Universal Children’s Day 2013

Date: 23rd November 2013
Category: UK 1st periodic review

On 20th November each year, Governments and organisations around the world come together to observe Universal Children's Day, marking the day on which the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of the Child in 1959 and later the UNCRC in 1989.

Universal Children's Day was established in 1954 and is celebrated each year to promote international togetherness, awareness among children worldwide, and improving children's welfare.

A key objective of Universal Children's Day is to promote the human rights of children through increased awareness of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC), as well as encouraging States to take stronger measures to guarantee these rights for children.

The importance of international law to this end goes without saying. And the newest addition - the Optional Protocol (OP) to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on a complaints procedure for children - is a safeguard for combating impunity for children's rights violations.

Meanwhile there are still 33 States that have not ratified the Optional Protocol on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography, and 44 States have yet to ratify the Optional Protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflict. And three States have yet to ratify the Convention on the Rights of the Child itself.

To mark Universal Children's Day 2013, Together released its State of Children's Rights report 2013.