Public International Law: How is one of the most vulnerable groups of migrants protected?
1. Introduction
Separated and Unaccompanied migrant children are one of the most vulnerable groups of migrants, particularly susceptible to abuse and exploitation. Their innocence and vulnerability makes them easy to manipulate and unlikely to stand up and demand that their rights are acknowledged. Many times they are unaware of the right afforded to them in terms of the Convention on the Rights of a Child (CRC), which protects every child, regardless of their nationality or immigration status. Thus it is up to the state that finds them to ensure that their rights are being upheld and they are being supported to the best of the state’s ability, by adopting
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Unaccompanied children
“are children who have been separated from both parents and other relatives and are not being cared for by an adult who, by law or custom, is responsible for doing so.”
Separated children
“are children who have been separated from both parents, or from their pervious legal or customary primary care-giver, but not necessarily from other relatives.”
This essay will look at the problems faced by migrant children, focussing on those of unaccompanied and separated migrant children. It will then focus on how states can ensure those rights are protected and determine a processes that deals with unaccompanied and separated migrant children in an effective, as well as age and gender appropriate manner.
2. Problems faced by Migrant Children
As stated above migrant children are vulnerable to abuse and violence as well as exploitation. However, all states, that have ratified the CRC, are obligated to ensure that a child is sheltered against all forms of punishment and discrimination, and as such states that find migrant children within their territory should act in accordance with these rights. It should also be noted that children are protected under the CRC from all forms of exploitation and
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This is felt even more so by migrant children whose situation is normally exasperated by “weak legal protection”, language and communication problems, and lack of documentation. This unfortunate situation leads to unaccompanied and separated children, because there is no support system waiting for them at their destination, being harassed by authorities, drug abuse and/or physical abuse, as well as trafficking.
Not only are these risks faced by migrant children in obvious violation of the general right to human dignity, but also violates the rights set out in the CRC, such as the right not to be subjected to sexual abuse , or the right to not be subjected to “inhumane or degrading treatment”.
It is disheartening that the rights set out in the CRC are still not protected by the states that find that their boarders are being crossed by migrant children, leaving them open to abuse, when children are “entitled to special care and
By the late nineteenth century the economic lines in America between the upper and lower class were quickly widening because of the boom of urban industrial expansion. Moreover, during the 1800s, America witnessed an influx of immigrants coming from many parts of the world, they made tenement houses in New York’s lower East Side a common destination. One person witnessing the living conditions of these tenements was journalist Jacob A. Riis. For several years, Riis, with camera in hand, tooked a multitude of photographs that depicted the atrocious working and living conditions in the New York slums. Riss reported that the tenements were severely overcrowded, unsanitary, and a breeding ground for crime and disease. Riss also claimed that the “slum” landlords of these tenements exploited immigrants by charging them more rent than they could afford. As a result, every member of the family had to work—even young children. Subsequently, in 1890, Riis wrote a book entitled: How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York, which included his horrifying photographs and sketches, as means to expose to the middle class the chaotic environment of tenement living. Although Riss’s book exposes a myriad of social and economic problems regarding tenement housing, one of the more prominent ills his photographs and prose reveal is the harsh and distressing reality that immigrant families from the lower class must treat their children as a form of labor in order to survive. With this in mind, by describing and analyzing three of Riis’s photographs, I will demonstrate the validity of my argument which portrays the exploitation of child labor.
Copyright (c) 2005 Virginia Journal of Social Policy & the Law Virginia Journal of Social Policy & the Law, 2005, 12 Va. J. Soc. Pol'y & L. 371, 13986 words, SYMPOSIUM: THE STATE CONSTRUCTION OF FAMILIES: FOSTER CARE, TERMINATION OF PARENTAL RIGHTS, AND ADOPTION: FROM ANTICIPATION TO EVIDENCE: RESEARCH ON THE ADOPTION
Swan, Rita. 2010. “Equal rights for children under the law” Children’s Healthcare Is a Legal Duty, Inc
Family dynamics present interesting revelations, especially regarding the relationship between parents and children. While most families undoubtedly encounter dysfunction at some point throughout life, immigrant families seemingly experience such stress continually. A handful of short stories, including “Two Kinds” by Amy Tan, “Who’s irish” by Gish Jen, and “A Thousand Years of Good Prayers” by Yiyun Li, demonstrate how strained relations erupt in immigrant families. Familial tension noticeably arises because of the immigrant parents’ inability to fully adjust to the American way of life. Further, immigrant parents adhere to strict expectations in an attempt to uphold the family’s conservative heritage. Finally, immigrant parents typically
In the United States there are approximately 397,000 children in out-of home care, within the last year there was about 640,000 children which spent at least some time in out-of-home care. More than 58,000 children living in foster care have had their biological parental rights permanently terminated (Children’s Rights, 2014). Due to the rising number of children in foster care and the growing concerns of the safety, permanency, and well-being of children and families, the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997 was signed into law. On November 19, 1997, President Bill Clinton signed the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997, to improve the safety of children, to promote adoption and other permanent homes for children who need them, and to support families (Child Welfare League of America). The Adoption and Safe Families Act also promotes adoption by offering incentive payments for States. During the FY of 1999-2003 the payment to states which had exceeded the average number of adoptions received $20 million (Child Welfare League of America). The ASFA improved the existing federal child welfare law to require that the child’s health and safety be a “paramount” concern in any efforts made by the state to preserve or reunify the child’s family, and to provide new assurances that children in foster care are safe (Shuman, 2004).
I have to introduce you to three individuals, not random individuals, but siblings - two brothers and a sister. They may seem just like any other people, but they have a secret that isn’t easily realized unless you know them. They belong here in the sense that they were born here, but their hearts belong to another land. They are the children of immigrants; the first generation to be born in America. It is a unique experience that to others may seem odd or exotic, but for these three is just as normal as learning to ride a bike.
The United States is in the midst of a major debate over immigrants and their place in our economic and political life. As during other times in our history, immigrants, are being blamed for causing or contributing to the social, economic and political ills of our society. Politicians from both major parties, at both the national and state levels, are promoting a range of punitive legislative proposals that single out immigrants for adverse treatment by the government. Many violate basic civil liberties principles.
Ifezue G. Rajabali M., ‘Protecting the interests of the child’ [2013] Cambridge Journal of International and Comparative Law 1: 77–85
“I was watching how two women were being raped by fifteen men, and the truth is it was extremely unpleasant for me” stated Kevin who is only fourteen years old. Just like Kevin many have had a traumatizing event throughout their journey. In the documentary film Which Way Home migrant children of various ages travel hundreds of miles to reach the same destination which is the United States, all while encountering different kinds of risks and challenges. Which Way Home serves as an eye opener to its audience on the sad reality of the danger migrant children face in trying to actualize their American dream. Throughout the film statements such as Kevin’s were used to capture its viewers’ attention. Even though it was not said straight forward the
. . . As I had claimed before, these children are being forced by severe beatings and
Parental child abduction: a family relative's (usually parent's) unauthorized custody of a child without parental agreement and contrary to family law ruling,
Children who are exploited for criminal gain are just as eligible for agency support and thus all forms of child exploitation should be measured in the same way (APPG, 2017). Worryingly, the amount of children who were reported to the UK Government’s National Referral Mechanism (NRM), increased to 1,278 in 2016 which is the highest logged by the National Crime Agency (2017). Over a third of victims who were trafficked were legally classified as children who were forced into manipulative labour such as forced criminality (Bulman,
Globalisation has increased modern technology all over the world enabling more people, such as globally separated families, to maintain contact. Increased media coverage also draws the attention of the world to human rights violation which can lead to an improvement in human rights. This is not a reflection of all marginalised groups. In Australia, the detention of unaccompanied asylum seeking children (UASC) contravenes the United Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), however the media are prohibited to enter detention centres and report on this issue (Cemlyn and Briskman, 2003).
In 1989, the U.N. General Assembly created a bill known as the Convention on the Rights of the Child. An excerpt from Article 23 of this document explains that “The child has the right to be protected from work that threatens his or her health, education or development. The State shall set minimum ages for employment and shall regulate working conditions.” In a report conducted in 1997, which focused on child labor, UNICEF condemned child labor as “one of the worst abuses of children’s rights” and emphasizes the importance of schooling as a key tool in eliminating child labor. UNICEF argues that “the single most effective way to stem the flow of school age children into abusive forms of employment or work is to extend and improve education so that it will attract and retain them… primary education must be made universal and compulsory.”
Child labour is an issue that has plagued society since the earliest of times. Despite measures taken by NGOs as well as the UN, child labour is still a prevalent problem in today’s society. Article 23 of the Convention on the Rights of a Child gives all children the right to be protected from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child 's education, or to be harmful to the child 's health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development.1 Child labour clearly violates this right as well as others found in the UDHR. When we fail to see this issue as a human rights violation children around the world are subjected to hard labour which interferes with education, reinforces