NEPAL: Stronger child protection needed for flood-displaced
As the numbers of people displaced by floods living in camps in eastern Nepal grow, aid workers are calling for stronger child protection measures. More than 60,000 people are displaced after the Koshi River , Nepal's largest , burst its banks last month, flooding the Sunsari and Saptari districts. Of these, an estimated 20,000 are children younger than 18.
NAMIBIA: Government steps up birth registrations
Hundreds of thousands of undocumented Namibian children may be deprived of social service benefits, but a new government initiative launched at one of the country's busiest hospitals hopes to change all that. According to Namibia's latest Demographic and Health Survey in 2006, about 40 percent of Namibian children do not possess birth certificates – a prerequisite for applying for any social grants
PAKISTAN: Return of “lost” boys highlights the plight of street children
Asif, 16, was among 53 “lost” boys, aged between eight and 16, who boarded the bus on the morning of 16 August to return to his parents’ house. Social workers say Pakistan has a large population of runaway or lost kids, estimating their number at more than 70,000. Navaid Hasan Khan of Azad Foundation, an organisation working with street children, estimates there are between 13,000 and 15,000 in Karachi alone and the number is increasing. The UN Children's Fund, UNICEF, estimates there are 10,000 in Karachi.
AFGHANISTAN: Attacks deprive 300,000 students of education
Afghanistan has made impressive progress in primary and secondary education since the downfall of the Taliban regime in late 2001. However, resurgent Taliban and worsening security have put the country's hard-won educational achievements at serious risk. More than 600 primary, secondary and high schools are closed, mostly in the volatile southern provinces, because of prevalent insecurity and attacks on formal education, the MoE said.
Netherlands: Dutch schools to track girls forced into marriage
Dutch Integration Minister Ella Vogelaar has announced the creation of an emergency line where schools can raise the alarm if immigrant girls do not return from a holiday. Schools have found that immigrant girls are sometimes left behind in their countries of origin to be forced into an arranged marriage. According to the minister, this happens mostly in Turkish, Moroccan and Pakistani families. She will also study whether it's possible to make such cases punishable by law. The move comes after pressure from the Labour Party.
United Kingdom: UNICEF welcomes British recognition of migrant children's rights
The UN Children's Fund (UNICEF) applauded the decision by the British Government to grant children seeking asylum, migrant children and those trafficked into the country the same rights as British children, including their right to education, health care and social services. "The decision paves the way for vulnerable children who are subject to immigration control to enjoy the fundamental human rights spelled out in the Convention [on the Rights of the Child] for every child,” UNICEF said in a press release.
