With a growing number of developing countries releasing children from detention as a preventive measure for COVID-19, how can we support all countries to do the same?
As part of global efforts by UNICEF Child Protection to generate new knowledge, evidence and data about how COVID-19 is impacting on the protection of children, in 2020 I was commissioned by UNICEF to lead a rapid analysis on how UNICEF programming is evolving in response to the impact of the pandemic, covering children’s access to justice and violence against children. The first two publications arising from this work are Access to Justice for Children in the era of COVID-19: Notes from the Field and Access to Justice for Children in the era of COVID-19: Learnings from the Field. The reports were co-authored with Vijaya Ratnam-Raman, UNICEF Child Protection Specialist (Access to Justice), and were launched last month, in the first of a series of webinars on children's access to justice. This blog is a summary of my presentation for that webinar. The next blog will cover the second report on learnings from the field.
Why this matters.
The right to personal liberty is one of the most enduring and important of all human rights, yet one UN global study estimates that every year more than 400,000 children worldwide are held in juvenile detention facilities and prisons, yet in 2021 we still do not know the actual number of children detained let alone have disaggregated data on gender, age, ethnicity/race, (dis)ability, etc.
Releasing girls and boys from detention is a public health priority and a key prevention measure for COVID-19 for the simple reason that as we know, the pandemic spreads much more rapidly in confined spaces. For a fuller discussion of these issues, please see my earlier blog: Five Strategies for Protecting Children in Detention. New variants of the virus appear to be more infectious and are infecting younger adults and children at higher levels than previous mutations.
And while vaccines are likely to provide a bridge to a post COVID-19 world, for some people in some countries, in the meantime, prevention remains the priority. This means keeping children out of high-risk environments such as detention facilities.
Purpose & scope.
The purpose of the rapid analysis was to document how UNICEF access to justice for children work is adapting to meet the challenges of COVID-19.
It sought to identify and understand answers to three questions:
Contribution to the result – How was the result achieved and what was the contribution of UNICEF and partners to the achievement of the result?
Enabler for the result – why was UNICEF able to achieve the result / what were the enablers or critical success factors for the achievement of the result?
Context - where does the key result fit within the broader context of the global results achieved by UNICEF?
The scope of the analysis was not to review all types of access to justice interventions, but specifically those concerned with children being released from detention as a preventive measure for COVID-19 and steps being taken to keep justice services functioning during lockdowns and social/ physical distancing.
And while COVID-19 is a global pandemic its impact at the country level varies country by country. Some countries are dealing with the first wave of the spread of the virus while others are battling a second or third wave of new infections. In other countries, the virus is only just emerging. This means that the ‘humanitarian or human rights imperative’ for a government to release children from detention or to place a moratorium on new admissions will vary according to country specific circumstances. Since the conclusion of the rapid analysis, new variants of COVID-19 have emerged, further complicating the situation, but also providing new opportunities for intensified advocacy for the release of children in detention.
Methodology.
The analysis reviewed the knowledge, data and evidence reported by UNICEF Headquarters, Regional Offices and Country Offices responding to child justice and child protection issues in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. It included information extracted from UNICEF Situation Reports and indicators, Country Office Annual Reporting and other established UNICEF mechanisms and platforms for collecting and analysing data. A key source of data was COVID-19 Situation Reports produced by UNICEF Headquarters, Regional Offices and Country Offices. UNICEF Headquarters, Regional Offices and Country Offices’ websites were used to gather further information COVID-19 programme priorities as well as child justice priorities and results.
The rapid analysis highlight key interventions or approaches being implemented by 32 UNICEF Country Offices, the seven UNICEF Regional Offices and UNICEF Headquarters. Specifically:
East Asia and the Pacific: East Asia and Pacific Regional Office (EAPRO); Cambodia, Indonesia, Myanmar
Eastern and Southern Africa: Eastern and Southern Africa Regional Office (ESARO); Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, South Sudan
Europe and Central Asia: Europe and Central Asia Regional Office (ECARO); Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, Turkey, Uzbekistan
Latin America and the Caribbean: Latin America and the Caribbean Regional Office (LACRO); Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Uruguay
Middle East and North Africa: Middle East and North Africa Regional Office (MENARO); Iran, Iraq, Morocco, State of Palestine, Sudan
South Asia: Regional Office for South Asia (ROSA); Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka
West and Central Africa: West and Central Africa Regional Office (WCARO); Côte d’Ivoire, Gabon, Guinea, Nigeria
The key findings.
UNICEF’s call for governments and detaining authorities to place a moratorium on new admissions of children to detention facilities and to urgently release all children who can safely return to their families or an appropriate alternative, have been positively received in many countries.
At least 37 countries are providing for the release of more than 11,600 children using a range of alternative measures to detention, as well as placing a moratorium on new admissions of children into detention. Examples includes the Sudan (releasing approximately 85 per cent of children in detention); the West Bank and Gaza in the State of Palestine (85 per cent); Morocco (35 per cent); Albania and Indonesia (50 per cent); and Mozambique (42 per cent). In Gabon, less than 10 children remain in detention since most have been released as a preventative measure against COVID-19.
Five countries are implementing innovations in their court processes through the introduction of ‘virtual courts’ to ensure continuation of court services for victims, witnesses and alleged juvenile offenders.
Nine countries are innovating by moving justice-related training programmes from face-to-face learning to online learning.
All UNICEF Regional Offices and many Country Offices are using the inter-agency Technical Note: Protection of Children during the COVID-19 Pandemic, to guide their advocacy efforts with governments. The Technical Note was developed by UNICEF, the Alliance for Child Protection in Humanitarian Action and other partners.
In several countries, United Nations-wide advocacy approaches are being successfully used in access to justice programming, especially the release of children and women from detention.
How can we support all developing countries to do the same?
Prior to the onset of the pandemic, some developing countries were using alternatives to detention. However, COVID-19 has created a humanitarian imperative for governments to act quickly to protect at-risk population groups such as those in confined spaces. This has seen many countries starting or increasing efforts to release children from detention.
Looking forward, it will be important to understand why countries are not releasing children in detention as a preventative response to COVID-19. The more we know about the rationale for these decisions the better able agencies such as UNICEF and others will be in their advocacy approaches to overcome them.
Equally important will be the need to invest in country level experiences and learning, in both developing and industrial countries, from releasing children from detention to supporting countries to develop plans to achieve scale.
Supporting evidence generation and wider dissemination of global south evidence on the cost-effectiveness of these interventions alongside rehabilitative and restorative approaches compared to retributive and punitive approaches in juvenile justice will also be an important action.
Enablers for change.
The rapid analysis identified two main enablers for this change.
First, UNICEF’s long-term investments in strengthening diversion and alternatives to detention is a key enabler for the release of children from detention as a preventative measure for COVID-19. For example, in Montenegro, years of investment in diversion and reform of the juvenile justice system meant that when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, there were fewer than 20 children and young adults in detention. In Iraq by 2019, the use of diversion and alternatives to detention resulted in 74 per cent of children in conflict with the law being diverted or given alternatives to detention, representing a 45 per cent reduction.
Second, trust, longevity and creativity have positioned UNICEF as the preeminent voice on child justice and are the key enablers for the results that are being achieved by UNICEF Country Offices across all regions. As the leading agency on child justice across the world and its long-standing ‘trusted partner’ status with justice and security ministries/agencies, UNICEF was amongst the first UN agencies when the pandemic hit to be called upon or to approach governments about the rights of children in the justice system, especially children in detention. In Indonesia for example, since 2004, UNICEF has supported and invested in reform of the juvenile justice system, including in research on alternatives to detention, a situation analysis of children in conflict with the law, and piloting court and community-based diversion models which were alien during that time. UNICEF supported advocacy and legal drafting of Juvenile Criminal System Law in 2012 and supported capacity building for implementation when the law entered into force in 2020.
Despite this progress more action is still needed.
Despite this progress, much more needs to be done. Many children unnecessarily remain in detention. Certain categories of children such as children in military detention, those detained in the context of national security concerns and children in detention due to their alleged association with armed groups remain least able to access measures made available to other children. Continued attention is required to ensure their release, that their rights are upheld and where necessary they equally benefit from child-friendly and gender sensitive justice systems and processes.
Intensified action is required to address the lack of disaggregated data on child justice, including data on girls and children in immigration detention. Intensified action is also required to accelerate justice sector reforms for children, particularly in countries where those reforms have stalled.
Finally, a new and concerning phenomenon requiring close monitoring is the arrest and detention of children for violation of curfew orders and movement restrictions orders related to the pandemic.
About the author.
Bruce Grant is an international child protection adviser and consultant, based in Sydney Australia. As a retired staff member of UNICEF, he has served as chief of child protection in some of the toughest development and humanitarian contexts in which UNICEF works. His work on justice for children’s issues is extensive. Prior to joining UNICEF, he was the Policy Coordinator for the New South Wales Department of Juvenile Justice. In 2002 he was awarded a Churchill Fellowship to travel to the UK, USA and Canada to conduct comparative analysis research on best practice programmes in juvenile justice. Churchill Fellowships are awarded to Australians striving for excellence. In 2020 he founded Child Protection in International Development, a website for sharing resources and generating and promoting new knowledge in child protection in international development. He currently writes a blog series titled, Child Protection in the Age of COVID-19.
