Save the Children

• Afghanistan: CIVICUS stands in solidarity with Save the Children

  Global civil society alliance, CIVICUS condemns the horrific attack on the office and staff of Save the Children in Jalalabad, eastern Afghanistan. We stand in solidarity with Save the Children and applaud the resolute courage of colleagues who continue their important work in very difficult circumstances.

• Every Voice Counts: UN Puts Spotlight on Children as Human Rights Defenders

  By Lena Ingelstam and Ulrika Cilliers, Save the Children, Tor Hodenfield, CIVICUS, and Beatrice Schulter, Child Rights Connect

  Many children want to defend their rights and the rights of others and when children speak out things change.

  Every day, millions of children take action and influence laws, budgets, service delivery and the realization of their rights as set out in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. They speak out on poverty, education, health, violence, the environment, discrimination, and many other things. Children are human rights defenders when they take action and promote, monitor and defend children’s rights and the rights of others.

  The UN Convention on the Rights of the Child provides all children with the right to act as human rights defenders, rights which are reinforced in the UN Declaration on Human Rights Defenders.

  “I believe we are all human rights defenders in our own way. Some of us in small and quiet ways because that’s how we feel and all we can give to the world and some in large ways. The impact may be big or small but we all fight for what we believe in.”
  Child participating in Child Rights Connect & Centre for Children’s Rights Survey

  92 per cent of children who participated in a new survey by Child Rights Connect and the Centre for Children’s Rights at Queen’s University, Belfast, see themselves as human rights defenders. But children face serious challenges when promoting and defending their rights and the rights of others. In the survey, children identify four main barriers:

  • Adults do not take children seriously. They do not see children as competent and children’s views are not respected.
  • Children do not feel safe; 70 per cent of children are concerned about violence when they act as human rights defenders.
  • Children lack information; 40 per cent of children agree that one of the main challenges they face as human rights defenders is the lack of information about rights.
  • Children sometimes struggle to act due to lack of time, money and ability to travel to meetings.

  Children from the most marginalized and deprived groups often face additional challenges when they want to take action and promote and defend rights.