Children's Rights

‘Regarding that the child, for the full and harmonious development of his or her personality, should grow up in a family environment, in an atmosphere of happiness, love and understanding,’ states the internationally ratified Convention on the Rights of the Child which came into force in 1990 in its fifty-four articles. Unfortunately, these high ideals are not being achieved in for too many places, leading to suffering and even death for our children. There are various legal, social and biological definitions of ‘children’ and they are generally considered as young people up to eighteen years. ‘The world’ can be defined as the institutions that guarantee the well-being of children, and ‘failing’ means not providing the required standards of care. Thus, we find children being punished, children without health care, children forced into becoming soldiers and even children being taken away their education.

According to the Convention on the Rights of the Child in which Article 37 states, “No child shall be subjected to torture or other cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment” and that, “No child shall be deprived of his liberty unlawfully or arbitrarily. The arrest, detention or imprisonment of a child… shall be used only as a measure of last resort and for the shortest appropriate period of time,” while this aim is accepted in many parts of the world, it is actually sad to say and to see that there are still a large indefinite number of children suffering everywhere and everyday. This kind of horrifying situation exists in Syria today where children were abducted and imprisoned by the Syrian army. These children were subjected to contortion and sexual violence such as that they were beaten, blindfolded and subjugated to stress positions, whipped with heavy electrical cables and scarred by cigarette burns. Reported by a child martyr who was subjected to electric shocks, “Depended on what mood these men were in, they showed no sympathy, no mercy.”