Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2001-07-05-Speech-4-158"
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"en.20010705.8.4-158"2
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". – I would just like to say that it is a pleasure to listen to the debate and to take part in it, not least since it was so ably moved by my friend Mr MacCormick.
It is an important debate as part of the preparatory process for the UN Special Session on Children. The Commission, in coordination with Member States, firmly supports a rights-based approach founded on the Convention of the Rights of the Child. Since 1992, for almost one decade now, all cooperation agreements between the European Union and third countries have incorporated a clause defining human rights as an essential element of the agreement. This includes the rights of the child and respect for the core labour standards as set out in the eight ILO fundamental conventions. The Commission strongly supports efforts by the international community to eliminate child labour across the world. In this regard, the Commission particularly supports the work of the ILO which adopted a convention in 1999 banning the worst forms of child labour, some of which were referred to during the debate.
On 15 September 2000, the Commission underlined its support for the ILO's efforts against child labour by adopting a recommendation to the Member States to ratify this new convention. While there is no specific Community competence in children's matters, the European Commission recognises children as a particularly vulnerable group within the overarching policy focus on poverty and vulnerability, and the concerns about children as well as about human rights and gender issues are an integral part of our development policy objective of poverty eradication, especially in social sectors such as education and health.
Whereas there is no explicit focus on children in development cooperation, ECHO has made children a priority for our humanitarian assistance this year. Promotion of the rights of the child is also a high priority for funding under the European initiative for democracy and human rights where the promotion of the rights of the child was chosen as a priority theme for funding under the budget this year.
As a complement to the European Union's intervention in international fora such as the UN, the Commission offers substantial support to projects designed to address the plight of children affected by conflict, and there were several references to that problem. Since the beginning of 2000, more than EUR 40 million have been spent on projects providing assistance and protection to children affected by armed conflict. The Commission is therefore active in supporting children's rights both at the political level and through practical initiatives. I am grateful for your indulgence, President, but this seemed to me to be a sufficiently important subject on which to make those remarks."@en1
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