In March 2021, the European Commission published  the EU Strategy for the Rights of the Child  with the aim to better protect children, assure their rights, safeguard against all forms of discrimination and intimidation and place them at the center of EU policymaking. In order to achieve this, the Strategy focuses on six thematic areas including:

  • children’s participation in political and democratic life
  • socio-economic inclusion, health, and education
  • combatting violence against children and ensuring child protection
  • child-friendly justice
  • digital and information society
  • global dimension

Based on these themes, the Commission’s Strategy proposes concrete actions to address emerging challenges. One such example being the establishment of the European Child Guarantee with the objective of breaking cycles of poverty and social exclusion through Member States support of children in need.

Recently, the European Council released their conclusions on the EU Strategy for the Rights of Child to express their commitment to ensuring that children are fully fledged holder of rights and that the protection and promotion of the right of the child is a key objective of the European Union. Notably, the conclusions marked the impact of COVID-19 and Russia’s war of aggression on Ukraine as urgent challenges that expose children to widened inequalities in access to services as well as to violence, trafficking, and family separation.

Intending to address these concerns, the Council conclusion outlines five key recommendations, each accompanied by detailed actions, to be implemented by Member States to ensure the rights of all children. These recommendations include, but are not limited to, the development of comprehensive policies and measures to ensure the rights of all children without any discrimination, increase efforts to prevent and combat all forms of violence against children, strengthen justice systems to be compliant with the rights of all children, and finally, to develop and support the implementation of EU legal guarantees for the protection of the fundamental rights of the child in crisis or emergency situations without discrimination.

To read more in-depth about the European Council’s conclusions on the EU’s Strategy on the Rights of Child, click here.