In a wide-ranging resolution strongly condemning the recruitment and use of child soldiers and providing for country-specific resolutions against that practice, the Security Council Wednesday asked the Secretary-General to devise urgently, and preferably within three months, an action plan to halt the recruitment and use of children in violation of international obligations, in close collaboration with United Nations peacekeeping missions and country teams, consistent with their respective mandates.
Under a related term, the Council asked the Secretary-General to ensure that compliance by those parties was reviewed regularly through a process involving all stakeholders at the country level, including government representatives, and coordinated by a focal point, to be designated by the Secretary-General, charged with engaging parties in dialogue leading to time-bound action plans, so as to report to the Secretary-General, through his Special Representative, by 31 July.
The Council expressed its intention to consider imposing targeted and graduated measures, through country-specific resolutions, such as a ban on the export or supply of small arms and light weapons, as well as other military equipment, and on military assistance, if the parties concerned refused to enter into dialogue, failed to develop action plans or failed to meet the commitments included in such action plans.
It decided to continue the inclusion of specific provisions for the protection of children in the mandates of United Nations peacekeeping operations, including, on a case-by-case basis, the deployment of child protection advisers, and asked the Secretary-General to ensure that the need for child protection advisers was systematically assessed during the preparation of each peacekeeping operation.
Kilde: FN
