Children’s Human Rights Centre Network gaining momentum
The project “Network of Children’s Human Rights Centres” began in early March and is gaining momentum. Its coordinating centre – the civic youth organization M.ART IN-club names among the violations which lead people to turn to them infringements of children’s property rights and requests for help in cases involving adoption, care or tutelage.
During the last three months the centres have been approached by 119 children and teenagers. 25 approached the Makiyivka Centre which is linked with the youth organization M.ART IN-club. The latter has worked for more than 10 years providing help to destitute children, while other partners in the network also have considerable experience of social work with children and young people.
Thanks to support from the European Commission it has been possible to unite the efforts of seven NGOs in the Donbas region and supplement the range of social services already provided with legal assistance.
The main mission of the organizations from six cities in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions is to provide qualified legal and social assistance to social orphans, that is those children who are without family care, yet do not have official orphan status, nor therefore State social protection.
According to Victoria Fedotova, the Project Director, the most widespread problems are those linked with children’s right to housing. The activities of the bodies of care and tutelage in Ukraine are regulated by a huge number of normative legal acts which are not interlinked, making it very difficult to ensure control over observance of children’s rights. Problems often get out of control because there is no single body bearing responsibility for the child’s fate with this instead being spread over a number of different services and authorities. This can result in children losing their right to accommodation and finding themselves without means for existence when they leave the school-orphanage [internat] or other social institution.
Some of the children and young people in need of assistance have been living on the street and / or suffering from drug addiction.
From information at www.civicua.org.ua