Articles 17 and 13 of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child protect children's right to information. Below is a compilation of news from around the world relating to these articles. They are grouped according to some of the guidelines for States Parties in reporting to the Committee on the Rights of the Child. These include:

• Access to information from a variety of sources
• Promoting understanding, peace and tolerance
• Promoting equality of the sexes
• Protecting children from material injurious to well-being
• Encouraging the media to have linguistic regard for minority children
• Encouraging the development of media for children
  

Access to information from a variety of sources

Guidelines: "Ensure the child “has access to information…from a diversity of national and international sources” – especially those aimed at promoting wellbeing and physical and mental health."

Sex education

• Latin America: Lack of sex education creates fertile ground for child sex abuse,
  IPS
• Africa urged to boost sex education, Agence France Presse
• Aids fears as Bush blocks sex lessons, Observer on Sunday
  

School history textbooks

• Miami school board bans Cuba school book, BBC 
• French angry at law to teach glory of colonialism, The Guardian
• Japanese textbook treatment of Nanking massacre
• India: Book banned for offending Sikhs, BBC
  

Promote understanding, peace and tolerance

Homosexuality

• Poland strikes back against homosexual education: fires teacher responsible
• Poland: Director of teacher training centre sacked over LGBT inclusive language in manual on human rights education
  

Religion

• Religion enters Russian Schools, BBC
• United Kingdom: Curb Influence of Religions in Schools, says National Union of Teachers, The Guardian
  

Promote equality of the sexes

• Girls’ right to education, BBC

Protecting children from material injurious to well-being

Guidelines "Encourage the development of appropriate guidelines for the protection of the child from information and material injurious to his or her well-being, bearing in mind the provisions of articles 13 and 18”: article 17 (e)

• Chatrooms may be banned in US schools to combat sexual predators, The Guardian
• Safety Online, CRIN
• Children and Media Violence, MediaWise Factsheet
• Research on the Effects of Media Violence, Media Awareness Network
  
  

Encouraging the media to have linguistic regard for minority children

Guidelines: “Encourage the mass media to have particular regard to the linguistic needs of the child who belongs to a minority group or who is indigenous.” Article 17(d)

• id21: Mother Tongue First - Children's right to learn in their own languages
  

Encouraging the development of media for children

• First newspage launched by and for children in Iran, UNICEF
• Children’s Express, Northern Ireland
• Children Have the Right to Quality Media, Central Union for Child Welfare
• People and Media – Making a big impact, UNICEF Voices of Youth
  

Previous Publication (general) items

• 07/09/2006: Moving Young
• 07/09/2006: A Passage to Hope: Women and International Migration
• 07/09/2006: A High Price to Pay: Detention of Poor Patients in Burundian Hospitals
• 07/09/2006: GUIDE: International Law and Standards on Children and Neglect
• 07/09/2006: STATE NEGLECT: Children in Prison for Lacking Basic Care and Protection

Organisation Contact Details:

Child Rights International Network
East Studio
2 Pontypool Place
London
SE1 8QF
Tel: +44 (0)207 401 2257
Email: info@crin.org
Website: www.crin.org

Last updated 12/09/2006 06:09:41

Please note that these reports are hosted by CRIN as a resource for Child Rights campaigners, researchers and other interested parties. Unless otherwise stated, they are not the work of CRIN and their inclusion in our database does not necessarily signify endorsement or agreement with their content by CRIN.