The Convention on the Rights of the Child Before the UN Treaty Bodies and the ICJ : ‘Taking into Account’ or Ignoring?

Today there are several entities – agencies, organs, bodies – of the United Nations implementing human rights. The purpose of this paper is to take stock and reflect on the presence and impact of the Convention on the Rights of the Child in the work of the systems of protection of human rights coordinated under the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, in particular before the so-called ‘Treaty Bodies’ and the Human Rights Council. A further section – given its general jurisdiction – is dedicated to the most important judicial organ of the UN: the International Court of Justice. This practice, notwithstanding some notable exceptions, shows that the Convention on the Rights of the Child is not taken into consideration in applying other treaties, even when rights of children are at stake. Twenty years after the work of the International Law Commission on fragmentation, a move toward coordinating the activities of the several bodies of the Office of the High Com-missioner for Human Rights has yet to be started.