Author: Jette Nietzard

Saint Lucia has done a lot for children in recent years. Among other things, some councils and parliaments have been introduced where children and young people can voice their opinions. However, there is still a lack of implementation of the proposals. Less positive is the finding that an increasing percentage of households are classified as poor.

While Saint Lucia has a stipulated age of consent for girls with regard to sexual relations, there is not one for boys, which puts them at increased risk of sexual exploitation and abuse.

Children with disabilities are not effectively integrated into all areas of social life and there are just a few sufficient and adequate facilities for them. To improve the situation of children with disabilities, the Committee recommends to ensure that schools provide inclusive education and take all the necessary measures to ensure that children with disabilities are fully integrated into all areas of social life.

The Committee is concerned about the state of prenatal and postnatal care, the increase in the number of children born with low birth weight, the increasing infant mortality rate, and the large number of children classified as overweight or obese. The Committee is also concerned about the lack of education programmes for basic child health, and the lack of developmental paediatricians for children with developmental disabilities on the island.
Therefore, the Committee recommends to continue to increase efforts to ensure adequate provision of prenatal and postnatal care, and address the increasing number of children born with low birth weight, the increasing infant mortality rate, and obesity among children, through awareness-raising efforts, and the reasons for these trends.

Concerning drug and substance abuse, the Committee recommends that the State party strengthen measures to address alcohol abuse and drug use by children and adolescents, through education programmes and campaigns.

Saint Lucia has a National Mental Wellness Centre and has undertaken a review of its mental health system. To further improve the situation, the Committee recommends that the State party strengthen available quality services and programmes of mental health for children.

The Committee is concerned that natural disasters have the potential to undermine the social safety net of Saint Lucia, with negative consequences for children and families exposed to poverty. To better protect children, the Committee recommends that the State party develop strategies to reduce the vulnerabilities and risks for children and families which may be produced or exacerbated by climate change.

The Committee is concerned about the persistence of child labour in the informal economy and recommends to take measures to prevent children from being economically exploited.

The Juvenile justice system of Saint Lucia should be brought into line with the Convention. The Committee recommends that the State party adopt a holistic and preventive approach to addressing the problem of juvenile offenders and the underlying social factors.

The Ministry of Social Transformation, Local Government and Community Empowerment has initiated a child- and gender-sensitive social protection reform.

Concluding observations on the second to fourth periodic reports released on 8 July 2014. More information about education: Education Law and Early childhood education

In the Marshall Islands, children's rights are not yet adequately implemented. This includes the areas of health care, but also education and child labour. The archipelago is also one of the regions most affected by the consequences of climate change, but the State party does not include children in planning for the future.

The Committee recommends that the State party ensure that comprehensive age-appropriate sexual and reproductive health education is part of the mandatory school curriculum targeting adolescent girls and boys, with a particular focus on preventing early pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections, including HIV/AIDS. The Committee further recommends to decriminalize abortion in all cases for girls, ensure access to safe abortion and post-abortion care services, irrespective of whether abortion is legal or not, and ensure that the views of the girl are always heard and respected in abortion decisions as well as improve adolescents’ access to reproductive health-care and related services. Additionally, the Committee recommends that the State party increase support for reproductive health and family planning services, including access to available and affordable contraception, especially in the outer islands.

The Committee recommends that the State party adopt a human rights-based approach to disability and develop and support community campaigns and programmes to address discrimination and stigma against children with disabilities as well as give priority to measures that facilitate the full inclusion of children with disabilities in all areas of public life.
Also, Marshall Islands should ensure access to all public buildings and public spaces, all service delivery, and transportation in all areas, especially in the outer islands. Furthermore, the Marshall Islands should guarantee that all children with disabilities, including children with intellectual and psychosocial disabilities, have the right to inclusive education in mainstream schools, independent of parental consent, and ensure the availability of qualified assistance in integrated classes providing individual support and due attention to children with learning difficulties.

The Committee recommends that the State party reduce child mortality by improving access to and use of health, nutrition, water, sanitation and hygiene services, especially in the outer islands. Marshall Islands should also scale up immunization, particularly in the outer islands, and provide sufficient investment in suitable technologies, such as delivery and conservation, and human resource capacities for immunization services. Additionally, the Committee recommends that the State party ensure that there are adequate facilities in place for the treatment of children, including sufficient numbers of well-trained health workers for children and pregnant women, especially obstetric neonatal care facilities, particularly in the outer islands.
The Committee further recommends to strengthen its efforts to improve access to basic health-care services for all children, particularly in the outer islands, and provide mobile health-care teams with more resources so that they are more frequently available and reach a wider population.

The Committee recommends that the State party strengthen both the quality and the availability of mental health services and programmes for children and, in particular, increase the number of specialists in children’s mental health. Furthermore, the Committee recommends that the State party ensure adequate psychosocial care and rehabilitation facilities and outpatient services specifically for children. Additionally, the Committee recommends that the State party strengthen efforts to prevent suicide among children and adolescents, including by increasing the availability of psychological counselling services and social workers in schools and communities, and by ensuring that all professionals working with and for children are trained to identify and address early suicidal tendencies and mental health problems.

The Committee recommends to implement the recommendations of the Special Rapporteur on the implications for human rights of the environmentally sound management and disposal of hazardous substances and wastes, especially those relating to the immediate and continuing effects of the nuclear tests of the United States of America, on children’s health, the right to live in a healthy environment and indefinite displacement.
Furthermore, the Committee is concerned about the insufficient incorporation of climate change adaptation and disaster risk reduction into the school curriculum and the lack of a comprehensive disaster-sensitive social protection system. Additionally, the Committee is concerned about the insufficient inclusion of the special needs of children, including children with disabilities, in planning disaster risk reduction, preparedness, response and recovery and the inadequate number of and access to evacuation centres, particularly in the outer islands.

The Committee recommends that the State party establish a legislative framework to ensure the legal accountability of business enterprises and their subsidiaries operating in or managed from the State party’s territory, especially in the tourism industry.
The State party should also establish mechanisms for the investigation and redress of violations of children’s rights, with a view to improving accountability and transparency, and require companies to undertake child rights impact assessments and consultations, and full public disclosure of the environmental, health-related and child rights impacts of their business activities and their plans to address such impacts, and promote the inclusion of child rights indicators and parameters for reporting. The Committee further recommends to undertake awareness-raising campaigns with the tourism industry and the public at large on the prevention of sexual exploitation of children and widely disseminate the charter of honour for tourism and the World Tourism Organization global code of ethics for tourism among travel agents and in the tourism industry.

The Committee urges the State party to bring its juvenile justice system fully into line with the Convention and other relevant standards. In particular, the Committee recommends that the State party designate specialized judges for children and ensure that such judges and all relevant support staff receive appropriate training. It also recommends to ensure the provision of free, qualified and independent legal aid to children in conflict with the law at an early stage of and throughout the legal proceedings. Marshall Islands should further ensure, in cases where detention is unavoidable, that the children are not detained together with adults and that detention conditions are compliant with international standards, including with regard to access to education and health services.

The Committee recommends that the State party consider holding targeted consultations with families and children, including those in vulnerable situations, and with civil society organizations, with a view to strengthening the strategies and measures for reducing child poverty. It also recommends to strengthen the support available to children living in poverty, in particular those in single-parent families, families with three or more children and families with children with disabilities, and ensure that social protection measures cover the real costs of a decent standard of living for children, including expenses relevant to their right to health, a nutritious diet, education, adequate housing, water and sanitation. Also, the Committee recommends that the State party take immediate steps to guarantee access to clean water and sanitation for all children, and ensure that sanitation facilities are reviewed and improved.

The situation of Roma children is the main focus of the report because very little has happened since the last report. They have far less access to education and health.

The Committee calls on the State party to investigate the full extent of the practice of forced sterilization of women and girls in the communist and post-communist period in the State party and to provide financial and other reparations to the victims.

To change the situation in this day and age, the Committee recommends to ensure the universal coverage of modern contraception and abortion services under public health insurance and remove the parental consent requirement for abortions and contraceptives requested by adolescent girls above the age of sexual consent.

Further, Slovakia has a high teenage birth rate, accompanied by a high rate of school dropout and high infant mortality rate among new-born children of young mothers from socially disadvantaged backgrounds. The Committee recommends to develop and implement a policy to protect the rights of pregnant teenagers, adolescent mothers and their children and combat discrimination against them and to foster responsible parenthood and sexual behaviour, with particular attention to boys and men.

The Committee urges the State party to set up a comprehensive strategy, prioritize family and community care and ensure that inclusive education is given priority over the placement of children in specialized institutions and classes.

Infectious diseases, such as tuberculosis and syphilis, spread in isolated Roma communities and the use of inhaled substances, such as toluene, is widespread, especially among young children. Also, there is a shortage of doctors, especially in rural areas, which hinders children’s access to regular medical check-ups and emergency care. To improve the situation, the Committee recommends to introduce systematic measures to effectively monitor, sanction and stop segregation in all its forms in the State party’s hospitals and conduct awareness-raising programmes in Roma communities on basic rights and complaint mechanisms in cases of violations of those rights.

The Committee is concerned that procedures for interrogating children are often used only for children who are younger than 15 years of age and children can undergo initial questioning without the presence of their lawyers, parents or other trusted persons. To improve the situation, the Committee recommends to Slovakia to expeditiously re-establish specialized juvenile court procedures with adequate human, technical and financial resources, designate specialized judges for cases involving children and ensure that such specialized judges receive appropriate education and training.

A significant percentage of Roma families continues to live in segregated situations and many still do not have access to adequate housing and suffer from a lack of basic facilities such as sanitation, electricity, drinking water, a sewage system and waste disposal. The Committee recommends to ensure that Roma families are not subjected to forced evictions and demolitions of their settlements without prior notice and that, when such demolitions are necessary, adequate and appropriate alternative housing solutions are provided for them.

In the recent discussions on migration and the European Union’s relocation and resettlement schemes, the State party has repeatedly made clear that it will not accept refugees and asylum seekers who are Muslims.

The Committee is concerned that human rights education is not part of the compulsory curriculum and that no statistics are available on the extent to which it is provided in schools.

In the Swedish report, racism and discrimination are the main issues that still need to be addressed. It is also problematic that child benefits for asylum-seeking families are reduced after the third child - in contrast to general child benefits. Teachers and other professionals working with children are not trained on how to deal with bullying.

The Committee is concerned about the increasingly high rate of suicide among persons with disabilities, including children, in the State party.
The Committee is seriously concerned about the practice of coercive and involuntary treatments inflicted on children with disabilities in mental health-care settings, in particular the use of restraining straps or belts for up to two hours, and of seclusion.
Although the number of children having access to inclusive education is very high, the Education Act enables schools to deny a place to pupils with disabilities when taking the child would involve “significant organizational or financial difficulties”.

The Committee recommends that the State party step up its efforts to improve the health status of children from disadvantaged and marginalized groups, and allocate sufficient financial, human and technical resources to guarantee their right to health without discrimination.

The Committee urges the State party to establish a system of independent expert monitoring of the diagnosis of ADHD and other behavioural specificities, and of the use of drug treatments for the children diagnosed. The Committee is concerned that, while the rates of mental health and psychosocial disorders are high among young people, school health services are inadequately resourced to address them in a timely and appropriate manner, and that access to school psychologists and the psychosocial support system involves a long waiting period.

The Committee recommends to completely prohibit the export of arms, including small arms and light weapons, when the final destination is a country where children are known to be, or may potentially be, recruited or used in hostilities.

The Committee is seriously concerned about the practice of solitary confinement of children in conflict with the law in remand prisons and police cells and about the large number of children in the latter. The Committee appreciates the various measures taken by the State party to facilitate contact between children and their incarcerated parents, including the setting up of visiting apartments in several prisons.

Children deprived of their liberty are not always informed of their rights and the reasons for restrictions being imposed on them, nor afforded all fundamental legal safeguards from the very outset of deprivation of liberty, such as the right to access to a lawyer, the right to an independent medical examination and the right to notify a relative or a person of their choice.

The Committee is concerned about the significant rise in child abuse, especially of children up to 6 years of age, and is disappointed that only a few reports of such abuse result in prosecution.

The report from Australia shows good implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child in many areas, such as physical health. However, there is no free education, although the country is very wealthy. Also, Australia has big issues with mental health, many diagnosed ADHD patients and suicides. In addition, many previous recommendations have not been implemented and the attitude towards Asylum seekers is terrible.

The Committee recommends that the State party strengthen measures to prevent teenage pregnancies among Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders girls, including by providing culturally sensitive and confidential medical advice and services. It also recommends to continue providing children with education on sexual and reproductive health as part of the mandatory school curriculum, paying special attention to preventing early pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections.

The Committee welcomes the establishment of the National Disability Insurance Scheme in 2013. It further recommends that the State party make clear the eligibility criteria and the types of support covered by the Scheme and ensure that the Scheme has the human, technical and financial resources necessary for its optimal and timely implementation. It also recommends to conduct awareness-raising campaigns aimed at government officials, the public and families to combat the stigmatization of and prejudice against children with disabilities and promote a positive image of such children.

The Committee urges the State party to prohibit by law the sterilization of girls with disabilities without their prior, fully informed and free consent.

To guarantee every child the right to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of health, the Committee urges the State party to promptly address the disparities in health status of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island children, children with disabilities, children living in remote or rural areas and children in alternative care. Australia should also address the increasing rate of child obesity.

The Committee urges the State party to invest in addressing the underlying causes of suicide and poor mental health among children, to improve knowledge about mental health with a view to promoting children’s awareness and access to support services and to ensure that the Fifth National Mental Health and Suicide Prevention Plan has a clear focus on children and that children’s perspectives are included in the development of the response services provided. It also urges Australia to prioritize mental health service delivery to children in vulnerable situations, in particular Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, children with disabilities, children in alternative care, homeless children, children living in rural and remote areas, asylum-seeking, refugee and migrant children, children from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds and lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex children. Australia further should strengthen measures to ensure that psychostimulant drugs are prescribed to children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder only as a measure of last resort and only after an individualized assessment of the best interests of that child and to ensure also that children and their parents are properly informed about the possible side effects of this medical treatment and about non-medical alternatives.

The Committee is very concerned about the State party’s position that the Convention does not extend to protection from climate change. The Committee emphasizes that the effects of climate change have an undeniable impact on children’s rights, for example the rights to life, survival and development, non-discrimination, health and an adequate standard of living. It is also concerned that the State party has made insufficient progress on the goals and targets set out in the Paris Agreement and about its continuing investment in extractive industries, in particular coal. The Committee expresses its concern and disappointment that a protest led by children calling on government to protect the environment received a strongly worded negative response from those in authority, which demonstrates disrespect for the right of children to express their views on this important issue.
The Committee urges the State party to ensure that children’s views are taken into account in developing policies and programmes addressing climate change, the environment and disaster risk management and to increase children’s awareness and preparedness for climate change and natural disasters. It also urges Australia to promptly take measures to reduce its emissions of greenhouse gases by establishing targets and deadlines to phase out the domestic use and export of coal and to accelerate the transition to renewable energy, including by committing to meeting 100 per cent of its electricity needs with renewable energy.

The Committee recommends that the State party ensure the legal accountability of Australian companies and their subsidiaries for violations of children’s rights, including in relation to the environment and health, committed within the State party or overseas by businesses domiciled in its territory, and establish mechanisms for the investigation and redress of such abuses. It also recommends to require companies to undertake assessments and consultations and to make full public disclosure of the environmental, health-related and children’s rights impacts of their business activities and their plans to address such impacts. Australia should further undertake campaigns to raise the awareness of those working in the tourism industry and the public at large on the harmful effects of the sexual exploitation of children in the context of travel and tourism and widely disseminate the Global Code of Ethics for Tourism of the World Tourism Organization.

The Committee again regrets that its previous recommendations have not been implemented and remains seriously concerned about the enduring overrepresentation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children as well as children with disabilities and their parents and carers in the justice system. It is also concerned about the high number of children in detention, both on remand and after sentencing, and that children in detention are not being separated from adults.
The Committee urges the State party to bring its child justice system fully into line with the Convention and to explicitly prohibit the use of isolation and force, including physical restraints, as a means of coercion or to discipline children under supervision, promptly investigate all cases of abuse and maltreatment of children in detention and adequately sanction the perpetrators. The Committee further urges Australia to ensure that children are detained in separate facilities and, for pretrial detention, to ensure that detention is regularly and judicially reviewed as well as to ensure that children with disabilities are not detained indefinitely without conviction and that their detention undergoes regular judicial review. Also, Australia should provide children in conflict with the law with information about their rights and how to report abuses.

Australia needs to ensure that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children as well as children living in remote areas and children in child protection services are registered at birth and receive free birth certificates. Children born through international surrogacy arrangements should be able to obtain Australian nationality through uniformly applied rules through the country. These children also have to be able to access information about their origin.

In addition, the Committee urges the State party to address the high rate of homelessness among children, particularly focusing on children leaving alternative care, and to include children under 12 years of age in the Reconnect Programme.

Concluding observations on the fifth and sixth periodic reports released on 27 September 2019. More information about education in Australia: https://www.goodschools.com.au and https://www.dese.gov.au

Turkey has not implemented many of the Committee's recent recommendations and must change this behaviour to implement the Convention on the Rights of the Child in its territory. Nevertheless, progress has been made in the areas of birth registration, children in street situations, and education.

While noting the State party’s efforts in combating gender-based violence, including “honour killings” and social pressure resulting in suicide, the Committee remains concerned that such practices continue and the significant number of victims are women, including girls. The Committee is also concerned about the insufficient number of shelters to host and protect women and children who are in danger of such practices. The Committee also recommends that the State party introduce a comprehensive system of data collection to obtain statistics on violence against women, including domestic violence and honour killings.

The Committee recommends that the State party adopt a comprehensive adolescent and reproductive health policy and take the necessary measures to educate children on reproductive health and the measures for preventing STDs. The Committee recommends that a multidisciplinary study be undertaken to understand the scope of adolescent health problems in the State party in order to be able to develop adequate policies and programmes.

Despite the State party’s efforts to provide children with access to education, the Committee is concerned that a large number of school-age children with disabilities do not enjoy their rights to education, and a high percentage of children with disabilities remain in special education programmes. Furthermore, the Committee regrets that the State party did not provide sufficient information as to whether support for children with disabilities reaches children everywhere, whether such support is adequate and whether the goal of integrating children with disabilities into the community is sufficiently attained.
The Committee recommends that the State party intensify its efforts to ensure that children with disabilities fully enjoy their rights. The Committee also recommends that the State party further encourage inclusion and integration of children with disabilities in society and the regular educational system, respectively, including by providing special training to teachers and by making schools more accessible.

The Committee welcomes the significant progress made by the State party in reducing maternal and infant mortality rates, improving immunization coverage and children’s access to treatment with the introduction of the Green Card scheme. However, the Committee is concerned about the significant disparities in the rates of maternal and infant mortality, malnutrition and stunting, as well as neonatal care, between the western regions and the socio-economically least developed Eastern regions.
The Committee encourages the State party to eradicate regional disparities and address maternal and infant mortality targeting the Eastern regions of the country. It also recommends that the State party continue its efforts to eradicate malnutrition, especially stunting, as well as improve neonatal care with special emphasis on the Eastern regions.

The Committee is concerned at the potential impact on children’s rights of the construction of the Ilisu and other dams, especially with regard to the negative effect on children and their families of forced evictions, resettlement and displacement, and other impacts on their cultural heritage and the environment. Therefore, the Committee recommends that Turkey ensure that impact assessments of human rights, including child rights, are conducted prior to the conclusion of trade agreements with a view to ensuring that measures are taken to prevent the occurrence of child rights violations.

The Committee urges the State party to increase the number of professionals working in the juvenile justice system and take measures to provide incentives for lawyers to work on cases involving children. In addition, the Committee recommends that Turkey should expedite the investigation and trial process in cases involving children, so as to reduce the number of children in pretrial detention, as well as ensure enforcement of the amendments to the Counter-terrorism Law and ensure that children detained and charged under this law are provided with all basic legal guarantees. The Committee further recommends to investigate allegations of rape and ill-treatment of children in detention.

The Committee takes note of the significant progress made in improving birth registration rates in the country. However, it remains concerned that there are still a number of children who are not registered or not immediately registered, in particular in rural and disadvantaged areas of the Eastern regions as well as children of mothers who do not have formal education.
The Committee recommends that the State party strengthen its efforts to ensure complete and immediate birth registration, in particular by improving birth registration systems, and providing information and raising awareness in rural areas of the Eastern regions and among mothers who do not have formal education.

The Committee notes with regret that several of these concluding observations have not been significantly addressed.

Concluding observations on the second and third periodic reports released on 20 July 2012. The Committee reiterates its concern about the reservations to articles 17, 29 and 30 of the Convention.

The report from the Republic of Korea shows that there is still much to be done, especially in the areas of education and administration of child justice, to implement the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. The education system is overburdened and offers little time for recreation, driving many children to suicide. The impact of climate change on South Korea is not addressed at all.

The Committee recommends to effectively address adolescent pregnancy, including by strengthening sexuality education at school, support services during pregnancy and childbirth and postnatal care, ensuring parenting support and promoting equally shared parenting.
The Committee is concerned about the lack of adequate and age-appropriate education on sexuality, in the context of adolescent pregnancies and increased HIV prevalence. It therefore recommends to provide age-appropriate sexual education, pay special attention to preventing adolescent pregnancies and HIV/AIDS, adequately cover sexual orientation and gender identity, and remove discriminatory and gender stereotypical language from the national standard on school sexual education.

The Committee notes the adoption of a comprehensive plan for people with disabilities and the increase in education professionals, in training and in the budget allocated to meeting the needs of children with disabilities. To further improve the situation, the Committee urges the State party to review legislation and policies to adopt a rights-based approach to disability and ensure the inclusion of all children with disabilities as well as to ensure that early detection and intervention programmes, including rehabilitation treatment, appropriate welfare and medical support, are provided countrywide to all children with disabilities, including asylum-seeking and migrant children with disabilities. Republic of Korea should also provide inclusive education for all children with disabilities, including by ensuring the presence of reasonable accommodations in the school infrastructure, in places for sport and leisure, in school transportation, in training and by assigning specialized teachers and assistants to provide individual support. Also, the State party should undertake awareness-raising campaigns to promote a positive image of children with disabilities and combat stigmatization and prejudice.

The Committee welcomes the extension of vaccinations to undocumented children. The Committee recommends to increase the health budget and strengthen local hospitals and
ensure universal access to national health insurance, especially for economically vulnerable groups of children and migrant children. Further, the State party should improve the accessibility of vaccinations for migrant children and strengthen health-care assistance in nurseries and schools, including for diabetic and obese children.

Concerning adolescent health, the Committee recommends to strengthen the prevention and treatment of substance abuse, including narcotic drug abuse and harmful use of alcohol. The Committee further recommends to strengthen prevention measures of obesity, smoking and drinking, including by imposing stricter regulations on alcohol advertising, increasing the number of smoke-free spaces, promoting sports and physical activities and encouraging children’s participation in life-skills education on preventing substance abuse.

While noting the establishment of a national action plan for suicide prevention, the Committee is seriously concerned that the high rates of child suicide, due in particular to problems in the family, depression, academic pressure and bullying, represent a leading cause of death among children. It notes with concern the lack of a systematic approach and a dedicated budget for addressing suicides and their root causes. The Committee urges the State party to strengthen its efforts to effectively prevent suicides among children and to address their root causes, as previously recommended, through comprehensive policies, psychological, educational and social measures and therapies for children, families and the public at large.

The Committee is concerned about reports of children’s rights violations resulting from business activities by companies of the Republic of Korea operating domestically and abroad. The Committee urges the State party to establish a child protection framework for companies in the State party operating domestically and abroad. Such a framework should include mechanisms for conducting child rights impact assessments and monitoring and evaluation mechanisms, in order to report and address children’s rights violations, and should make it clear that all stakeholders are responsible for fulfilling and protecting children’s rights.

The Committee welcomes the amendment to the Juvenile Act making it possible to count the period spent in a juvenile reformatory as part of the final sentence. However, it is concerned about the existence of two parallel systems for processing and reports of violations of children’s fair trial rights, including the non-involvement of guardians from the investigation onwards, the use of forced confessions, the lack of access to evidence and appeal, breaches of the presumption of innocence and the right to defend oneself, publicity of the trial and making conditional the right to legal assistance. In addition, there are higher detention rates among children compared with adults and the conditions of detention are inappropriate, including overcrowding and insufficient medical assistance, education, training, leisure and food, especially for girls; restrictions on communications, petitions and outdoor exercise. There are also cases of children detained together with adults and the lack of non-custodial measures to prevent reoffending.

To improve the situation, the Committee recommends, among other things, to establish a system with adequate resources of specialized child justice courts for all cases involving children in contact with the law and ensure that specialized judges for children and professionals working with children in conflict with the law receive appropriate education and continuous training on the rights of the child. The State party should also ensure that detention conditions, including for temporary detentions, comply with international standards, including with regard to personal space, equally for boys and girls, access to food, education, physical and mental health services, exercise, leisure, communication with the family and complaints mechanisms and that children deprived of their liberty are held in facilities close to their place of residence; and that detention facilities, including child welfare institutions, undergo continuous monitoring.

The Committee welcomes the adoption of the Special Act on the Promotion of the Normalization of Public Education and Regulation of Prior Learning, which aims to eradicate the practice of prior learning (i.e., the taking of private classes at the preschool level in preparation for school), the extension of the school admission quota for vulnerable groups of children, the introduction of the “free semester system” and the provision of support to out-of-school children. However, it remains deeply concerned about the excessive academic burden, accompanied by sleep deprivation and high levels of stress, which is a leading cause of suicide among children in the State party. It is also seriously concerned about the highly competitive education conditions, which virtually deprive children of their childhood, and also about the severe lack of time and of free and safe facilities for leisure, play and physical exercise for children, which, coupled with social pressure to excel academically, contributes to smartphone overuse for recreation.

Concluding observations on the fifth and sixth periodic reports released on 24 October 2019.More information about education in Korea: http://english.moe.go.kr/sub/info.do?m=020104&s=english and http://english.moe.go.kr/sub/info.do?m=020103&s=english

In Bulgaria, the situation is particularly difficult for children from Roma families, as they often do not enjoy health care, have no access to education and are exposed to exploitation. Violence in various forms takes up a large part of the report and poses a threat to many children in Bulgaria. The living situation and the implementation of children's rights for children who suffer from discrimination, i.e., children who are not Bulgarian citizens or have a disability, are very poor.

The Committee recommends to ensure unimpeded access to sexual and reproductive health services, including confidential counselling and modern contraception, and make the conditions for abortion less restrictive.

Pregnant girls placed in correctional facilities are often deprived of adequate living conditions, including a safe environment, adequate food and nutrition and a lack of access to appropriate medical care, and separation of mother and child after birth is apparently common place.

The Committee urges the State Party to give priority to measures that facilitate the full inclusion of children with disabilities, including those with intellectual and psychosocial disabilities, in all areas of public life, including leisure activities, community-based care and provision of social housing with reasonable accommodation. Also, Bulgaria should guarantee all children with disabilities the right to inclusive education in mainstream school, independent of parental consent.

The Committee is concerned at the high rate of infant mortality in some parts of the country owing to a lack of adequate health care, poverty, inadequate nutrition and the existence of harmful traditional practices.
To improve the situation, Bulgaria should ensure availability of and equitable access to quality primary and specialized health and dental care for all children, particularly those from socially and economically disadvantaged groups, including Roma children and children with disabilities. Further they need to strengthen efforts to ensure that access to adequate health care, including prenatal care for uninsured pregnant women, is extended to families living in the most vulnerable situations, particularly those living in marginalized and remote areas.

The Committee recommends that community-based mental health services be made readily available and preventive work in schools, the home and care centres be strengthened. It also recommends that the number of child psychiatrists and psychologists be increased.

The Committee is concerned that children living in vulnerable situations, particularly Roma children, continue to be exposed to harmful and exploitative work in the informal economy, mainly in agriculture, tourism, retail and domestic work.

The Committee is deeply concerned at reports indicating that children in juvenile detention centres suffer from disproportionate punishment, including physical beatings, arbitrary periods in solitary confinement and limited food rations. In addition to that, children as young as 8 years of age continue to be deprived of their liberty in correctional facilities.

The Commission for the Protection against Discrimination does not have a special unit to deal with cases of discrimination against children.

The committee recommends to provide all the support necessary to parents who may be at risk of neglecting their children, with particular emphasis on the situation in Greenland. In Greenland, the rates of sexual abuse and online sexual abuse of children are particularly high. Other than in mainland Denmark, child poverty remains high on Faroe Islands and in Greenland.

Denmark is on a good way and the points listed are by far less bad than in other states. There was hardly any usable material for the fact sheets, which is very good.

The committee poses that safeguards to identify girls who are at a risk for female genital mutilation are insufficient. The Committee also recommends that the State party align its legislation on abortion in the Faroe Islands with that in mainland Denmark, with a view to ensuring equal access of girls to safe and legal abortion.

In addition to that, 46 per cent of women in Denmark have experienced some form of physical, sexual or psychological violence before the age of 15. Therefore, the Committee recommends to introduce mandatory elements at all levels of the school curriculum on the unacceptability of violence against women and girls.

Forced treatment and the use of restraint by staff in institutions is legal. Education is insufficiently inclusive; schools and other public facilities are not always fully accessible and the proportions of children with disabilities in primary school who take their final exams and those attending upper secondary education are significantly below the corresponding figures for children without disabilities. Children born deaf with cochlea implants are prevented from learning and communicating in sign language.

The Committee recommends that the State party allocate adequate resources to ensure that all areas of Greenland have sufficient and healthy food reserves and to provide adequate benefits to low-income families.

The Committee recommends to ensure that access to psychological assistance is not dependent on a family’s economic mean.

While noting with appreciation that the proportion of children in conflict with the law has reduced, and welcoming the efforts made by the State party to prevent juvenile delinquency, including the initiatives aimed at strengthening youth resilience against extremism, the Committee nonetheless urges the state party to abolish court-ordered solitary confinement of children. Additionally, the Committee recommends to implement a system focusing on prevention.

While noting with appreciation the many efforts made by the State party to effectively combat child trafficking, the Committee urges the State party to take effective measures to safeguard the rights of children in their territory, especially those of unaccompanied children, to ensure that they do not fall prey to trafficking. In so doing, the Committee urges the State party to continue its efforts to establish adequate and coordinated mechanisms for the identification and protection of child victims of trafficking, reduce bureaucracy and ensure systematic and timely information-sharing among relevant officials, and strengthen the capacity of police officers, border guards, labour inspectors and social workers to identify child victims of trafficking as well as to ensure that child victims are not, under any circumstances, treated as offenders, such as for migration offences, provide child victims with free legal aid and the support of child psychologists and social workers, including through the provision of adequate human, technical and financial resources, and ensure that all child victims have access to child- and gender-sensitive complaints mechanisms and to adequate procedures for seeking, without discrimination, compensation and redress.

The Committee recommends that the State party consider withdrawing the reservation made to article 40 (2) (b) of the Convention. Concluding observations on the fifth periodic reports released on 26 October 2017.

In Vietnam, hidden education fees keep children from education. In addition, migrant children are not considered equal to Vietnamese children and therefore have less access to education and health services and live in poorer households. Girls are structurally disadvantaged and female foetuses are deliberately aborted.

The Committee is concerned about societal discrimination against girls who consequently drop out of school and engage in early marriage, especially in the mountainous areas, and such discrimination also resulting in the practice of aborting female foetuses. Also, the Committee recommends that the State party raise awareness and provide access to services for adolescents in relation to sexual and reproductive health, respond to the increasing number of teenage pregnancies and abortions, and facilitate access to contraceptives, as well as to quality reproductive health services, assistance and counselling.

To improve the situation, the Committee recommends that the State party review existing policies and programmes to develop a rights-based approach in relation to children with disabilities, and effectively implement inclusive education and free-tuition policies in order to further facilitate children with disabilities in having access to school. The Committee further recommends to provide all schools with sufficient numbers of teachers who have skills in inclusive education so that all children with disabilities can enjoy access to high-quality inclusive education, with a particular focus on children with disabilities living in rural areas. Vietnam should also raise public awareness, and include children with disabilities in these awareness-raising and social-change interventions, to address widespread stigma and discrimination. In addition, the Committee recommends that the State Party reduce the trend to institutionalize children with disabilities and seek community-based child care solutions.

The Committee recommends that the State party take immediate steps to
promote common standards in health-care services for all children in all regions, and develop nutrition strategies, policies and legislation relating to positive infant and young-child feeding practices, aimed at reducing regional disparities relating to acute and chronic undernutrition. In addition, the Committee recommends to increase the resources available for district health centres and commune health stations and ensure that they have adequate human and material resources, particularly in relation to maternal health care and care of new-borns, infants and preschool children, and take measures, including awareness-raising campaigns and the expansion of service delivery, to increase immunization rates among infant and preschool children, paying special attention to ethnicity and geographic location.

The Committee is highly concerned that child labour remains widespread in the State party, in particular in the informal sector, and that labour inspections outreach is limited. Also, child inmates in drug detention centres are obliged to work and thus subject to forced labour.
Therefore, the Committee recommends that the State party take immediate and effective measures to eliminate child labour in unacceptable conditions, including at an early age and under dangerous conditions. The Committee also recommends that Vietnam implement effective measures to address the deep-rooted socioeconomic factors that push children into the workforce, in particular to increase the school attendance rate and reduce the school dropout rate with a view to avoiding child labour.

In spite of progress in certain areas of juvenile justice, the Committee expresses its concern about the lack of a comprehensive juvenile justice system, including the absence of a juvenile court, and the rising number of young offenders and the State party’s punitive system of dealing with young offenders. The Committee urges the State party to establish a specialized juvenile court and specialized police-protection units for children and to allocate adequate human, technical and financial resources to the juvenile justice system to ensure a focus on diversion and other alternative measures to deprivation of liberty, and ensure the provision of rehabilitation and reintegration programmes.

While welcoming the significant efforts made by the State party to reduce poverty, which have decreased the rate of poor households by 2 per cent per year, and while noting that Viet Nam moved from the group of poorest countries to the group of lower middle- income countries in 2010, the Committee is deeply concerned at the high number of children who still live in poverty in the State party. In addition, while noting the national target programme on clean water and rural sanitation currently under way, the Committee expresses its concern about serious gaps in the supply of safe drinking water, and about the inadequate sanitation facilities in the home and at schools, which affect the health of the child and the ability to retain children in schools.

Concluding observations on the third and fourth periodic reports released on 22 August 2012.More information about education in Vietnam: https://www.aljazeera.com