SRSG Santos Pais welcomes the adoption of a new protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child introducing a system of individual complaints for children

New York 19 December 2011 - The Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Violence against Children, Marta Santos Pais, welcomes the adoption by the General Assembly of a new protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child introducing a system of individual complaints for children.

“I wholeheartedly welcome the historical adoption of this protocol which consolidates the international system of accountability for human rights and is of decisive relevance to children’s protection from violence. I am confident the adoption of the protocol will be followed by a swift process of ratification and its provisions will help bring to an end the invisibility and conspiracy of silence surrounding incidents of violence against children.”

The protocol introducing a system of individual complaints for children is the third protocol to the Convention complementing the Optional Protocols on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornography and on the involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, which entered into force in 2002.