Global Status of Engagement in Reporting to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child

Since the establishment of the Committee, Child Rights Connect (formerly the NGO Group for the Convention on the Rights of the Child) has been the strategic partner of the Committee and the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) for the engagement of civil society in the reporting cycle. Its role is to strengthen the capacity of children’s rights defenders, including children, to use the CRC reporting cycle as an advocacy tool and in connection with other relevant UN human rights entry points. It also has a unique position that allows it to collect experiences and feedback from national level, draw lessons and recommendations, and channel them back to the Committee in order to improve the space for civil society engagement. Its approach is to maximize the potential of the Child Rights Connect network to empower children’s rights defenders in a sustainable way and with multiplying and long-term effect in order to influence and use the UN human rights system for change at national level.

The main goal of the review is to help Child Rights Connect to become more effective in discharging its mission; in particular, its core function of reinforcing children’s rights advocacy on the national and regional level by empowering children’s rights defenders worldwide to engage with the Committee, the other Treaty Bodies and the broader human rights system through information, knowledge and collaboration.