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‘Children on the move’ highlights need for evidence on child migration
After more than a year in hiatus we are bringing back Research Watch on 7 September with a new, more interactive format. Please check www.unicef-irc.org/research-watch UNICEF Innocenti is set to launch the latest edition of Research Watch, an online multimedia portal exploring current child rights research issues. Titled Children on the Move, the edition features in-depth video interviews, written commentary and podcasts on child migration with top researchers, policy analysts and child migrants themselves. An estimated 50 million children are on the move in the world today, and millions more have been deeply affected by migration. One in three migrants is a child. “Some of the most serious child rights concerns we face are increasingly linked to migration, and this is true in the countries of origin, along the route of transition as well as in the countries of destination,” said Goran Holmqvist, Associate Director of UNICEF Innocenti.“There is a large literature on migration, but much of it without a specific focus on children. Many vulnerabilities, and also international undertakings, specifically refer to children, so a child migration angle is called for.”Featured expert voices include Simon Parker, at the University of York, Jacqueline Bhahba, of Harvard Law and Harvard Kennedy Schools, Victoria Rietig, with the Migration Policy Institute, Andrea Rossi, UNICEF social policy specialist and Mike Dottridge, an independent child rights in migration expert. The main research themes highlighted in the videos include Push and Pull Factors Affecting Children in Migration, Child Migration and the Law, and Challenges in Protecting the Rights of Migrating Children. Two additional videos tell the story of migrant children in Guatemala and Greece. There are also think pieces on multiple research themes on child migration. Professor François Crépeau, UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Migrants on administrative detention of children and Michelle May, of the Harvard Program on Refugee Trauma writes on unaccompanied minors from Afghanistan, among others. The podcasts contain all full un-edited interviews with featured experts. The 7 September launch of Children on the Move coincides with the release of UNICEF’s major global report: Uprooted: the growing crisis for refugee and migrant children providing key world statistics and policy imperatives on child migration. Research Watch and the global report are key elements in UNICEF’s call for improved global cooperation on child migration on the eve of the 19 September UN Summit on Large Scale Movements of Refugees and Migrants and President Obama’s 20 September US Leaders Summit on the Global Refugee Crisis.UNICEF is mobilizing in all parts of the world to call for the following urgent actions for child refugees and migrants: protect unaccompanied children, end detention of children, keep families together, maintain access to quality essential services, address the root causes of conflict, violence and poverty and to combat xenophobia in transit and destination countries.(31 August 2016)