DCI’s HRC51 Round-up is now available!
During this session, Defence for Children International (DCI) spoke on behalf of the NGO Panel on Children Deprived of Liberty during the dialogue on arbitrary detention. The statement focused on the detention of children for their association or alleged association with armed forces or terrorists’ organisations, even if they are recruited through force or coercion. DCI called States to invest in the systematic training of all professionals of the justice system, to adopt protocols for the handover of children, to prioritise their reintegration, to comply with international human rights standards, to exclude children from national counterterrorism and security legislation, and to support the implementation and the follow-up of the recommendations of the GSCDL.
DCI also delivered a statement on Palestine during Item 7 on the Human rights situation in Palestine and other occupied Arab territories. It highlighted the situation of children in Palestine and particularly those detained by Israeli authorities under administrative detention. These children are never presented with charges and their attorneys have no legal means of challenging the detention and the alleged basis for it. DCI strongly urged all member States to end the use of solitary confinement and administrative detention against Palestinian children, to take urgent action to ensure accountability for violations, by supporting the efforts of the ICC to hold perpetrators accountable.
A She Leads activist delivered a statement with DCI, Plan International, ECPAT, Plan International, The African Women’s Development and Communication Network, and Terre des Hommes on the Annual discussion on the integration of a gender perspective throughout the work of the Human Rights Council and that of its mechanisms. The theme of the statement was on overcoming gender-based barriers to freedom of opinion and expression.
Finally, DCI spoke during the dialogue on technical assistance and capacity-building for Yemen in the field of human rights. The statement focused on the extremely worrying situation in Yemen: the population is in dire need of humanitarian aid including almost 13 million children. The statement also recalls the lack of fundings of the Yemen Humanitarian Response Plan of 2022 and the lack of access to education for children. The statement urges all parties to the conflict to extend the cease-fire, to stop attacks on schools, to cease the recruitment and use of children, to create an international and independent accountability mechanism to ensure that all crimes are addressed by the international justice system.
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