Krista Riley

• Lack of access to education
  
• Health problems and lack of access to necessary services
  
• Psychological trauma and suicide
  
• Exploitation of children as soldiers and workers
  
• Refugees and internally displaced children

After identifying the issues, we talked about who the decision-makers were and what they could do. We recognized decision makers as people with political power (governments, opposition parties, third-party governments, the UN), financial power (companies, arms dealers, international donors), and military power (armies, paramilitaries, rebel groups, and outside military influences such as the United States). We talked about the importance of ending greed and corruption of leaders on all levels.

On a local level, we said that teachers should be given more money and respect in their job, and that they should teach not only the academic necessities, but also lessons about the importance of peace, diversity, and human rights.

We said that local leaders have the responsibility to support local charitable initiatives and to welcome refugees and people in need. Nationally, we said that all government leaders should refuse discrimination in any form in their countries. We asked that governments resolve their conflicts through dialogue without resorting to force or the use of children.

We asked for a deeper analysis of the information from national media and more comprehensive coverage of children's rights issues. We also called on national governments to support other countries in need.

For the United Nations, we recommended the creation of zones of peace protected by UN peacekeepers, with special focus on the protection of schools and hospitals. We talked about the importance of stopping the exploitation of refugees, investing in humanitarian aid, and demobilizing and reintegrating child soldiers. We also asked for an end to the arms trade, especially the trade in small arms, which is making it so easy to recruit children as soldiers.

We want an end to the debt in developing countries to allow them to focus more intensely on their domestic situation. We also ask companies and consumers to verify the origin of the products that they buy to make sure that they are not profiting from war by buying products that finance weapons. As participants in this process, we agreed to raise awareness among youth in our own countries, try to communicate these issues through the media, and to work with our governments to ensure that they follow up on promises made at this Special Session on Children.
    
This meeting was followed by a plenary meeting in which the groups from each of the eight themes presented their ideas. It's interesting that many of the issues that have seen so much debate on an international level can be so universally and so quickly agreed upon by the children here. For example, although there is much debate about reproductive rights and reproductive education, most people here supported it as essential for health and for the prevention of HIV/AIDS. There was even a consensus on the importance of ending cultural traditions that are harmful to people's health. Although we come from different backgrounds, we all seem to have a very clear idea of what is necessary for children's rights in the world. I only wish we were the ones making the decisions!


Wednesday, May 8, 2002

Today was the beginning of the official UN Special Session on Children. This means that there will be statements in the General Assembly (GA), negotiations about the Outcome Document, and several side events, some sponsored by the UN and others organized by nongovernmental organizations (NGOs).

This morning, I went to a panel discussion on education in emergencies. My friend Betty from Northern Uganda was one of the speakers. She lives in an camp for internally displaced people and has sometimes had trouble accessing education, either because it is not available or because it is not affordable. I spoke up at the end to introduce some ideas that were brought up in the Children's Forum. One idea came from Tiana of Yugoslavia, who stated that education in times of crisis should include first aid training and practical training about the danger of war. Another idea was that education should teach children about their rights and about peace and world issues.
    
After this discussion, I went to the Intergenerational Dialogue on war-affected children. There were about 30 youth in total, from all over the world, Graça Machel and Olara Otunnu as international experts, government representatives from Canada, Colombia, Burundi, Switzerland, United Arab Emirates, and the President of Sri Lanka. (Note: Graça Machel chairs a UN committee called the Study on the Impact of Armed Conflict on Children. Olara Otunnu is Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict.) We all appreciated having the chance to speak to decision-makers directly.

Mayerly brought up the idea that eliminating the culture of acceptance of violence in toys and games would help to create an atmosphere of peace. I found it interesting to see the young Palestinian and Israeli representatives both asking how to end the occupation and bring peace to the region. It made me feel like maybe there was some hope after all of diplomatic communication between the two groups.

Graça Machel reminded us that sometimes there is a legitimate reason for conflicts or differences of opinion, but that we cannot allow violence to be legitamized. Olara Otunnu spoke about the existing agreements to protect children in war: the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Geneva Conventions, various Security Council resolutions, and the need for more monitoring to make sure that the agreements are implemented and maintained.

To use the Colombian government representative's summary of our discussion, we talked about the need to protect kids who are living through war and those who have survived it, to implement international conventions, to listen to children, to respect and teach children's rights, and to eradicate the culture of war.
    
After the dialogue, I went to Union Square for the beginning of a March for Children's Rights, which my Cambodian friend Sokunthea had helped to organize. It basically represented every single children's rights issue under the sun. I held a poster against child labor, a sign against the use of child soldiers, and wore a Say Yes for Children T-shirt.

There was one sign that I really liked, saying "Star light, Star bright, First bomb I see tonight, I wish I may, I wish I might, Live to see the morning light," which I thought really illustrated the corruption of innocence that war causes. Rattana from Cambodia was also in the march; Sokunthea told me that she was a domestic worker for two years, and she had personal experience with child labor. It's very hard to believe that to look at her, a very young-looking 14-year-old with such a bright smile, and even harder to imagine how someone could think of exploiting her.
    
I had to leave the march early to go to a meeting with Canadian NGOs and Canadian Senator Landon Pearson, who has done a lot of work for children's rights. This was the first time that I heard much about the Outcome Document. I had thought it was being discussed in the General Assembly, but it turns out it's being negotiated mostly behind closed doors.

Friday, May 10, 2002
    
Yesterday I went to discussions on refugees and on creative expressions of the peace movement. Later in the afternoon, I got a chance to meet Canadian Deputy Prime Minister John Manley and to see him speak in the General Assembly. Many of the GA speeches talked mostly about already-existing programs, and did not focus enough (in my opinion) on what they were planning to do or what they thought other countries should do. I had thought that the GA speeches would be more of a debate, as they usually are, but I guess that each country was allocated a certain amount of time during this session for a speech by a government minister about the country's activities. The Canadian government has really done a lot for children's rights. I'm really lucky to live in a country that does care about children here and overseas, and that will follow up on commitments made at this conference.
    
This morning I went to part of a discussion on HIV/AIDS. There's still a lot of work to do in reducing the stigma associated with the disease and in making prevention and protection more available.
    
After the AIDS panel, I went to a meeting at the Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict to talk about the creation of an international youth network for war-affected children. I had been at the same office two weeks ago to talk about the network, and I introduced our recommendations in today's meeting. It went really well, because we were already planning to work with existing networks and NGOs to spread the information, and many of the participants were part of exactly the people we're planning to work with. Olara Otunnu, the Special Representative, came to the end of the meeting and expressed his support for our work, and several other people in the office are also really interested in it, so we will hopefully be able to get it off the ground sometime soon.
    
It was really difficult to leave today, but I know that it's not over. As we have been saying all week, this is where the work really begins. Our words this week will mean nothing if we stop here. Our job—as participants, as young people, and as children's rights advocates—is to keep working and to monitor our governments to make sure that they follow through on their commitments to the world's children. This week, we children gave governments a strong message that we expect real action, and I think it might be up to us to set the example.

Photo: Steven Ehrenberg