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<p>The UK is firmly committed to ending the recruitment and use of child soldiers
and to protecting all children affected by armed conflict.</p><p>To mark the International
Day against the Use of Child Soldiers (Red Hand Day), the UK took part in an UN Security
Council (UNSC) Arria meeting on protecting children in shrinking humanitarian spaces.
The UK called for better integration of the Children and Armed Conflict portfolio
into UNSC country specific discussions and for all states to sign up to the key international
commitments traversing this CAAC portfolio: the Paris Principles, the Vancouver Principles
and the Safe Schools Declaration. The UK also highlighted the importance of mainstreaming
child protection in peacekeeping missions and the need to consider whether denial
of humanitarian access should be a violation which triggers a listing in the Secretary-General's
annual report on CAAC. Sharing experiences on UK engagement on the CAAC agenda with
other states serves to open up the humanitarian space and understand how collaborative
engagement can strengthen the protection of children in armed conflict. Lord Ahmad
of Wimbledon also met youth participants in the newly launched World Vision campaign
'<em>It takes a World…to end violence against children</em>' to discuss their views
and recommendations for the UK government regarding children in armed forces and groups,
including how the UK can galvanise the international community to better support this
agenda.</p><p>The UK can see a strong case in principle for re-galvanising our approach
to reintegration and remains committed to supporting the valuable work of the SRSG's
office in this respect. The UK has shown its support for the SRSG's recently launched
Global Coalition for Reintegration (GCR) by joining the 'Friends of Reintegration'
group, a forum to generate new ideas for supporting reintegration programmes for children
formerly associated with armed groups and sharing best practice and lesson learnt
with key member states. The GCR is working to provide more reliable funding to ensure
higher quality, longer-term reintegration programming and prevention of re-recruitment
for all children formerly recruited and used by armed groups and forces. The UK has
confirmed that it will be increasing its funding to the office of the SRSG for CAAC
to £450,000 for FY19/20 to continue assisting the SRSG with her current mandate and
will be giving an additional £50,000 to fund extended activities pertaining to the
GCR.</p>
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