Source: OSCE - Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe
Mission in Kosovo
November 16, 1999

The objective of the round tables is to highlight the current situation of children in Kosovo and identify problems with regard to protecting children's rights. The Convention provides for the Rights and

Pristina, 16 November 1999 - 20 November 1999 is the tenth Anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC). The Convention is the first international legal document to exclusively enshrine the protection of children's rights.

The Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), which provides the third pillar of the United Nations Mission in Kosovo (UNMIK), is contributing to a week long series of activities involving UNICEF and other children's organisations marking this important day by holding round table discussions in Pristina, Mitrovica, Pec, Gnjilane and Prizren.

• Freedoms afforded every child including:
• Freedom from discrimination or punishment on the basis of the status, activities, expressed opinions or beliefs of a child's parents and family members
• Right to Education
• Right 'to enjoy his or her own culture, to profess and practice his or her own religion, or to use his or her own language.'
• Freedom of Expression
• Freedom from economic exploitation and from 'performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child's education''
• Freedom from all forms of physical and mental violence and sexual abuse and exploitation
• Freedom from 'torture, arbitrary arrest, detention or imprisonment'
• A child is defined by the Convention as every human being under the age of eighteen.

Key local and international players in children's rights as well as youth representatives will be among the participants of the round tables.
The results of the discussions will be addressed in the children's rights workshop at the forthcoming First International Human Rights Conference in Kosovo on 10-12 December 1999.