UNICEF is strongly supporting a UN call for universal ratification of the two Optional Protocols to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child.

The protocols provide stronger protections to those already enshrined in the Convention relating to children in armed conflict, sale of children, child prostitution, and child pornography.

At a special event at UNICEF House in New York overnight, campaigns aimed at getting all countries to ratify and implement the protocols by 2012 were announced. Among the participants were UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and two UN special representatives on children.

UNICEF’s New York-based Executive Director, Anthony Lake, says that the Optional Protocols represent a promise made to the world’s most vulnerable children.

“These are children born into extreme poverty and despair, children in countries torn apart by conflict and children forced into unimaginable servitude by adults who regard them as commodities.

“Two thirds of the world's nations have ratified the protocols, but to fully honour the promise they represent, we need universal ratification and implementation.”

The Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict has been ratified by 132 States; 25 States have signed but not ratified it and 36 States have neither signed nor ratified it.

The Optional Protocol on the Sale of Children, Child Prostitution and Child Pornography, is a few steps closer to universal ratification, as 137 States have ratified it, 27 States have signed but not ratified it and 29 States have neither signed nor ratified it.

In addition to calling on all countries to ratify the Optional Protocols and to effectively implement them by incorporating them into national legislation, policy and planning, and providing victim protection and rehabilitation programs; the UN is calling on governments to comply with reporting obligations to the Committee on the Rights of the Child.