Nigeria, 1 September 2010 - Nigeria has been elected into an eight-man Board of Directors to push for the adoption of convention of Youth Rights at the United Nations General Assembly session slated for September this year.The election was conducted at the just concluded Mexico World Youth Conference, according to a statement signed by the Chief Press Secretary of the Nigeria Ministry of Youth Development, Mr. Goddy Ewerem.The statement said Nigeria and South Africa represent Africa on the board of directors because of what delegates at the conference described as political commitment to youth development in both countries.He said Nigeria was elected alongside Spain, Mexico, Russia, South Af...

Sudan, 31 August 2010 - The United Nations agency charged with protecting the rights of children on Tuesday welcomed the launch of a programme by the Sudanese Government to end the use of child soldiers by the Sudan People's Liberation Army (SPLA).The formation of the child protection unit follows an action plan signed by the SPLA committing to release all children in its ranks by November 2010 and to end the exploitation of children as soldiers across southern Sudan.The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) hailed the development as a milestone for the rights of children in the country, where the SPLA and the National Congress Party (NCP) signed a peace accord in 2005 to end the long-runn...

20 August 2010, BRAZZAVILLE, Republic of Congo — As the Republic of Congo marked its 50th Anniversary of Independence today, it embarked on unprecedented steps to advance quickly in the areas of reproductive health and gender equity.On the eve of the Congolese Independence Day, President Denis Sassou Nguesso announced that henceforth emergency obstetric care, including Caesarean sections, would be free. He also said he would submit to Parliament a bill calling for equal access for women to political, administrative and elective positions. Both are major step forward in this middle-income country that nevertheless has a high rate of maternal mortality (781 deaths per 100,000 live births, ac...

Liberia, August 12, 2010 - President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf has submitted to the National Legislature for ratification, the African Youth Charter. According to an Executive Mansion release, the Charter was submitted on Monday, August 9, 2010. It outlines the rights, duties and responsibilities of African Youth and Member States of the African Union, and establishes a foundation upon which to build policies, programs, and actions for youth development in the Member States.The Youth Charter, among other objectives, aims at preserving basic rights afforded to Youth, which include the right of development, privacy, protection of family and property, freedoms of movement, expression, and associa...

South Africa has delivered on Goal 3 of the Millennium Development Goals calling for the elimination of gender disparity in primary and secondary education by 2015.According to Engendering Statistics, 2009: 2, the primary enrolment rates of girls about doubled in South Asia, Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East and North Africa, rising faster than boys' enrolment rates. This substantially reduced large gender gaps in schooling.Reflecting on the country and department's successes during an Inaugural Women's Legacy Dialogue on Friday, Basic Education Minister Angie Motshekga said research has shown that 98 percent of young people aged 7 to 15 are involved in education programmes."Youth liter...

For more information, please consult the source text in French below: La Journée internationale de la jeunesse, célébrée ce jeudi, marque aussi le lancement de l'Année internationale de la jeunesse, dont les thèmes sont le dialogue et la compréhension mutuelle. Pour le Secrétaire général de l'ONU, Ban Ki-moon, dans le contexte actuelle de crise internationale, il est en effet « essentiel que les jeunes apprennent à s'écouter avec attention, à sympathiser, à reconnaître l'existence d'opinions divergentes et à résoudre les conflits ».« Aujourd'hui, la situation sociale et économique difficile justifie amplement que l'on prête une attention spéciale à la jeunesse », a ...

The African Movement of Working Children and Youth (AMWCY) organized a GEM meeting with its partners from Save the Children Finland, ILO, ENDA TM, Plan, Terre des Hommes and UNICEF. The workshops’, discussions revolved around the programming of the project "Reducing exploitation of working children in West Africa”. For more information, please consult the source text in french....

28th July 2010, Kampala/ Johannesburg - Members of the African Union (AU) reaffirmed at the end of their meeting on 27 July in Kampala, Uganda, that they would strive to spend 15 percent of their national budgets on health, but at the end of the day it is about how "effectively and efficiently" you spend the money, not about how much.The promise to spend 15 percent on health was made in Abuja, Nigeria, in 2001, but health experts like Chikezie Anyanwu, Africa Advocacy Advisor to Save the Children, which works to promote children's rights, were left wondering whether the percentages actually made a difference.Countries could spend more than 15 percent and still show no real reduction in the d...

Nairobi, July 26th, 2010— Tens of thousands of children, some as young as four years old, are being accused of "crimes" of witchcraft in Africa, according to a new report, which examines the consequences for the societies they live in.Unicef's Children Accused of Witchcraft report which was released last week looks at a number of case studies across the East African region and in particular the recent killing of albino children in Tanzania.The media, and more recently Internet sites in various regions of Africa regularly report shocking figures on the number of violent acts against children, that are related to witchcraft.Unicef acknowledges that executions of alleged witches have reached ...

Kampala, July 26th, 2010 — Maternal and child deaths are killing more people across the continent than conflicts, the African Union revealed yesterday. More than 500,000 women a year die in childbirth across the globe, almost exclusively in developing countries in Africa. Another 12,000 children die on the continent every day, mainly from treatable conditions like malaria, pneumonia and respiratory tract infections.Speaking at the opening of the 15th ordinary summit of heads of state at the Commonwealth Resort in Munyonyo, Mr Jean Ping, the chairperson of the AU Commission told leaders at the summit that efforts to reduce both maternal and child health had been very slow."Africa's progres...