“At its forty-third session, the Executive Committee requested the High Commissioner to present a policy paper on refugee children to its next session and to report on activities and measures taken by her Office to improve the situation of refugee children. It also welcomed UNHCR’s initiative to revise the format of the Guidelines on Refugee Children (Guidelines) and encouraged the Office to formulate targeted training programmes and to develop additional training material on refugee children to be used with existing programmes. 2. The purpose of the present note is to inform the Sub-Committee of the Whole on International Protection of certain present protection concerns relating to refugee children which, in UNHCR’s view, require particular attention. In addition to its ongoing efforts to resolve these problems in the field, the Office intends to address them in the above-mentioned policy paper, in the revised version of the Guidelines as well as in related training materials and programmes. They are (a) military recruitment; (b) detention; (c) implementing the right to education; (d) the situation of unaccompanied children in the care of families which are not their own; and (e) irregular adoption of refugee children. The following is a brief description and discussion of the problems confronted in these areas of concern.” – Publisher’s description
