{"id":27647,"date":"2016-03-24T12:00:07","date_gmt":"2016-03-24T15:00:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.rioonwatch.org\/?p=27647"},"modified":"2016-03-28T07:48:36","modified_gmt":"2016-03-28T10:48:36","slug":"street-children-demand-respect-for-human-rights-before-rio-2016-olympics","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/?p=27647","title":{"rendered":"Street Children Demand Respect for Human Rights Before Rio 2016 Olympics"},"content":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas\"\"<\/em><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWhere are my rights?\u201d Luana,* 17, asked at the General Assembly for Street Children. \u201cThe whole time that I\u2019ve been out in the streets, I haven\u2019t been able to see any respect to my rights…\u00a0I\u2019m not talking about only my own rights, but the rights of all of those who are out in the streets.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Assembly, which took place on Friday, March 18 at the Copacabana Palace Hotel, was part of a week-long campaign launch by\u00a0international NGOs Street Child United<\/a> and Terre des Hommes<\/a> between March 14 and 20.\u00a0The campaign, led by former street children and grassroots NGOs in nine countries, asserts the human rights<\/a> of street children and advocates the need for special protection in the lead-up to mega-sporting events.<\/p>\n

Research from Terre des Hommes’ campaign Children Win<\/a> demonstrates that street children face an increased risk<\/a> of human rights violations as host cities prepare to host mega-events<\/a>, including forced evictions<\/a>\u00a0in communities such as Vila Aut\u00f3dromo<\/a> and Favela do Metr\u00f4<\/a>\u00a0ahead of Rio’s Games. The report also examines Rio’s\u00a0\u2018street cleaning,\u2019 or ‘social cleansing,’ operations that placed street youths\u00a0like\u00a0Luana in juvenile detention centers before the 2014 FIFA World Cup.<\/p>\n

\u201cI suffered in this institution, and when I left this institution eventually, I wanted to give back to society…\u201d she told the audience at the General Assembly. \u201cSo, how can this happen?\u201d<\/p>\n

In addition to competing in Olympic-style events over the course of the week, Luana\u00a0and the other former street-connected children collaborated to write\u00a0an open letter to the International Olympic Committee (IOC) demanding that the rights of street children become a priority for mega-event host cities.<\/p>\n

The open letter, which forms part of a petition<\/a>, demands that IOC president Thomas Bach takes action to ensure that sports governing bodies work alongside national and local governments to \u201crespect and assure human rights\u201d in host cities.<\/p>\n

The former street children also proposed the \u2018Rio Resolution<\/a>,\u2019 a document asserting the human rights of children living or working on the streets. The Resolution primarily demands that street children\u2019s rights to education, legal identity and freedom from violence are respected and enforced globally.<\/p>\n

\u201cChildren have different needs to adults,\u201d Andrea Florence, Terre des Hommes\u2019 Strategic Alliance Officer, told RioOnWatch<\/em>. \u201cYou see a city in a different way when you see it from a child\u2019s perspective.<\/p>\n

\u201cChildren are more vulnerable<\/a>, and are seriously impacted by things like forced evictions,\u201d she continued. \u201cAs well as the rights to education, legal identity and freedom from violence, children also have the right to participation<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the proposal for the new upgrading plan<\/a> for Vila Aut\u00f3dromo, Eduardo Paes didn\u2019t consult with locals, much less with the children on their opinions on urban planning. From a child\u2019s rights perspective, he would need to talk to the kids and get their views on the proposal, in addition to (adult) locals.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

As well as ensuring marginalized youth\u2019s rights are respected by mega-events, Jo Clark, communications manager at Street Child United, argued that the Olympic Games should be inclusive of the wider host city.<\/p>\n

Speaking to RioOnWatch<\/em>, she said, \u201cWe chose to host our athletes in the favelas of Babil\u00f4nia<\/a> and Chap\u00e9u Mangueira<\/a> for two reasons.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirstly, it\u2019s convenient as the [Street Child] Games were hosted in Urca, and secondly as a statement of solidarity for communities that are excluded from\u00a0[mega-events].<\/p>\n

\u201cOur philosophy is about inclusivity and the Games are all about challenging negative perceptions of street children. A lot of the young people that are at risk on the streets in Rio come from or reside in favelas.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo host the athletes in [Babil\u00f4nia and Chap\u00e9u Manguiera] is a great statement about including marginalized people in the streets around the world as well as in Rio.\u201d<\/p>\n

The IOC has yet to publicly acknowledge the open letter and petition that resulted from the Street Child events, but\u00a0an email from the IOC\u00a0<\/em>affirmed\u00a0that\u00a0both the IOC and its chosen host cities are fully committed to “protecting\u00a0human rights for all Games-related matters and for all participants.” Rio’s Mayor’s office has since claimed it, too, is concerned with violations against kids.\u00a0On Wednesday March 23, the National Mayors’ Front in partnership with the Rio de Janeiro city government launched<\/a> the “Rio 2016 Olympics of Children’s Rights” with the aim of combating violations against children during the Summer Olympics. The project states that it will focus on the five most common areas of abuse during huge events of this kind: child sexual exploitation; child labor; use of alcohol and drugs; and lost and disappeared children.<\/p>\n

*This name has been changed to protect the\u00a0identity of the individual in question.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Clique aqui para Portugu\u00eas \u201cWhere are my rights?\u201d Luana,* 17, asked at the General Assembly for Street Children. \u201cThe whole time that I\u2019ve been out in the streets, I haven\u2019t been able to see any […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":103,"featured_media":27648,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1668,1736,1333,1329],"tags":[525,272,19,25,1259,197,5,152,301,1938,207,1017,4,259],"writer":[1956],"translator":[],"illustrator":[],"photographer":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-27647","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-participationwatch","8":"category-1736","9":"category-event-reports","10":"category-by-international-observers","11":"tag-chapeu-mangueira","12":"tag-mayor-eduardo-paes","13":"tag-favela-do-metro","14":"tag-human-rights","15":"tag-mega-events","16":"tag-morro-da-babilonia","17":"tag-olympics","18":"tag-participation","19":"tag-public-policy","20":"tag-rio-2016","21":"tag-sports","22":"tag-childrens-rights","23":"tag-vila-autodromo","24":"tag-youth","25":"writer-ciara-long"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27647","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/103"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=27647"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27647\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/27648"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=27647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=27647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=27647"},{"taxonomy":"writer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fwriter&post=27647"},{"taxonomy":"translator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftranslator&post=27647"},{"taxonomy":"illustrator","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fillustrator&post=27647"},{"taxonomy":"photographer","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/rioonwatch.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fphotographer&post=27647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}