally forcing them to work against their will was subject to a penalty of up to one year in prison and/or a fine. That left the door open for imposing just a small fine for what was a very serious crime.

Response by the Delegation
Responding to questions, the delegation noted that two non-governmental organizations had been involved in the original drafting of Sudan's report. At later stages of its preparation other civil society organizations had read the report and given feedback, and that feedback had been incorporated in the final version.

The delegation reiterated that all international human rights instruments ratified by Sudan were part of their domestic law, and so the Optional Protocol was currently enforceable in Sudan. Sudan then undertook to harmonize its laws with those instruments. The Children's Law of 2004, which harmonized the law with the Convention, was an example of that.

Forced labour was criminalized under Sudanese law. The delegation underscored that it was a well-known principle enshrined in Sudanese law that, regardless of the crime committed, crimes committed against children bore heavier penalties.

Prior to the age of 18, children were not criminally responsible and could not be sentenced to the death penalty, except as provided in the Constitution in exceptional cases.

In terms of children's instruments to which Sudan was a party, the delegation said that the African Charter on Rights and Welfare of the Child had not previously been implemented because there had been a lack of clarity regarding its status. It had been ratified and henceforth would be included in its laws.

In terms of budgetary allocations for children's issues, the delegation pointed to the growth of the Sudanese economy, and noted that, as a result, it had been possible to increase funding for children's issues. In 2005, 9.6 per cent of general expenditures, or 2.5 per cent of Sudan's gross domestic product, had been budgeted for children, as compared with 2004, when only 8.2 per cent of general expenditure had been allocated for that purpose. Moreover, between 2002 and 2006, in conjunction with the UN Children's Fund (UNICEF), some $250 million had been allocated for children.

Regarding Southern Sudan, and problems related to the Lord's Resistance Army, the Southern Government had formed a centre for healing former child soldiers, in conjunction with UNICEF, and also helped to send them back to their homes. In terms of the buying back of child slaves by non-governmental organizations, the organization Christian Solidarity had done that. Unfortunately, however, that organization had no way of returning those children to their families or reintegrating them in the community. The Southern Government had stopped Save the Children UK from attempting to buy back children, explaining that such payments were encouraging the practice. Children should not be paid for, but should be taken back and reintegrated into their communities.

In terms of legislation, the Government of Southern Sudan was starting from scratch, and most of its laws had not yet been enacted, the delegation observed. Child welfare was a priority issue. There was a child bill that specifically targeted child marriages. There was also a programme in place to help return abducted children and women. In terms of combating children's abduction across borders, negotiations had been held with the Government of Uganda to address that situation.

Regarding early marriage throughout the country, the delegation acknowledged that some of the 570 tribes in Sudan practised early marriage.

As for female genital mutilation, that practice could only be combated through changing social views. Several workshops had been held, and there had been awareness-raising campaigns to discourage that practice. Moreover, following the order of the President of the Republic, the National Council of Physicians had issued a decree prohibiting that practice for all physicians and midwives, and providing penalties for those who performed it.

With regard to children used in camel races, Sudan had a bilateral agreement with the United Arab Emirates to deal with the situation of the children used as camel jockeys. The Council for Child Welfare had also undertaken a survey in conjunction with UNICEF to return child jockeys and to provide the necessary psychosocial support, and a mechanism had been established to provide financial compensation to children who had participated in camel races. A memorandum of understanding was also in place with a Qatari charity organization to provide community support, including schools and health care facilities, in the affected regions of southern Sudan, and some $4 million had been earmarked for that purpose.

Preliminary Concluding Observations
JOYCE ALUOCH, the Committee Expert serving as Rapporteur for the report of Sudan, in preliminary concluding remarks, welcomed the fruitful dialogue with the delegation. Things were looking bright for Sudan. It appeared that the national will was in place, both at the national level, and on the part of the Government of Southern Sudan, to put all the new laws in place for the better protection of children in Sudan. Concluding recommendations from the Committee would centre on issues of monitoring, budgetary allocation, implementation of existing programmes and laws, and ratification of related international human rights instruments by the Government. Indeed, the most important priority for Sudan now should be implementation of the laws, policies and peace agreements that it had concluded.
NEVENA VUCKOVIC-SAHOVIC, the Committee Expert serving as Co-Rapporteur for the report of Sudan, also thanked the delegation and looked forward to working with them in future on these issues.

In the extreme northern conditions of Siberia, Russian Federation, certain schools follow the reindeers’ migration routes, making education accessible for the herders’ children. Called nomadic schools, these experimental primary schools date from the 1920s and 1930s. Thanks to the revitalization of indigenous culture, they are currently undergoing modernization, with UNESCO support.

“Nomadic schools educate children in their community and natural surroundings, far from population centres, “explains Sargylana Zhirkova of the Nomadic Schools Development Centre in Yakutia. “This allows their herder parents to follow the reindeer undisturbed”. In many cases, she adds, “those who run the schools are members of the herder community themselves”.

The nomadic schools project, supported by the UNESCO Moscow Office since 2005, began in the Nomadic Schools Development Centre at the Scientific Research Institute of the National Schools in Yakutia in the far north of the Russian Federation. It aims to support the nomadic school system of the region’s indigenous people: Dolgans, Evens, Evenks, Ukagirs and Chukchis. These ethnic groups live in the furthest reaches of northern Yakutia and are striving to revive their traditional way of life.

The main characteristic of the nomadic school are the small number of pupils and the variety of subjects taught by one teacher. Several interconnected approaches are used to help the schools ensure adequate education. These include providing textbooks in the mother tongues of the indigenous peoples; introducing information and communication technologies (ICTs) and distance education as well as training staff in planning, management and monitoring educational quality.

The Nomadic Schools Development Centre proposes seven different models for nomadic communities:

• The combined nomadic school – kindergarten brings nomadic pre-schoolers closer to thetraditions and way of life of their people through daily communication with their families.
• The community school is a small mainstream school, integrated in the community where the minority lives.
• The private tutor moves in with the nomadic community and teaches the children in local conditions.
• In the Taiga (forestry) school, the parents tutor their own children. This study programme is combined with sessions in a mainstream school.
• Pupils in the Combined basic-nomadic school alternate between mainstream school and the nomadic community.
• The network nomadic school moves between several herder communities. The teaching
• combines regular and correspondence classes. Frequent meetings take place between teachers and parent-tutors.
• The nomadic summer school teaches native languages and traditional culture. It targets children who no longer speak the indigenous mother tongue.

“The nomadic school is a vital institution for indigenous people who lead a nomadic way oflife,” declares Sargylana Zhirkova. “It provides education while adapting traditional culture to the 21st century”. However, to increase the quality of education in nomadic schools more trained teachers are needed. The requirements of the job are: a university degree, a good knowledge of teaching methods; familiarity with culture and language of specific nomadic people – and psychological readiness to endure severe weather conditions.