Ensuring the safety and wellbeing of children in armed conflict is vital

Click here for press release in Ukrainian.

Each year, November 20^th marks the anniversary of the dates when the United Nations General Assembly adopted two landmark instruments – the Declaration of the Rights of the Child in 1959 and the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1989.

Universal Children’s Day presents an opportunity for decision-makers, humanitarian community, civil society and families to promote children’s rights and to continue common efforts that can help build a better world for children, where they will be safe from harm and abuse and able to fulfil their potential in full.

In eastern Ukraine, the ongoing armed conflict continues to impact millions of civilians, including children, especially in the frontline areas. The large-scale humanitarian crisis in the Donbas makes the need to strengthen the protection of children’s rights imperative.

Active hostilities in Donetsk and Luhansk regions continue to claim lives and result in destruction of housing, critical civilian infrastructure and educational facilities. The conflict has driven thousands of families with children away from their homes, and displaced families need support in rebuilding their lives and integrating into new communities.

With armed violence now in its fifth year, children and youth in eastern Ukraine face a harsh reality: shelling on a daily basis, heavy contamination of the territories by mines and unexploded ordnance, disruption of basic services and decrease of family incomes forcing people to resort to negative coping strategies, multiplying the vulnerability of children.

Due to constant fear and exposure to deadly safety risks, children experience psychological trauma and distress, adversely affecting their well-being and health, the learning process at schools and enjoying the childhood.

To minimise the long-lasting devastating effect of the conflict for children, it is critical:

• For parties to the conflict to increase compliance with the applicable legal frameworks requiring (1) sparing civilians from attacks and the effects of hostilities and (2) ensuring equal and unimpeded access of the conflict-affected population to their rights and basic services;
• For the humanitarian community to continue taking concerted efforts in addressing key protection concerns and meeting basic needs of the population concerned with a view to improve the situation on the ground; and
• For the donor community to continue allocating necessary funding for protection and assistance programmes targeting the most vulnerable civilians, including children and their families.

In addition, following the outbreak of hostilities in eastern Ukraine and subsequent withdrawal of the Ukrainian authorities from the non-government controlled territories in 2014, families from those areas have had difficulties in accessing Ukrainian civil status documents, including birth certificates.

A birth certificate is a precondition for a child’s access to the entire spectrum of rights and to critical state services, such as education, healthcare or the legal inheritance of property. Moreover, lack of access to birth registration puts children from non-government controlled areas at risk of statelessness.

The current judicial procedure for residents of non-government controlled areas requires passing through several stages, including court proceedings, in government-controlled areas, which is a lengthy, cumbersome and costly process. Such an approach raises concerns under international law, introduces excessive barriers and, consequently, makes this service inaccessible for a number of families, especially for the most vulnerable. It is estimated that 57 per cent of children born in non-government controlled areas do not have birth certificates issued by the authorities of Ukraine.

Law of Ukraine No. 2268 ‘On peculiar aspects of public policy aimed at safeguarding state sovereignty of Ukraine over the temporarily occupied territory of Donetsk and Luhansk regions’, adopted on 18 January 2018, reiterates the non-recognition approach regarding all acts done and documents issued by the de facto authorities in non-government controlled areas, ‘except for documents certifying facts of birth or death of a person, which shall supplement an application for the state registration of birth or death of such a person.’

This clause is seen by Norwegian Refugee Council as an excellent opportunity for the relevant authorities to amend the current legal regulation of this matter and to establish a new – administrative – procedure that would govern, in particular, the issue of birth registration for residents of non-government controlled areas. However, as of 20 November 2018, no amendment to the existing regulation has been introduced by the relevant authorities.

The office of Norwegian Refugee Council in Ukraine:

• Calls on all competent state authorities to revitalise, without any further delay, the work on introducing a non-discriminatory, responsive and accessible system of birth registration – through an administrative procedure – for families from the non-government controlled areas;
• Recommends to bring the relevant services closer to the contact line and to ensure access to information on a new civil status acts registration procedure by residents of non-government controlled areas.