April 12th - SRSG supports first International Day for Street Children

New York, 12 April 2011 - Open Letter:

Across the world millions of street children face a daily struggle of abuse, hunger and exclusion as the international community fails to realise their rights.

In India alone there are an estimated 11 million children living on the streets with no access to the most basic of living conditions, whilst in Rwanda 93% of street girls surveyed are reported rape victims.

This is not an issue that solely affects developing nations. Last year, in Britain an estimated 100,000 children ran away from home, 16,000 of whom slept rough, putting themselves in a position of unimaginable danger.

We believe that the rights of street children cannot be ignored.

It isn’t as though they don’t have any: the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC) has been signed and ratified by almost every country in the world, but these rights continue to be ignored. We call for all governments to ensure that the rights of street children are recognised and included in policies and legislation.

Today, to mark the first International Day for Street Children – which is being supported and celebrated across the world – we urge people to join the campaign at www.streetchildren.org and bring street children one step closer to accessing their fundamental rights as set out in the UNCRC.

Signatories of the open letter for the launch of the first International Day for Street Children:

Andrew Moss, Chief Executive, Aviva Plc

Sally Shire, Chief Executive, Consortium for Street Children

Russell Brown MP, Co-Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Street Children

Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer, Co-Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Street Children

Lord Daniel BrennanKCSG, QC, Patron of CSC

Lord Malloch Brown, former FCO Minister of State for Africa, Asia and the UN

Baroness Goudie, Chair of the UN.GIFT Women’s Leaders Council

Craig Whittaker MP, Education Select Committee member

Lord Hardie, QC, PC, Senator of the College of Justice in Scotland and former Lord Advocate

Baroness Gibson, Deputy Speaker, House of Lords

Marta Santos Pais, Special Representative of the UN Secretary General on Violence Against Children

Dr Moushira Khattab, former Expert on the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child

Michael Odysseos, President, International Police Association

Dr. Benyam Dawit Mezmur, Vice-Chairperson (2nd) of the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child

Brian Woods, Award winning documentary maker, True Vision Productions

Yasmin Batliwala JP, CEO, Advocates for International Development

Publication of open letter: The Guardian