Plan to remove Roma children from their families in Slovakia
The Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said on Monday that the government proposes a system, in which Romani children will be taken from settlements and be placed in boarding schools. The fact that some Romani families living in settlements – as other families in Slovakia – experience challenges to supporting the education of children because of poverty, language barriers and other factors, highlights the need for government to provide support and assistance to all to overcome such barriers. "Isolated from the outside world, Romani children will find it more difficult to fully participate in Slovak society," Halya Gowan, director of Amnesty International's Europe and Central Asia programme, said. "Rather than establishing another parallel system of separate education for children based on their ethnicity, it is necessary that the Slovak government focus its efforts towards ensuring that mainstream schools include all children regardless of the social background, language or other abilities," Halya Gowan said. Amnesty International has called on the Slovak government to address the core of the problem – persisting segregation of Romani children in education which should be overcome by reforms to the education system to ensure truly inclusive education for all children. (Amnesty International, March 9)

Investigate massacre, step up patrols in Nigeria
Nigeria's acting president should make sure that the massacre of at least 200 Christian villagers in central Nigeria on 7 March 2010, is thoroughly and promptly investigated and that those responsible are prosecuted, said Human Rights Watch. The latest killings in Nigeria's restive Plateau State took place in the early morning hours of 7 March, when groups of men armed with guns, machetes, and knives attacked residents of the villages of Dogo Nahawa, Zot, and Ratsat, 10 kilometres south of Jos, the capital of Plateau State. The dead included scores of women and children. Witnesses to the killings, community leaders from Jos, and journalists who visited the villages told Human Rights Watch that they saw bodies, including corpses of young children and babies, inside houses, strewn around the streets, and in the pathways leading out of the villages. A Christian leader who participated today in a mass burial of 67 bodies in Dogo Nahawa said that about 375 people are dead or still missing. These attacks we see as reprisal attacks from the crisis in January," the Plateau State police spokesperson, Mohammed Lerama, told Human Rights Watch. According to official police figures, the police have so far arrested 98 people in connection with the attacks. (Human Rights Watch, March 9)

Inter-American Commission condemns repression against activists and their children in Honduras
The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) has condemned the murders of three people in Honduras last month who had actively opposed, or were related to people who opposed, last year's coup d'etat. It has also deplored the kidnappings, arbitrary detentions, acts of torture, sexual violence, and illegal raids to which members of the resistance have been subjected. The Commission has recently received information indicating that the children of activists are being threatened and harassed, and, in two cases, killed, as a strategy to silence opponents. In one such instance, 17-year-old Dara Gudiel was found hanged in the city of Danlí. She was the daughter of journalist Enrique Gudiel, who runs a radio programme called “Siempre al Frente con el Frente,” which broadcasts information about the resistance. These events are taking place in a context of grave harassment directed against active members of the resistance in Honduras. More than 50 detentions, eight cases of torture, two kidnappings, two rapes, and one raid have been reported by members of the resistance in the last month. (Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, March 9)

Poverty pushes Bosasso children on to streets in Somalia
A long civil war, frequent droughts, unemployment and high food prices have led to an increase in the number of street children in Bosasso, the commercial capital of Somalia’s self-declared autonomous region of Puntland, with NGOs and government officials calling for urgent steps to resolve the problem. Between 4,500 and 5,500 children are on Bosasso's streets, according to the governor. The children, according to Abdihakim Farah Arush, chairman of the Bari Child Protection Network (BCPN), fall into two categories: those who work to help their families, mostly local and internally displaced who go home at night; as well as those who sleep on the street, mostly substance abusers. The reasons for the children being on the street vary, he said. Many of those from south-central Somalia were separated from their families on their way north while others end up on the streets to help their families, or fend for themselves. Arush said while most street children were boys, more and more girls were joining them, cleaning business premises or people’s homes. Some children as young as two or three were put on the streets to beg by desperate families. Governor Ghele said the authorities had identified a site to build a home for the children but did not have the financial resources to build and operate it. (IRIN News, March 8)

Vulnerable children benefit from child-friendly schools in Mozambique
In Mozambique, the effects of AIDS, poverty and food insecurity have eroded the traditional support system provided by families and communities, giving rise to a rapid increase in the number of orphaned and vulnerable children. There are an estimated 1.4 million orphans in the country, including some 400,000 who have lost parents to AIDS. Responding to these challenges, the Child-Friendly Schools Initiative aims to improve the quality of education in primary schools through the implementation of an integrated package of school interventions and quality standards. The initiative is benefiting approximately 750 schools and over 300,000 school-age children. In this context, schools have become entry points for delivering a range of essential basic services. The package of school interventions covers five main focus areas: education; water, sanitation and hygiene; health; protection of vulnerable children; and community participation. The initiative promotes caring for the physical, psychological and emotional well-being of every child, with special attention to vulnerable children and girls. In collaboration with local health authorities, the child-friendly schools facilitate access to primary health care. Mobile health units come to the schools regularly to provide vaccinations, de-worming and nutritional screening. (UNICEF, March 1)