COMMISSION ON HUMAN RIGHTS STARTS ITS DEBATE ON THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD

Commission on Human Rights
57th session
10 April 2001
Evening






Special Representative of Secretary-General for Children
and Armed Conflict, Special Rapporteur on Sale of Children,
Address the Commission



The Commission on Human Rights this evening started its debate on the rights of the child, hearing from the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict and the Special Rapporteur on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography.

Olara A. Otunnu, the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, welcomed the fact that war-affected children had been placed high on the international political agenda in recent years. However, he said there was still a gap between the commitments made by parties to armed conflict and the ugly reality that children faced in times of war. The international community must pay attention to areas of particular vulnerability among war-affected children. These included the special needs of girls; internally displaced children; the provision of education for war-affected children; the rapid spread of HIV/AIDS in the corridors of armed conflict; the impact of sanctions on children; and the liberation of abducted children.

Ofelia Calcetas-Santos, the Special Rapporteur on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography, reported to the Commission on her two trips to Morocco and the Russian Federation last year. The two visits typified two diverse situations on the problem of the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography. It was not easy to assess the situation of children in Morocco, primarily due to the veil of social taboos which still enveloped the general topic of children abuse. And in the Russian Federation, the situation of children was just as difficult to assess as that in Morocco for altogether different reasons. She had received consistent reports that there was a common resignation, if not acceptance, that prostitution was just another way of earning a living, and that attitude was carried on with respect to children.

In response to the introduction of the Special Rapporteur’s report, a Representative of Morocco said that protecting the rights of the child was a matter of national priority in Morocco. Since Morocco had signed the Declaration on the Survival, Protection and Development of the Child in 1992 and had ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1993, the country had elaborated a national action plan to implement legal international instruments on the rights of the child and had put in place a follow-up mechanism. A national congress on the rights of the child had also been set up.

And a Representative of the Russian Federation said that by inviting the Special Rapporteur, the Russian authorities had demonstrated the desire to discuss the problem in the country with regard to children. She was, however, attempting to compare the situation of the Russian Federation with the information she received from other countries, which was not at all comparable to a given situation. She had included in her report information she received from non-governmental organizations, which were, in the Government's view, not at all reflecting the reality of children in the country.

Among country delegations which took the floor, Sweden, on behalf of the European Union, said that despite greater awareness of the rights of the child, millions of children still had their rights violated every day and there was a need for the international community to take positive and concerted actions to improve the situation of children. And Senegal noted that despite international efforts, the situation of children remained critical because of, among other things, the growth in poverty, social and economic inequalities, effects of globalization, the HIV/AIDS pandemic, armed conflicts, the debt burden, and the reduction of official development assistance. Cuba echoed these sentiments, adding that a genocide against children was being committed and it was the international community’s responsibility to redouble its efforts to put an end to this tragedy.

Most delegations spoke about national efforts to promote and protect children’s rights. Representatives of the following countries addressed the Commission this evening: Morocco, the Russian Federation, Sweden on behalf of the European Union, Senegal, Poland, Norway, Madagascar, Syria, Cuba, Niger, Romania, Nigeria, Qatar, Latvia, Japan and Algeria.

The Commission will meet at 10 a.m. on Wednesday, 11 April to continue its debate on the rights of the child.

Rights of the Child

Under this agenda item, the Commission has before it a series of documents.

There is a report (E/CN.4/2001/74) on the status of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which itemizes which States have ratified or acceded to the Convention on the Rights of the Child as of last November, and also lists those States which have ratified or acceded to the optional protocol to the Convention as of last November.

There is a report of Olara A. Otunnu, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict (E/CN.4/2001/76), which stresses the need to address impunity and bring to justice those responsible for violations of the rights of children in conflict situations; highlights situations in which children are unacceptably involved, including in Sierra Leone and
northern Uganda; and describes the Special Representative’s continued efforts to ensure the inclusion of child protection in United Nations peacekeeping operations and to strengthen such measures already in place.

There is a note by the Secretary-General on the Programme of Action for the elimination of the exploitation of child labour (E/CN.4/2001/77), which mentions various resolutions which led to the adoption of the programme.

There is also a report of Ofelia Calcetas-Santos, Special Rapporteur on the sale of the children, child prostitution and child pornography (E/CN.4/2001/78), which reviews activities carried out in the year 2000, summarizes international developments relating to the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography; reviews the involvement of the private sector in such activities; and outlines situations in nine specific countries and regions.

An addendum (Add.1) describes the Rapporteur's mission from 28 February to 3 March 2000 to Morocco to look into the issue of commercial sexual exploitation of children. It recommends, among other things, that urgent attention be given to the matter of growing numbers of street children in the larger cities of the country; and that all legislation, particularly penal legislation, be closely examined to ensure that children who are victims of abuse and exploitation are not held criminally culpable.

A second addendum (Add.2) reviews the Rapporteur's mission to the Russian Federation to look into issues of the sale of children and child labour and recommends, among other things, that special courts be established to deal with minors and minor affairs; that the Government policy of placing children in need primarily in shelters and orphanages should be reviewed to allow for greater use of foster parents; and that networks of street educators trained to encourage children to leave the streets should be developed.

There is a report of the Secretary-General (A/55/163-S/2000/712) on children and armed conflict, which states that children have increasingly been victimized as both the targets and perpetrators of violence; that almost half the world's 21 million refugees are children, while another 13 million are displaced within the borders of their own countries; and that the number of children under the age of 18 who have been coerced or induced into taking up arms as child soldiers is generally thought to be in the range of 300,000. The report reviews efforts to protect children in the midst of conflict, measures to ensure access to humanitarian assistance, and undertakings to curb the flow of small arms.

And there is a note by the Secretary-General (A/55/442) on protection of children affected by armed conflict, which review activities and the initiatives undertaken in the past year by the Security Council, regional organizations, and the UN system; describes activities to place war-affected children high on the international political agenda; and outlines future efforts and attempts to build a movement for the protection of children affected by conflict.

Statements

OLARA A. OTUNNU, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, said that in recent years, war-affected children had been placed high on the international political agenda. Many regional organizations had adopted the issue as their own. The United Nations Security Council had become actively engaged, affirming that the protection of children affected by armed conflict was a matter of international peace and security. The well-being of children was now being included in peace agendas and had become a priority concern in post-conflict peace building. A range of new international norms had been adopted, above all the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child. Warring parties had made concrete commitments for the protection of war-affected parties. Finally, there had been a major growth in advocacy and programme activities by non-governmental organizations, focusing on the issue. However, there was a gap between the commitments made by parties to armed conflict and the ugly reality that children faced in times of war.

A worrying trend was the looting of natural resources. This was the theft of children’s birthright - the use of wealth needed for their education and development. A second worrying trend was the increasing cross-border recruitment of children. Recent examples included Sierra Leone, Liberia, Uganda, Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Another trend was the proliferation of small arms and light weapons. These weapons killed, maimed and injured. Many children were forced to grow up in a culture of violence.

The international community must pay attention to areas of particular vulnerability among war-affected children. These included the special needs of girls; internally displaced children; the provision of education for war-affected children; the rapid spread of HIV/AIDS in the corridors of armed conflict; the impact of sanctions on children; and the liberation of abducted children.

OFELIA CALCETAS-SANTOS, Special Rapporteur on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography, said that during the past year, she had had two field missions, the first of which was to Morocco from 28 February to 3 March 2000, where she visited the cities of Casablanca, Rabat, Meknes, Tangier and Marrakesh. The second mission was to the Russian Federation from 2 to 11 October 2000 where she visited Moscow and St. Petersburg. The two visits typified two diverse situations on the problem of the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography. It was not easy to assess the situation of children in Morocco, primarily due to the veil of social taboos which still enveloped the general topic of children abuse. Many were genuinely lulled into complacency by the belief that there were sufficient traditional and social sanctions which were in place that would deter exploitation of children. Despite that belief, however, the Special Rapporteur was grateful to note that there seemed to be a burgeoning awareness by various sectors, including the Government, that many serious problems had to be addressed. The increasing number of non-governmental organizations attending to the concerns of children was also quite significant.

In the Russian Federation, the Special Rapporteur was able to visit the two key cities of Moscow and St. Petersburg and her findings basically referred only to those cities. The situation of Russian children was just as difficult to assess as that in Morocco for altogether different reasons. In the Russian Federation, there was a palpable absence of awareness but that was not caused by any aversion to discussing the issue. On the contrary, she had received consistent reports that it was because there was a common resignation, if not acceptance, that prostitution was just another way of earning a living, and that attitude was carried on with respect to children.

NACER BENJELLOUN-TOUIMI (Morocco) said that protecting the rights of the child was a matter of national priority in Morocco. Civil society and Government representatives were undertaking all efforts to improve child protection at all levels. Since Morocco had signed the Declaration on the Survival, Protection and Development of the Child in 1992 and had ratified the Convention on the Rights of the Child in 1993, the country had elaborated a national action plan to implement legal international instruments on the rights of the child and had put in place a follow-up mechanism. A national congress on the rights of the child had been set up and convened every year to evaluate progress made in implementing the Declaration, evaluate the impact of strategies adopted and identify actions that called for further mobilization. Morocco's commitment to the promotion of the rights of the child was reiterated in the Millennium Summit with the signing of the two Optional Protocols to the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

Morocco had increased school enrolment and reduced the infant mortality rate through the introduction of a health programme and vaccination programmes. In this regard, UNICEF had underlined in 1999 that Morocco, which was committed to the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, could be considered as a model country in the Middle East region and Northern Africa.

NATALIA ZOLOTOVA (the Russian Federation) said that by inviting the Special Rapporteur, the Russian authorities had demonstrated the desire to discuss the problem in the country with regard to children. The authorities were able to talk with her about the deficiencies in legislation and in practice. She was, however, attempting to compare the situation of the Russian Federation with the information she received from other countries, which were not at all comparable to a given situation. In her report, she had condemned certain situations existing in the country concerning child prostitution and child pornography. She had also included in her report information she received from non-governmental organizations, which was, in the Government's view, not at all reflecting the reality of children in the country. The Russian Federation had emphasized that the modalities of child adoption had to be improved in accordance with international norms. The Special Rapporteur’s research was also flawed. Among other things, she wrote that the Russian Federation had not ratified the Convention on Protection of Children and Cooperation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption (the Hague Convention on Adoption), although it had already done so.

THOMAS HAMMARBERG (Sweden), speaking on behalf of the European Union, said that there was a greater awareness of the rights of the child, education and health and more information about how children were affected by sexual exploitation, armed conflicts, violence and neglect by their families or societies. Yet millions of children still had their rights violated every day. Knowledge in itself was not enough. In order to combat the daily violations the international community must continuously take positive and concerted actions to improve the situation of children.

Sexual exploitation of children existed all over the world. The continued fight against all kinds of sexual exploitation of children, including child sex tourism, was a challenge for all. Child pornography on the Internet was another substantial problem of growing magnitude and it threatened to tear down social, cultural or ethnic barriers. Armed conflicts had a devastating impact on children. Children were affected in multiple ways, including all forms of abuse - the use of children as soldiers, the situation of refugee and displaced children and ethnic and gender-based violence. One of the most depressing evils of our time was child labour. The practice of work under hazardous conditions, which prevented millions of children from enjoying their childhood and from receiving education and training, could not be tolerated. Due to the HIV/AIDS pandemic, many children - not least the children orphaned by AIDS, particularly in Africa - had suffered a severe setback to the enjoyment of their rights.

MANKEUR NDIAYE (Senegal) recalled that in the last two decades, important efforts had been deployed at national and international levels to ensure the implementation of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, which was adopted by the General Assembly in 1989 and at present was ratified by 191 States. Despite that, the situation of children remained critical because of, among other things, the growth in poverty, social and economic inequalities, effects of globalization, the HIV/AIDS pandemic, armed conflicts, the debt burden and the reduction of official development assistance. The statistics on the situation of children in the world was deplorable: more than 10 million children under the age of five died each year because of malnutrition or avoidable illnesses. The economic and social constraints on the family and the different forms of discrimination and violence against women had also created negative effects on the education and development of children.

In December 2000, the Government of Senegal had made public the national report on the follow-up of the world decade on children, 1990-2000, prepared under the auspices of the national committee on the follow-up, which was attached to the Secretariat General of the Presidency of the Republic. It was noted that there had been a positive evolution on the rights of children and the education of girls. Despite the limited resources, significant progress had been realized in the implementation of the national plan of action for children. A vast national programme was also under way with the view to resolve problems of street children, begging and disabled children.

IRENA KOWALSKA (Poland) said that the issue of rights of children had been dealt with in many instruments and had always been looked at from an interdisciplinary perspective. The Polish health care system ensured free medical services for every child. This included vaccinations and regular medical check ups. Access to health care and education was universal for both females and males. To combat childhood diseases and strengthen primary health care, respective government departments had focused their actions on health education. The HIV/AIDS issue was a crucial element of health education conducted all over the country. A national programme of preventing HIV/AIDS infections was established in 2000.

Poland attached great importance to supporting children living under critically difficult conditions. At the national level, preparation for the ratification of International Labour Organization Convention 182 on the worst forms of child labour had been completed. Poland was also in the process of preparation to ratify the Optional Protocols to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict and on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography.

PETTER F. WILLE (Norway) said that his country was happy to be among the first States to sign the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the involvement of children in armed conflict, and Norway was preparing for the ratification of the document. Exploitation of children through child labour, sexual exploitation and trafficking were issues of deep concern to the Norwegian Government. In December 2000, Norway had ratified International Labour Organization Convention 182 on the worst forms of child labour. No child should be involved in child labour which would prevent them from receiving a proper education. Education was imperative both to the creation of the child's own future and to the development of the society.

Norway was fully committed to contributing to ensure that the forthcoming conference on children would be an opportunity to reaffirm action and agree on tools for action to improve the lives of children during the first part of the new century. Survival of children was the first priority, and support to health standards was crucial to enhance the well-being of the child. The Government had placed great importance to contributing to the Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization. Another threat to children's health and well-being was the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The issue was on top of the agenda of Norwegian development cooperation as a subject which had implications that struck much further than the question of health.

CLARAH ANDRIANJAKA (Madagascar) said that her country attached great importance to the promotion of the rights of the child. In fact, the population of Madagascar was characterized by its youth: 43 per cent of the population was under 15; 54.9 per cent under 20; and only 5.5 per cent was above 60. Considering this structure, the national population policy, while being based on the well-being of the population as a whole, placed particular emphasis on the rights of the child. At the national level, measures to promote the rights of the child included, among others, the prohibition of employment as apprentices of children under 14 and the prohibition to use children under 18 for strenuous tasks; free compulsory education accessible to all; access to health services; the creation of sports and recreational centres; and the adoption of a law on paedophilia in 1998 to combat child prostitution. At the international level, the Government had ratified several international instruments, including the two Optional Protocols to the Convention on the Rights of the Child.

IBRAHIM IBRAHIM (Syria) said his country attached great importance to the promotion and protection of children's rights. The future of children had been the major concern of the Syrian authorities. The Government had incorporated legislation which reflected the norms of the World Health Organization and UNICEF. Further, the Government had taken measures with the aim of improving the situation of children. Additional measures had also been taken to prevent children from illnesses and chronic diseases. The Government had also achieved progress in maintaining the health conditions of mothers and children, as well as the family. In the field of education, primary education had been made compulsory and without any fee. Special programmes had been provided for disabled children and for their integration in society. Other programmes for children included those achieved to rehabilitate street children. In Syria, there was no law which compelled the enlistment of children in the army.

JORGE IVAN MORA GODOY (Cuba) said that there was a ferocious war being waged against children and their rights, a conflagration being fed by poverty, HIV/AIDS, bloody armed conflicts and discrimination. Some 85 per cent of children on earth lived in the Third World. Millions of children worked hard in plantations or in humid and miserable warehouses from sunrise to sunset. Today, 300,000 children fought in different armed conflicts and 14 million lived in refugee camps. Millions of children were sexually exploited, were living in the streets sheltered by piles of cardboard, and were kidnapped or murdered. According to UNICEF’s annual report for 2000, 11 million children died from curable diseases every year. The same report indicated that in 2000, 170 million children suffered from malnutrition, more than 100 million never attended school and one in every ten children suffered a disability. Two million girls were forced to become prostitutes every year. Some 250 million children under 15 were obliged to work to survive in underdeveloped countries.

Today, an increasing number of children were obliged to substitute their innocent childish games for the sexual claims of a northern depraved consumer. Cuba was stupefied when it saw the increase in the number of travel agencies promoting sexual tourism to the countries of the south. The sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography were traumatizing millions of children, lacerating whole populations and, as a plague, affecting humanity as a whole. A genocide against children was being committed and it was the international community's responsibility to redouble its efforts to put an end to this tragedy.

ADAMOU SEYDOU (Niger) said that following the ratification of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Government of Niger had established in 1991 a national committee for the survival, protection and development of the child. In addition, a national plan of action had been elaborated for the period 1991 to 2000 whose implementation had cost 14 billion Francs CFA. During the last three years, considerable progress had been made in the area of children's rights. Education of children between 4 and 16 had been made obligatory by the 1998 law on education. Further, the Government had created separate detention centres for juvenile offenders who were sentenced to serve long periods and who were dangerous. Other juvenile offenders had been placed in rehabilitation centres with the view to reinsert them into the society.

Niger had ratified the 1951 Convention related to the status of refugees and the 1967 protocol to the Convention. It was also a State party to the Convention of the Organization of African Unity on Refugees, as well as the African Charter of Human Rights and Welfare of the Child. With the end of the 1995 armed conflict in the northern part of the country, Niger had created an office of a high commissioner for peace in order to reinsert armed combatants in the society.

PETRU DUMITRIU (Romania) said that for a decade now, Romania had been going through a comprehensive process of reforming its national system of child care. The Romanian Government had placed the issue of child protection as a top national priority and had taken concrete measures in order to boost the child care system, with a view to ensuring the good functioning of services and institutions for children in difficulty. At the institutional level, the National Agency for Child Protection was an intrinsic part of the Government's high-level executive structure. On the normative ground, a legal definition of the child in need had been adopted as a measure to better provide for the physical and moral development, safety and integrity of the child.

Based on the multiple partnerships between governmental and non-governmental organizations, a substantial number of projects had been undertaken to support families with economic and social difficulties, prevent neglect and abandonment of children and offer an adequate environment for children in need.

P. O. OKUNROMADE (Nigeria) said that his country was making every effort to protect the rights of children by ensuring that all obstacles to their growth and development were removed. Nigeria acknowledged, in particular, that persisting gender discrimination meant that the human rights of the girl child, as all children, seemed often to be impaired by inadequate legal recognition. A national summit on children was organized from 14 to 16 November 2000 to serve as a forum for a situation analysis and a review of progress made with a view to identify obstacles and make recommendations on how to achieve holistic development of the Nigerian child. It had also provided an appropriate forum for collecting input from various stakeholders for the finalization of the "end decade report" presented at the UN preparatory meeting in December 2000 for the UN General Assembly Special Session on children in 2001.

Nigeria expressed its deep abhorrence at criminal practices such as children being used in armed conflict, child labour, and child trafficking for prostitution, among other things. While Nigeria applauded the success in raising the minimum age limit for recruitment to 18 years, it vehemently called for reduction in the participation of such children in conflicts and called for total peace in those conflict areas to enable those children enjoy their rights.

KHALID BIN JASSIM AL-THANI (Qatar) said that considerable progress had been made worldwide in protecting children against a number of diseases. Unfortunately violence and war continued to harm children. In World War One, civilians accounted for 5 per cent of the victims. This percentage rose to 50 per cent in World War Two. Today, civilians, including women and children, sometimes accounted for 80 per cent of victims. The State of Qatar had always taken measures to protect the rights of the child. Importance was granted to setting up a data base on children to unify indicators to help deal with insufficiencies that prevented progress in the area of child care at all levels. Legislation was also promulgated to protect children. Among others, initiatives covered children in vulnerable sectors of societies. The State had been able to provide children with the necessary conditions for their development. Qatar was concerned about the continued suffering of Palestinian children under Israeli oppression. The Israeli blockade in place since last September had deprived Palestinian children of their right to work, education and health. Qatar was also concerned about the situation of children in Iraq who were suffering as a result of the embargo.

RAIMONDS JANSONS (Latvia) said his country was currently making efforts to accede to the Optional Protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflict to the Convention on the Rights of the Child. It was also attaching great importance to the forthcoming Special Session of the General Assembly on children, which would provide the broadest, most significant forum for the discussion of children's issues among Member States, and between States and non-governmental organizations. The universality of the Convention on the Rights of the Child was too often far from children's real lives. Legal norms often lacked a careful insight in the every day needs of children. In addition, education of children was one of the main elements in the integration programme of society adopted by the Latvian Government. The teaching of tolerance and diversity to youth was the cornerstone of the educational system at the national level.

NATALIA ZOLOTOVA (the Russian Federation) said that improving the rights of the child was a matter of priority for her Government. Priority was accorded to programmes targeting children and work was being completed on legal documents aimed at improving the situation of children in the country. At the international level, the Russian Federation had already ratified the Optional Protocol on children in armed conflict to the Convention on the Rights of the Child and was considering the ratification of other relevant instruments. Regretfully, numerous international commitments made had not been implemented. These included ensuring universal access to education and health and banning child labour. The international community would have on its conscience the large number of children who took part in armed conflicts. In recent years, the United Nations had achieved considerable progress in this area. At the same time, efforts should not focus only on situations of armed conflict. Death penalties imposed on children, their access to firearms, child drug addiction, pornography and terrorism which did not spare children - all these issues also deserved the attention of the international community.

HOCINE SAHRAOUI (Algeria) said the last decade had been marked by the raising of the awareness of the international community on the necessity to increase the promotion and protection of the rights of children. That awareness had allowed a significant achievement of the rights of the child in the form of adopting international instruments which were devoted to the protection and promotion of the rights of children. Although some progress had been made in certain parts of the world concerning the education and health situation of children, in some other areas of the world, the situation of children had deteriorated until it had reached an intolerable level.

The forthcoming Special Session of the General Assembly on children would constitute a unique occasion to go one step forward in the effective promotion of the rights of children. The international instruments adopted so far had not been followed up by tangible effects. The summit would go beyond words and the international community would deal with the problem of development which was related to the promotion of the rights of children.


MASARU WATANABE (Japan) said that the plight of children, especially under certain circumstances such as extreme poverty or armed conflict, could not be overstated. Children formulated their ideas and view of the world from a very early stage of their lives. Lack of basic health and primary education, or physical and psychological instability of displaced children, for example, would have serious long-term implications not only on the development of their personalities but also on the society as a whole. The Japanese Government, for its part, had been tackling these problems at home, by enacting, for example, the Child Abuse Prevention Law, the Law for Punishing Acts Related to Child Prostitution and Child Pornography and for Protecting Children. In July last year, the Government had announced the Okinawa Infectious Diseases Initiative as part of the fight against infectious and parasitic diseases such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, malaria and polio.

Trafficking in children, child prostitution and child pornography required the urgent attention of the Commission. Advances in information technology and globalization had created a new threat to the safety and dignity of children. Gravely concerned with this problem, the Japanese Government, in cooperation with other international organizations and NGOs, would host the Second World Congress against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of Children in Yokohama in December 2001.

OFELIA CALCETAS-SANTOS, Special Rapporteur on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography, in her concluding remarks, thanked the Moroccan and Russian Governments for their collaboration during her visits. She welcomed the open-minded response of the Moroccan delegation to her report. She was also saddened by the criticism that the delegation of the Russian Federation had levelled against her. For example, it had been said that in her report, she did not include the legislation of the Russian Federation. The lack of the resources allocated to her did not permit her to translate the voluminous legislative documents in Russian. The Russian Federation, as a Member State of the United Nations, should understand that problem. As for her writing that the Convention on Protection of Children and Cooperation in Respect of Intercountry Adoption (Hague Convention on Adoption) had not been ratified while it actually had been, the Ministry of Education of the Russian Federation did not inform her that Russia had ratified the 1993 Hague Convention on Adoption. Probably because the Ministry did not know about the recent ratification either. In addition, she had received many reports that sexual exploitation of adolescents had been tolerated and it was not sanctioned as a crime. The alcoholic consumption of children was evident in the Russian Federation without the authorities taking any account of its detrimental effect on children. The duration of her visit had been limited by the Russian authorities to only 10 days although she had wanted to stay for a longer period to visit that vast country. It was that limited time that did not allow her to include many important points in her report with regard to the rights of children. Finally, she said that the attack of the Russian Federation on the report was probably so strong because her research had been too good and had shown the situation in the country. She said that she would not be seeking an extension to her mandate as Special Rapporteur.




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