Enhancing Child and Youth Participation in Cambodia: UNHRC’s Universal Periodic Review (UPR)
As part of our efforts to incorporate children’s voices in decision-making, together with other coalition members from the Child Rights Coalition in Cambodia (CRC Cambodia), we facilitated a workshop for children and youth, enabling them to voice their recommendations under Cambodia’s Universal Periodic Review process, a mechanism of UNHRC. Learn how.
About the Universal Periodic Review (UPR) process
The Universal Periodic Review (UPR) process is a cyclic mechanism of the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) through which States submit recommendations to their peers, based on their assessment of the situation of human rights, including children’s rights. On 8th May 2024, the 4th cycle session of Cambodia was held in Geneva. Cambodia received 277 recommendations from 100 countries, and 71 were related to children, the highlight being the need to accelerate the adoption of the upcoming new Child Protection Law.
Enabling children’s recommendations
On the 19th and 20th of June, the Child Rights Coalition Cambodia (CRC-Cambodia), a network of 60 international and local NGOs working to promote the realisation of children’s rights and child participation in Cambodia, organised a participatory workshop, “YOUR NEXT ACTION FOR MY RIGHTS! Enhancing Child and Youth Participation in the Universal Periodic Review (UPR)” with children and youth. As an active member of the coalition, Terre des Hommes Netherlands and coalition member, Action Education supported the facilitation of this workshop.
Thirty-eight children and youth from 12 provinces in Cambodia representing various youth networks* reviewed the new UPR recommendations, especially those related to education, child protection, health and participation mechanisms for children and youth.
After reviewing the recommendations in groups of 4, children and youth arrived at key priorities that they believed would contribute best to the realisation of child rights in Cambodia, in line with the UPR process.
Here are the top four priorities suggested collectively by children and youth :
(1) Stop child marriage and teenage pregnancy by raising awareness of their negative consequences
(2)Improve the Law on Domestic Violence and Protection of Victims
(3)Speed up the adoption of the Child Protection Law to protect all children’s rights under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC)
(4)Take action to reduce early school dropouts at the secondary school level
“This is my first time attending a UPR (Universal Periodic Review) workshop. I feel I can learn new experiences to understand what UPR is and select the key priorities so we have a chance to raise it. I want us to have a joint statement to the Ministry (Government) to accelerate the Child Protection Law as child abuse and child labour still happen in Cambodia."
- A 19-year-old female youth representative from Siem Reap representing the Adolescent and Youth Reference Group (AYRG).
The quote has been translated from Khmer.
Individual recommendations by 4 children and youth
Taking the recommendations forward
In the coming months, Terre des Hommes Netherlands along with Action Education and other Child Rights Coalition partners at CRC-Cambodia will present the shortlisted recommendations from children and youth to government representatives, primarily the Cambodian Human Rights Committee and the Cambodian National Council for Children, in line with the steps of the UPR process.
“This participatory process is extremely important to ensure that our future work with the Cambodian government is informed by children’s voices”, says Mr. Lay Yan, Executive Director of Child Rights Coalition Cambodia.
From Terre des Hommes Netherlands, we were represented by Ms Bushra Zulfiqar, Regional Director of Asia, Ms Zoe de Melo, Global Programme Manager and Mr. Chhengla Leap, Project Coordinator based in Cambodia.
*Youth networks at the workshop - the Adolescent and Youth Reference Group (AYRG), Child Advocacy Network (CAN) and the Cambodia Children and Young People Movement for Child Rights (CCYMCR)*
*New Child Protection Law in Cambodia.- Through significant from the civil society led by UNICEF, Cambodia is in the process of finalising a new child protection law, which is expected to be enacted by the end of 2024. This law aims to address various issues that place children at risk, such as violence, exploitation, and lack of access to essential services like education and healthcare. The new child protection law seeks to address these issues by creating a more comprehensive, robust and child-friendly legal and social framework. (Information sourced from OpenAI)