UNITED NATIONS INTERNATIONAL CHILDREN’S EMERGENCY FUND

PANORAMA MUN 2020

BackgroundPresident: Gerardo Alderete Casillas Email: 38569@salleleon.edu.mx

Committee It is an organization of the United Nations whose main purpose is to protect the rights of every child in the world, safeguard the well-being of all infants and improve their living circumstances so as to provide them with an optimal development.

Based in New York, UNICEF was created in 1946 to provide relief to children in countries devastated by World War II; Being its current president Gustavo Suárez Pertierra since 2018, the organization remains helping children from every origin.

Functions The function of this fund is to collaborate with allies of the United Nations so as to use the power of the media and social networks to achieve positive changes in the children´s lives, as well as their communities.   Similarly, UNICEF is to promote the protection of the children rights, with an eye to help them to meet their basic needs and to increase the opportunities offered to them so that they can fully reach their true potential.

Topics Topic A: Measures to fight child abduction in Latin American countries for labor

exploitation.

Topic B: Prevention of Xenophobic attacks in European countries towards young

people of Islamic origin.

Topic C: Action to prevent school shootings in North America.

UNITED NATIONS INTERNATIONAL CHILDREN’S EMERGENCY FUND

Topic A: Measures to fight child abductions in Latin American countries for labor exploitation.

Kidnapping is generally understood as ‘the arbitrary limitation, unjustified and illegal, of personal freedom through activities of retention, seizure, hiding and/or withdrawal’. Nowadays, kidnappings have more than one purpose; however, a considerable part of these is for labor exploitation.

Child labor has been reduced considerably in Latin America, nevertheless, 5,7 million children are still working in precarious, high-risk and unpaid situations. Mexico is one of the countries with the highest levels of labor exploitation for minors in sectors such as agriculture, maquiladoras and assembly plants for exports. In a country with 122 million people, 2,5 million children are working about 48 hours and earning between 20 and 40 dollars and inhaling psycho-addictive substances to tolerate workloads.

Also, a study by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE), published in 2017, found that of the 1,8 million children between the ages of 5 and 17 who work, 54,4 percent were forced to do so. While in Colombia, children under 4-year-old are exploited in sectors of agriculture, industry and production of various materials, not to mention services such as street work, product sales, domestic work, among others.

According to the article 16 of the Convention on the Rights of Child, “no child shall be subjected to arbitrary or unlawful interference with his or her privacy, family, home or correspondence, nor to unlawful attacks on his or her honor and reputation.” the search for prompt and viable solutions is necessary, in this case, the article 19 indicates that “States Parties shall take all appropriate legislative, administrative, social and educational measures to protect the child from all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse, while in the care of parent(s), legal guardian(s) or any other person who has the care of the child.”

According to this information, is very important the prompt resolution of the problem in order to reduce labor abuse and give the quality of life that infant deserve, considering the high rates of labor exploitation each country must take appropriate actions and promote children rights.

Guide questions

1. How countries from other continents can intervene in the search for solutions for the topic? 2. How the topic affects countries outside of America? 3. What facts within the affected countries lead to the need to employ minors? 4. How could the delegation work with governments to find solutions? 5. How does a country's economy affect the deplorable situations in which children are exploited?

Topic B: Prevention of Xenophobic attacks in European countries towards young people of Islamic origin

Xenophobic attacks are dreadful problems around the world, being these issues awfully common in European Countries. Among others, discrimination towards people from Islamic Origin is one of the main reasons for these crimes in Europe.

Xenophobic comments made by European inhabitants, in addition to the ones made by political representatives towards people of Islamic origin is rather an alarming problem, since the moral integrity of the infants is damaged, resulting these in physical aggressions and in this way affect and violate the children rights; Those practices are called Islamophobia. As a result of the xenophobic attacks the Islamic population deserves to be treated in the most respectful way.

UNICEF aims to safeguard the welfare and care of the rights established in the Declaration of the Rights of the Child, which are violated by xenophobic attacks in the moment that these are performed.

This statement establishes in the principle four that every child must enjoy the benefits of social security, being this clearly not respected, preventing an optimal development.

Therefore, every country must seek the necessary measures to prevent these attacks from being performed and give Islamic children the importance they deserve, without affecting and neglecting the sovereignty of each of the European nations, while trying to address this problem in a diplomatic way, avoiding attacks between nations.

Guide Questions

1. How should representatives act against the attacks spilled by European countries?

2. What solutions would your delegation recommend taking into account the fact that each country enjoys its own ideologies?

3. What articles of the Declaration of the Rights of the Child are not respected?

4. Which circumstances have originated the problem?

Topic C: Actions to prevent school shootings in North America.

A school shooting is an attack at an educational institution, such as a primary school, secondary school, or university, involving the use of firearms. Many school shootings are also categorized as mass shootings due to multiple casualties.

This phenomenon is mainly seen in the United States of America, which has the highest number of school-related shootings, notwithstanding, school shootings have taken place in many countries across the world. In 2019 there were 434 mass shootings. This averaged 1.19 mass shootings per day.

There were more mass shootings across the U.S. in 2019 than there were days in the year, according to a gun violence research group. According to studies, factors behind school shooting include family dysfunction, lack of family supervision, mental illness among many other psychological issues.

Among the topmost motives of attackers were bullying/persecution/threatened (75%) and revenge (61%), while 54% reported having numerous reasons. The remaining motives included an attempt to solve a problem (34%), suicide or depression (27%), and seeking attention or recognition (24%).

This topic is complicated to solve since in the United States, carrying weapons is allowed and access to them is very easy, therefore, nations will have to see how to reduce the rates of attacks in schools without violating the sovereignty of other nations and respecting people's rights.

Guide questions

1. What leads children to begin a school shooting? 2. Has your country done something against school shootings? 3. What could prevent children for practicing it? 4. What is your delegation willing to provide for the damaged countries? 5. Has your delegation been suffering from this problem?

References

Official committee website: https://www.unicef.org/es

● Topic A

Child Slavery Refuses to Disappear in Latin America. (2019, December 20). Retrieved from http://www.ipsnews.net/2018/05/child-slavery-refuses-disappear-latin-america/

Child Labour. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.ilo.org/global/topics/child-labour/lang--en/index.htm

Findings on the Worst Forms of Child Labor - Colombia. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://www.dol.gov/agencies/ilab/resources/reports/child-labor/colombia

Pax Christi Netherlands, M. Moor, L. Zumpolle. (November 2001). Kidnapping in a global context. The kidnap industry in Colombia

● Topic B

Steven T. . (2003). DECLARATION OF THE RIGHTS OF THE CHILD . January 05, 2019, de UMPOD Retrieved From: https://www.umpod.cz/fi leadmin/user_upload/Pravni_predpisy_AJ/declaration_child1959.pdf

European Islamophobia. (n.d.). 2018 EUROPEAN ISLAMOPHOBIA REPORT. January 05, 2019, European Islamophobia Retrieved From: http://www.islamophobiaeurope.com/

Rebecca A.. (2017). Islamophobia. January 05, 2019, American Physichological Association Retrieved From: https://www.apa.org/monitor/2017/04/islamophobia

Giacomo Pirozzi. (2018). French full-body veil ban, violated women’s freedom of religion: UN Human Rights Committee. 2019, January 17, de UN News From: https://news.un.org/en/story/2018/10/1023872

• Topic C

By Associated Press . (n.d.). US Mass Killings Hit New High in 2019; Most Were Shootings. Retrieved January 11, 2020, from https://www.voanews.com/usa/us-mass-killings-hit-new-high-2019-most-were-shootings

BBC. (2019, November 16). Students killed in California school shooting. Retrieved January 11, 2020, from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50422956

BBC News. (2019, December 29). US sees highest number of mass killings on record. Retrieved January 11, 2020, from https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50936575

Bosman, J. (2019, December 20). List of School Shootings in 2019. Retrieved January 11, 2020, from https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/14/us/school-shootings-list.html

Walker, E. C. W. A. C. (2019, November 19). School shootings list 2019. Retrieved January 11, 2020, from https://edition.cnn.com/2019/11/15/us/2019-us-school-shootings-trnd/index.html

Young, K. C. B. (2020, January 10). Rise in mass shootings leads to “rapid growth” in active shooter insurance. Retrieved January 11, 2020, from https://www.cnbc.com/2020/01/10/rise-in-mass-shootings-boosts-active-shooter-insurance.html