Child rights in a lecture [Archives:2002/38/Local News]

In the fourth seminar sponsored by Al Saeed Foundation for Science and Culture on Thursday, August 22, Mr. Abduarahman Abdulwahhab gave a lecture titled ”The international agreement and Child Rights in Yemen”. The lecture included many aspects and discussed various articles related to the child rights.
He emphasized that child rights are integral to human rights and children of today are definitely the grownups of tomorrow.
”In November 1989, the Agreement on Child Rights was adopted as forming the first legal international document adopting guarantees for group of rights on the child rights.” crowning previous declarations on the very topic back in 1923.
The agreement is not just a legally characterized one but also forms a perception of highly humanitarian vision. Its principles include political, moral and cultural dimensions that help effect a change in the understandings and behavior” he said
”These human rights of the child stipulate that the child should enjoy the rights granted to humans regardless his age, such as protection against violence and exploitation. Each child has the right to have a name, nationality, social and health securities and improvement of his living conditions as well as the right to expression , thinking and basic education.” Those rights are classified into civilian rights, economic rights, cultural, social and health rights” he added.
The lecturer added that Yemeni laws paved the way for many changes aimed at providing guarantees for the child rights in Yemen in line with the general objectives and principles that adopted by the International Committee for Child Rights in October 1991.
The Yemeni constitution includes the general rules that guarantee rights of the child, but defining the details have been left for laws to regulate. The constitution gave an importance to childhood and motherhood and to their care, a text compatible with what has been stipulated in the international agreement. However, the Yemeni draft law on childhood has not yet defined a certain age for childhood, as laws contradict in this regard. This contradiction constitutes a worrying question. A certain law specifies a child at a certain age as an adult while another law considers him at the same age as a child. So, under this contradiction, is it possible for children to practice their rights?

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