Children and Armed Conflict - Security Council, 10251st meeting

The 10,251st meeting of the Security Council is called to order. The provisional agenda for this meeting is children and armed conflict. The agenda is adopted. In accordance with rule 39 of the Council's provisional rules of procedure, I invite the following briefers to participate in this meeting: Ms. Vanessa Frazier, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict; Ms. Catherine Russell, Executive Director, United Nations Children's Fund; Ms. Jainaba Jagne, African Union Special Envoy for Children Affected by Armed Conflict; and Ms. Bethany Ellis, Director, Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict. It is so decided. The Security Council will now begin its consideration of item 2 of the agenda. I wish to draw the attention of Council members to document S/2026/826, letter dated 13 October 2026 from the Permanent Representative of Greece to the United Nations, addressed to the Secretary-General. I now give the floor to Ms. Vanessa Frazier.

Thank you, Mr. President. Excellencies, distinguished colleagues, For a child caught in armed conflict, the test of three decades of international commitments, including this Council’s resolutions, is whether these commitments change what happens next: whether monitors can reach children; whether they are recruited or released; whether they can return to school; and whether anyone is held to account when they are harmed. These are the tests we should put before ourselves today. Graca Machel’s 1996 report placed the experiences and rights of children at the centre of the international response to armed conflict. Successive Special Representatives have carried that work forward, bringing verified evidence before the Security Council, engaging parties, and pressing for changes in their conduct. The Convention on the Rights of the Child, its Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, and international humanitarian law instruments remain indispensable in guiding our collective efforts to prevent grave violations against children, ensure accountability, and uphold the rights and dignity of every child caught in situations of armed conflict. Over the past three decades, this combination of legal frameworks, sustained advocacy, and engagement with parties to conflict has produced concrete results. More than 40 action plans have been signed to date with parties to conflict, contributing to the release of over 220,000 children from armed forces and groups, and their transfer to civilian child protection actors. more than 220,000 children. Please think about that number. Each one is a life. That figure alone speaks to the impact of this mandate, but its contribution extends beyond release. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, implementation of the action plan helped put measures in place to end and prevent the recruitment and use of children by national armed forces. In Nigeria, More than 2,000 children formerly associated with the Civilian Joint Task Force were formally separated and received reintegration support. In Colombia, a national program has supported thousands of children leaving armed groups to rebuild their lives in civilian communities. In some cases, verified implementation has also enabled parties to be delisted from the annexes of the Secretary General's annual report. Again, here, these are not just words. They represent commitments made with the UN and implemented. They represent children given a second chance in life, families reunited, and communities beginning to heal. Ultimately, they are the building blocks of lasting and sustainable peace. These are no small achievements in a climate where even principled engagement can be contested. Each action plan requires continued engagement, careful verification, and practical follow-through. These show that persistent diplomacy, grounded in credible evidence, can change parties' conduct and children's lives. The impact of the mandate extends beyond action plans. The Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism provides a credible, United Nations-verified picture of grave violations that helps identify patterns and emerging risks. Its findings have supported accountability efforts and informed consideration of targeted measures, including sanctions. Through advocacy and technical engagement with national authorities, the Office has also supported legal and policy changes including measures to criminalise recruitment and use, protect schools from attacks, and ensure children born in captivity can be registered. National legislation and policy also show how these commitments can be put into practice. For instance, in the Philippines, the Department of Education has adopted a national policy framework on learners and schools as zones of peace. The Office contributes CAC analysis to national review processes, including the Universal Periodic Review and Voluntary National Reviews. Furthermore, over the years, more than 10 country situations have been removed from the Secretary-General’s reporting following an assessment that conditions changed and child protection concerns were addressed. Continued monitoring and follow-through remains essential to sustaining these gains. President, the scale of current violations remains stark. In 2025, the UN verified 38,558 grave violations, affecting 24,174 children. This is the highest number of children affected since the mandate was established. For the first time in the mandate’s history, Government forces were responsible for the majority of verified grave violations. This is deeply troubling. I condemn all grave violations against children, in every situation and every conflict, irrespective of who commits them. International humanitarian law and international human rights law bind all parties to an armed conflict. No party is exempt from its duty to protect children or from scrutiny when violations are committed. Over the past three decades, the Security Council has adopted 15 resolutions on children and armed conflict, establishing a strong framework that responds to both existing and emerging challenges. Resolution 2832, adopted unanimously just last week, adds to this body of work. I congratulate Greece on its leadership and thank Council members for their support. Member States have reinforced this robust framework through additional commitments such as the Paris and Vancouver Principles and the Safe Schools and OEWPA Declarations. The Office has also developed child protection guidance for European Union and NATO operations, works with regional organizations to strengthen protection efforts, and trains government officials, human rights practitioners, civil society, military personnel, and mediators. The Office has also contributed child protection expertise to legal, international, and policy processes, including the ongoing work on a convention on crimes against humanity. The groups of friends on children and armed conflict also help maintain political attention and support implementation. Through my office's Prove It Matters campaign, member states can reaffirm their commitment to child protection and the Convention on the Rights of the Child. I encourage those who have not yet done so to join the campaign and translate their support into action for children affected by armed conflict. President, Since taking up this post, I have pursued a field-focused approach, grounded in dialogue, diplomacy, and action. I have so far undertaken missions to various situations and countries, including the Syrian Arab Republic, Lebanon, Haiti, Ukraine, and the Russian Federation. Missions and engagement with various Member States have been directed towards securing access, commitment, and practical protection for children. I intend to continue these efforts in the period ahead. My Office has also issued supplementary analysis of the drivers and trends behind grave violations to support earlier and more effective action. Regional cooperation is equally important. I value my close work with the African Union Special Envoy for children affected by armed conflict, who is also briefing the Council today. In Cameroon, my office's efforts at a regional conference led to the technical endorsement of the Yaoundé Strategy, the first regional strategy for preventing violations against children in armed conflict in Central Africa. We intend to build on this progress and encourage similar efforts elsewhere. Field engagement brings us closer to children's realities. Dialogue and diplomacy can open doors. Our responsibility is to use those openings to secure change. Engagement must never be a substitute for action. As we mark this anniversary, I urge the Council and Member States to focus on four priorities. First, ensure that verified information leads to action. Parties to conflict must allow monitors to work safely and without obstruction. When violations are documented, Member States should press for specific steps to end them, protect children, and hold perpetrators accountable. The UN's efforts to monitor and respond to grave violations gives these children something priceless: visibility, protection, and the promise that the world has not forgotten them. Second, translate existing commitments into practice. Parties to conflict must protect schools from attack and refrain from using them for military purposes. States that have endorsed the Safe Schools Declaration and the Political Declaration on the Use of Explosive Weapons in Populated Areas should implement their commitments through national policies, military guidance, and operational procedures that reduce harm to children. They should also strengthen efforts to prevent recruitment and support children's release and reintegration. Third, preserve council unity and make full use of the council's toolkit. This framework has an impact only when council members apply it consistently across situations and follow through on their decisions. I urge members to keep the CAC Working Group's work moving, adopt timely and practical conclusions, and maintain sustained engagement with parties. The Council's voice carries weight when it speaks in unity and acts on its decisions. Fourth, sustain prevention, protection, and reintegration. Prevention depends on early action, capable child protection services, and reliable support for monitoring and reintegration. Member States should sustain that work at local, national, and regional levels. Children should also be heard safely and meaningfully in decisions about their protection and future. President, I also acknowledge UNICEF, UN Peace Operations and other UN entities contributing in the implementation of the CAC mandate, Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict, and the civil society organizations, national partners and child protection colleagues who work alongside children and communities, often in difficult and dangerous conditions. Their knowledge, access, and persistence are essential to monitoring violations, preventing harm, and helping children recover. They must be able to carry out this work safely and with the support it requires. Shockingly, 136 UN personnel, civilian and uniformed, and 350 humanitarian workers died in 2025. This is unacceptable. Thirty years of work have produced practical tools and measurable gains. Yet, the continued scale of violations shows that the Council, Member States, and parties to conflict must do more to protect children. These four priorities require more than consensus in this chamber. They require sustained political commitment. Protecting children is a global responsibility. Let us work together, in unison, for a world where justice, safety, and dignity for children are not privileges, but guarantees. Political commitment must also be matched by resources. I thank Member States and partners whose voluntary contributions support this mandate and call for predictable, flexible, multi-year funding to sustain monitoring, prevention, and reintegration. I remain fully committed, with energy and resolve, to working with all of you, Member States, parties to conflict, regional organizations, civil society, and children themselves, to deliver on the mandate entrusted to me. I close with the words of a child who participated in the Prove It Matters campaign, who told us: “War took both of my parents from me and left my childhood incomplete. No child should ever experience the pain I have lived through. Let us build our future not on loss, but on peace and compassion. Mr. President, every day, i think of the children who wake up to conflict instead of classrooms, to fear instead of futures. This must change. Collective action can change this. Let us prove, through our actions, that children's safety, dignity, and future truly matter. 30 years from now, children must be safer because we acted today. I am ready to do my part. I ask this council to do its part too. Use every tool at its disposal to protect children. Thank you.

I thank Ms. Fraser for her briefing. I now give the floor to Ms. Catherine Russell.

Mr. President, Excellencies, distinguished colleagues, good morning. Thank you to Greece for convening this important meeting and to colleagues for their remarks and their critical leadership here today. Thirty years ago, Graca Machel's landmark report on the impact of armed conflict on children confronted the international community with a devastating truth: Children were not simply caught in the crossfire of war. They were being deliberately targeted, recruited, and exploited, deprived of the protection that they deserved. The report helped transform how the world understood the consequences of armed conflict for children, and it laid the foundation for the Children and Armed Conflict agenda we recognize today. Over the past three decades, that agenda has helped place the protection of children at the heart of international peace and security. We've established mechanisms to monitor and verify grave violations against children. We've strengthened accountability, and we've created opportunities for direct engagement with parties to conflict. And we have seen what sustained political commitment can achieve. More than 40 action plans have been signed with parties to conflict, and more than 220,000 children have been released from armed forces and armed groups, giving them the opportunity to rebuild their lives. Behind these achievements are children reunited with their families, returning to school, and reclaiming their futures. But 30 years on, we face a deeply troubling paradox. While the international community has built a strong framework to protect children in war, the reality of children living through conflict is increasingly dangerous. As the Special Representative said, since 2005, the United Nations has verified more than 430,000 grave violations against children in armed conflict. More than 38,000 were in 2025 alone. Last year, the highest number of grave violations were verified in the State of Palestine, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and Nigeria. And these are only the violations the United Nations was able to verify. The true scale is undoubtedly greater. These figures represent children killed and maimed, children recruited into armed groups, children subjected to sexual violence, abducted from their communities, and denied the humanitarian assistance they desperately need. Increasingly, children are suffering multiple violations, compounding the physical and psychological harm they endure. During my visit to Sudan last December, I met a girl named Nahed. She was just 16 when the war broke out. Her family fled Khartoum seeking safety, but unfortunately, the war followed them. Armed men attacked the village where they had taken refuge. Her grandfather and uncle were killed. Girls were raped and abducted. Na had managed to escape, but the terror of what she witnessed remained with her. Her story is a devastating reminder that behind every violation is a child whose life may never be the same. Excellencies, at the very moment children most need protection, our ability to reach them is being undermined. Since 2005, the United Nations has verified more than 44,000 incidents of denial of humanitarian access, including more than 8,000 in 2025 alone. These are not simply obstacles to humanitarian operations. They mean children going without lifesaving healthcare, families unable to access safe water or essential supplies. excuse me, children cut off from education and the vital services they need. Humanitarian workers and facilities are also coming under attack, placing both those delivering assistance and the children who depend on that assistance at greater risk. In many conflict settings, we are witnessing deeply concerning patterns in the conduct of hostilities. In 2025, government forces were responsible for the majority of verified grave violations against children, including killing and maiming, attacks on schools and hospitals, and denial of humanitarian access. The widespread use of explosive weapons in populated areas continues to incur devastating consequences for children. And more than 70% of verified child casualties in 2025 were caused by explosive weapons. These weapons do not only kill and injure children, they destroy schools, hospitals, water systems, and other infrastructure essential to children's survival and development. And the consequences can last long after the fighting stopped. At the same time, emerging technologies are creating new threats. The growing use of artificial intelligence and weaponry, including for targeting, raises serious concerns about the conduct of warfare and the protection of children. Armed drones are increasingly being used in conflict zones, creating terrible threats for children's lives and leaving families living in constant fear. Digital technologies are also creating new avenues for recruitment, exploitation, and abuse. The Security Council's recent adoption of Resolution 2832, addressing the impact of digital technologies on violations against children in armed conflict, is a welcome step towards confronting these risks. Advances in technology must strengthen the protection of children, not expose them to new forms of harm. Excellencies, these trends are deeply alarming, but they are not inevitable. Three decades of experience have shown us that progress is possible when political will is matched by sustained engagement and concrete action by member states. And I've seen firsthand what that support can mean. During my visit to South Sudan in December, I met women and girls who had experienced terrible violence. Two survivors told me they had contemplated taking their own lives before receiving support at a UNICEF-supported center. They described how counseling and peer support had become a lifeline for them. Their experiences remind us that protection is not only about preventing violations; it’s also about helping survivors recover, restoring their dignity, and giving people hope for the future. Yet more than one-third of UNICEF-supported safe spaces for women and children in South Sudan closed last year because of funding cuts. We know what works, but we must have commitment and resources to sustain it. As we mark this anniversary, UNICEF has three calls to action. First, all parties to conflict must cease and prevent grave violations against children and fully respect their obligations under international law. without exception. Member states with influence over parties to conflict must use that influence. Diplomatic engagement, political pressure, and other available tools must be directed towards changing behavior and protecting children. Our commitment to protect children must be firm in every conflict and with all parties. Second, we must protect and strengthen the Children and Armed Conflict framework itself. This means sustained support the monitoring and reporting mechanism, the country task forces on monitoring and reporting, and the implementation of action plans with parties listed in the Secretary General's annual report. It also means continued political engagement, including through the Group of Friends on Children and Armed Conflict. These mechanisms help turn international commitments into concrete protection for children. They depend on political support and resources, yet funding for humanitarian assistance and protection for children affected by armed conflict remains minuscule compared to global military spending. This imbalance reflects choices, and these choices have consequences for children. Third is a plea on behalf of the millions of children who are trapped in conflicts around the world. We must redouble our efforts to prevent and resolve the wars that are devastating children's lives. Humanitarian assistance saves lives. Child protection mechanisms can help prevent violations and support survivors, but neither can substitute for political solutions to conflict. Political actors must provide sustained diplomacy, inclusive peace processes, and durable agreements that place children's rights and protection at their center. Excellencies, 30 years ago, the international community recognized that the suffering of children in war could no longer be treated as an unavoidable consequence of conflict. That recognition helped build a framework that has changed hundreds of thousands of lives. But the children caught in today's conflicts cannot wait another 30 years for the protection they have been promised. We must act, and we must act now. Thank you very much.

I thank Ms. Russell for her briefing. I now give the floor to Ms. Jainath Ajan.

Mr. President, Excellencies, I thank Greece for convening this briefing. Thirty years after the landmark Grasse-Michel report and of the CAC mandate, essential protective tools have been established. Their effectiveness, though, still depends on sustained political engagement national implementation, and greater accountability. This emphasis reflects the acknowledgment that while there has been noticeable progress in building relevant regional and global partnerships, and in consolidating shared values to improve the welfare of children affected by armed conflict, many still endure profound hardship. Therefore, this session reflects the Clarion commitment to shared stance that diminishing support for global norms and human rights will not undermine strategic global efforts to provide needed solutions to children who have been unjustly affected by armed conflicts. Mr. President, on advancing the agenda within the African Union, my appointment in February 2026 And the standalone child protection pillar in the AU's revised post-conflict reconstruction and development policy are epochal developments that clearly demonstrate the AU's growing institutional commitment to progressive, proactive measures across its diplomatic and security approach. Our advocacy for the Safe Schools Declaration, education in emergencies, and child-sensitive early warning aligns this commitment with prevention and recovery. In this regard, complementarity between the AU Special Envoy and the UN Special Representative is essential. I thank SRSG Vanessa Frazier for consistently initiating joint efforts with me to address the plight of children, advance the armed conflict agenda, and strengthen our collective response. UN monitoring, reporting, and engagement with parties should support the preventative and multi-stakeholder participatory strategic toolkits at our disposal. alongside the AU political engagement, regional coordination, and follow-up mechanisms focused on proactively addressing children's welfare. Despite underfunding constraints and competing priorities, the UN and the AU should support the implementation of the action plan and protect frontline capacity, as outlined in the communique resulting from dialogue between the AU Commission and the UN Secretariat, as well as between the AU Peace and Security Council and this Council. I also encourage closer exchanges between the Security Council Working Group on Armed Conflict and Children and relevant AU mechanisms, including consideration of field visits in consultation with the countries concerned. Mr. President, I had the honor of leading a mission to Borno State in the Federal Republic of Nigeria as part of my advocacy agenda. My delegation engaged with relevant stakeholders on their progressive initiatives to provide appropriate solutions to children affected by complex security developments. We visited Bulamkoti Interim Care Centre and Mona Vocational Centre, where conflict-affected children receive support through education and vocational training. These needs-focused interventions offer credible pathways to recovery and should be complemented by sustained mental health and psychosocial support, community acceptance, and opportunities beyond the centers. This innovative national support model also requires concerted attention and strategic partnerships, including those with the AU and the UN. It should continue to underscore the importance of continuity in children's education. More robust efforts are needed to address bottlenecks in birth registration, lost documentation, and cross-border differences in language and curricula. Reintegration must include flexible enrollments and accelerated learning aligned with recognized education pathways. Mr. President, on responding to evolving protection risks. At the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child's Day of General Discussion on 14th October, My message was clear: safe digital learning must advance alongside protection from recruitment and exploitation. The information technology space should not be another frontier where the welfare of children in conflict situations is further eroded. I therefore encourage global stakeholders to expedite the development of an agreed, enforceable value system for creating and deploying information technology systems and platforms. On that note, Mr. President, I congratulate Greece on the adoption of Security Council Resolution 2832/2026. The AU, too, has taken commendable steps to address the potential misuse of information technologies against children. Adopting the AU Model Law on Child Online Safety lays a foundation for stronger national action. Member States must collectively engage big tech, telecommunications providers, and other stakeholders through a business and human rights approach that requires child rights due diligence, safety by design, and access to remedy. The ability of actors to funnel harmful content to children through dark encrypted channels, which makes detection and investigation more difficult, should be eliminated. In African conflict settings, these technologies can amplify recruitment, exploitation, and other grave violations. As I stressed during the Council's June 2026 open debate, our response must address both the risks and opportunities. This requires law enforcement to continually develop specialized skills to keep pace with rapid developments in modern information technology. Child exploitation in extractive industries within war and survival economies also warrants greater attention. Prevention requires scrutiny of business conduct and supply chains, along with accountability for those who exploit children. Mr. President, on ensuring children influence decisions. Whilst in Borno State, I attended a children's parliament session in Maiduguri. Such standing mechanisms provide a sustainable foundation for participation when they're inclusive, adequately resourced, and safeguarded. I end with a message from one of the child parliamentarians, Honorable Fatima Ali Mulla. I quote, "Include children's voices. Create opportunities for children to contribute to decisions affecting their safety, well-being, and future. Ensure accountability and actions. Turn promises into practical measures and monitor progress to ensure children receive the protection and support they need." End quote. I urge Member States to sustain these mechanisms and ensure that children receive feedback on how their recommendations influence decisions. Excellencies, This anniversary must serve as a reminder to all of us that our ultimate responsibility is to ensure that commitments made in this Council translate into meaningful change in the lives of children affected by armed conflict, particularly those whose voices often go unheard. I thank you. Merci.

I thank Ms. Jen for her briefing. I now give the floor to Ms. Bethany Ellis.

Thank you, Mr. President. On behalf of Watchlist on Children in Armed Conflict, I would like to thank Greece for hosting today's event to mark this significant anniversary for the CAC mandate. Excellencies, 30 years ago, civil society organizations were among the leading voices calling for the establishment of the CAC mandate and for the impact of armed conflicts on children to be systematically addressed by the Security Council. Child protection and child rights experts recognize the need for improved monitoring and reporting on violations against children, and for coordinated action to protect children in armed conflict at the highest political levels. In 2001, a group of these organizations together formed Watch List on Children and Armed Conflict. Over the next 25 years, our global NGO network has brought expertise, experience, and insights from civil society working on the ground in humanitarian settings, and when possible, from children themselves, to help shape, refine, progress, and push for implementation of the CAC agenda. We have continued to support and partnered with the CAC mandate, rooted in the conviction that its unique tools have the capacity to facilitate concrete action to protect children living in war. Already this morning, we have heard some of the results that have been achieved over the past 30 years: children released from armed groups and forces and receiving reintegration support; Action plans implemented, grave violations stopped, and parties removed from the annexes. Security Council working group conclusions adopted, with targeted recommendations and follow-up on action plan progress. Child protection capacity embedded in UN missions, handover protocols implemented, and peace agreements incorporating child protection provisions, to name a few. The CAC agenda has contributed to the development of a robust legal and normative framework, including through the 15 Security Council resolutions that most recently just brought through last week under Greece's leadership, complemented by commitments like the Paris Principles, the Safe Schools Declaration, the Vancouver Principles, and most recently, the political declaration on UHPA. The monitoring and reporting mechanism has provided reliable, systematically gathered and verified data on grave violations, alerting us to persistent perpetrators, and allowing us to more effectively target resources, make recommendations, and proactively take action towards prevention and accountability. Civil society organizations have been critical to implementation of the CAC agenda on the ground, contributing to documentation of and response to grave violations against children. running child-friendly spaces, providing humanitarian assistance, offering reintegration programming, undertaking case management, connecting children who have experienced violence with resources for their support and recovery, and working with communities and across sectors to strengthen the protective environment for children. Yet as we mark this important milestone for the mandate, the gains of the past 30 years and our collective ability to meet the growing protection needs faced by children in war are under serious pressure. UN monitors continue to verify record-breaking numbers of grave violations. Government forces have overtaken non-state armed groups as the primary threat to children. Armed conflicts continue unabated. International law, including special protections for children, is selectively applied, ignored, or blatantly disregarded by warring parties. Humanitarian aid is obstructed or denied, restricting children's access to essential services with consequences for their survival, recovery, growth, development, and long-term health and livelihood prospects. Fast-evolving weapons technology, including unmanned drones and artificial intelligence and autonomous weapons systems, are enabling faster and more frequent attacks while widening the distance between human decision-makers and the use of force. The use of explosive weapons in populated areas is disproportionately impacting children, who are as much as seven times more likely to die from blast injuries than adults, and who, if they survive, still face complex, long-term physical and mental health consequences. In the midst of all of this, impunity for grave violations is rampant, and the political will to address these threats appears insufficient. While children's protection needs continue to rise, resources to meet those needs are shrinking. the abrupt, severe, and continuing global funding cuts have not spared child protection actors. In addition to the strain on MRM and UN child protection capacity, civil society organizations have been severely impacted, with local country offices, programming staff, and community-based interventions particularly hard hit. Fewer children are receiving services. Mental health and psychosocial support, reintegration programmings, and case management have all faced cuts. And the child protection workforce is facing technical gaps, excessive workloads, and reduced specialized services. It is clear that urgent steps must be taken if we are to retain the progress made over the past three decades and genuinely turn our commitments into impact for children today. I offer three areas for action. First, defend and reinvest in what we already have that works. Reiterate supports for the CAC mandate, the MRM, the country task forces, child protection components in UN missions, and civil society child protection actors. Urge parties to develop, sign, and implement time-bound action plans and consistently follow up on progress. Rigorously defend civic space and humanitarian access, and back up commitments with resources, providing predictable, long-term funding across both UN and civil society actors, including local and community actors, at the scale needed to meet the challenges facing them. Second, impunity must become unacceptable, and accountability should be recognized as critical to preventing future violations. All parties must be held to the same standards when it comes to children, without exception. International humanitarian and human rights law must be upheld with swift investigations and meaning accountability for violations, including, when relevant, prosecution for war crimes, genocide, and crimes against humanity. Cooperation should be fostered with international investigative, justice, and accountability mechanisms, including the International Criminal Court, and dedicated child rights expertise should be systematically included in these mechanisms. Parties committing patterns of grave violations should be listed in the annexes of the Secretary General's report and only delisted when an action plan has been implemented and the violation has stopped. Finally, member states should evaluate their own national positions, policies, and relationships with party to conflict to ensure that they consistently align with and meaningfully reflect their CAC commitments. This means incorporating commitments made under the Paris Principles, the Safe Schools Declaration, the Vancouver Principles, and the Political Declaration on UAPA into relevant legislation, policy, military doctrine, protocols, and training. This means prioritizing funding for child protection, education, and mental health in humanitarian budgets. This means leveraging diplomatic relationships to urge the signing and implementation of action plans to end and prevent grave violations. And it means ending weapons transfers to parties violating international law and reevaluating favorable economic relationships with governments whose forces are listed for grave violations or who are directly supporting parties committing grave violations. The Children and Armed Conflict Mandate exists for a reason, and it isn't about numbers or statements. It's about the safety and well-being of children, children with names, friends, and dreams for their future. It's about the refusal to accept their suffering as an inevitable consequence of war. We owe them more than words. We owe them protection, accountability, a childhood without fear, and the opportunity to realize their rights in a peaceful future. I thank you.

I thank Ms. Hays for her briefing, and I shall now make a statement in my capacity as the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Hellenic Republic. First of all, I thank Vanessa Frazier, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict; Catherine Russell, Executive Director of UNICEF; Dainaba Jen, African Union Special Envoy for Children Affected by Armed Conflict, and Bethany Ellis, Director of Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict, for their insightful briefings. 30 years ago, the landmark report presented by Graca Machel to the United Nations General Assembly set light on the devastating consequences of war for children. It also established a compelling mandate: The protection of children must be central to conflict prevention, peacebuilding, and recovery. This mandate has driven significant progress. The establishment of the Office of the Special Representative on Children and Armed Conflict, the Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism, and the Security Council Working Group has helped develop a robust response to the plight of children and coordinate international action. Through sustained advocacy and engagement, including the implementation of action plans with parties to conflict, thousands of children have been removed from the theaters of conflict, and concrete commitments have contributed to the prevention of violations and abuses. Yet, these achievements stand in stark contrast to the unprecedented scale and complexity of violations and abuses against children reported in recent years. This year’s annual report of the Secretary-General sounds the alarm: as a record number of children had their rights violated in conflict during the previous year, the highest number since the mandate was established. Moreover, the changing nature of conflict demands that we adapt our responses. As in every aspect of our lives, digital technologies create new risks and raise additional concerns in the field of child protection. Children are recruited and exploited through smartphones. Their natural affinity for technology becomes a weapon against them. At the same time, digital technologies can also help protect children. Technology-enabled education promotes digital literacy and skills and empowers children to recognize online threats. There is a certain responsibility to close the digital divide and help countries strengthen their capacity to respond to new threats. Greece attaches particular importance to protecting children in the digital environment, while also enabling to benefit from new technologies. Guided by the firm conviction that the integrity and effectiveness of the Children and Armed Conflict Mandate must be preserved, Greece proposed a resolution that safeguards these foundations while introducing a critical new dimension: the impact of digital technologies on children and ways to counter it, as well as ways to harness these technologies for the benefit of the children. In a particularly welcome development, The Security Council unanimously adopted the resolution a few days ago, with 93 Member States co-sponsoring it. We are greatly encouraged by this outcome and would like to once again thank all Member States for their support, which has helped advance this important new dimension of the KAG mandate. A few thoughts on the way forward. We must maintain and strengthen partnerships. Child protection requires closer cooperation between member states, the United Nations, regional organizations, and civil society. It should also be systematically integrated into conflict prevention, mediation, peace process, and recovery strategies. We must also give due consideration to the voices of children and young people in shaping our policies and responses, with appropriate safeguards to protect their safety, dignity, and well-being. We need to reinforce engagement with parties to conflict. Principled dialogue, including through action plans, can deliver meaningful results. Their effective implementation requires clear responsibilities, measurable steps, sustained engagement, and support for the release and reintegration of children. We should address implementation challenges by safeguarding the monitoring and reporting mechanism, strengthening field-to-field expertise and partnerships with local actors, and facilitating humanitarian access. We must also ensure that commitments are matched by adequate and predictable resources so that monitoring, reporting, and child protection capacities are maintained, particularly in the field. Accountability and prevention must be supported by consistent political engagement and effective national justice mechanisms. Through the Prove It Matters campaign with Greece's champions, A child delivered a simple but very powerful message: a protected child is a secure future. Let these words guide our collective action. Let us demonstrate, through sustained political will, concrete investments, and genuine partnerships, that the protection of children is not simply an aspiration, but an indispensable foundation for lasting peace. 30 years after the establishment of the Children and Armed Conflict Mandate, let us ensure that the next 30 years will be remembered not for the promises we made, but for the violations we prevented and the children we protected. Thank you. I resume my function as President of the Council. I now give the floor to Her Excellency Ms. Dace Melbāde, Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs of Latvia.

Thank you. Thank you, Mr. President. And let me begin by welcoming His Excellency Mr. Giorgos Geropetritis, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Hellenic Republic, as the President of this meeting. I thank all of our briefers, Ms. Vanessa Fraser, Ms. Catherine Russell, Ms. Jenabe Jagne, and Ms. Bethany Ellis for their vital contributions and unwavering dedication. Indeed, today we must ask ourselves a simple yet uncomfortable question: How can we do more and do better? The global situation remains deeply alarming. Last year, the UN verified over 14,000 children killed or maimed, a horrifying 34% increase in children killed. Children continue to be recruited by armed groups in the DRS, Nigeria, Haiti, and beyond. Attacks on schools and hospitals reached tragic highs in the occupied Palestinian territory, Ukraine, and Myanmar. And child abductions rose to the highest level ever recorded. In Ukraine, Russia's war of aggression continues to steal childhoods and shatter families. Children are killed in their homes and on playgrounds. Schools and hospitals are targeted, while air raid sirens force children to shelter underground for hours in freezing darkness as Russia's attacks persist. The unlawful deportation and forcible transfer of Ukrainian children are clear, outrageous violations of international law. Echoing the strong call of the UN General Assembly, we demand the immediate and unconditional return. Mr. President, recently, I hosted a group of Ukrainian children in Latvia. They spoke of learning to recognize by sound alone which drones overhead were the most deadly. Some had lost loved ones, others had no homes to return to. And during my own visit to Ukraine, standing in a kindergarten shattered by a Russian missile, I saw firsthand how even the safest spaces for our youngest have been turned into ruins. Indeed, no child anywhere in the world should ever have to carry such horrors. At the same time, emerging technologies are creating terrifying new risks. Terrorist groups like ISIS exploit online games to recruit children. In Kharkiv, Russia has used online platforms to manipulate minors into acting as informants and saboteurs. To respond, I fully agree with you, Mr. President, we urgently need stronger safeguards built in close partnership with tech companies and civil society. Children's rights must be protected online just as fiercely as offline. In this regard, Latvia has submitted national comments on the ILC draft articles on crimes against humanity to explicitly include child recruitment and use of children among these acts. Mr. President, the international community already has the tools. monitoring mechanisms, action plans, 15 Security Council resolutions, and targeted sanctions. But commitments on paper will not protect a single child without real implementation. We urge parties listed in the Secretary General's report for committing grave violations to engage with the UN and sign and implement concrete, time-bound action plans to end and prevent the violations. And this is the only path to delisting. Latvia is concerned by the lack of resources for UN missions for the protection of children as the crisis deepens on the ground. Thus, we will continue to advocate for child protection as an essential component of mission mandates. We are also concerned that the lack of agreement of subsidiary body chairs has prevented the working group of CAC from performing its functions. Given the importance of its conclusions for protection efforts on the ground, we stress the need to reach an agreement without further delay to ensure that the working group can resume its work. Thirty years of this mandate have proven what sustained actions can achieve. Now is not the time to step back. Mr. President, Latvia will continue to stand up and speak out. Every child in every conflict deserves to grow up in safety, peace, and dignity. Thank you.

I thank Your Excellency Ms. Belbade for her statement. I now give the floor to the representative of Panama.

Thank you, Mr. President. I would like to welcome you most warmly at this meeting, and I’d like to thank your delegation for its leadership, where we have found a fundamental partner in advancing the shared priority and translating it into action through this Council. I also recognize the Special Representative of the Secretary General, Vanessa Frazer. and the Executive Director of UNICEF, Catherine Russell, and thank them for their valuable remarks and their tireless work on behalf of children in the most adverse circumstances. I also welcome Janaya Jagne, African Union Special Envoy for Children in Armed Conflict, and Bethany Ellis, Director of Watchlist for Children in Armed Conflict. And I recognize and welcome Her Excellency Dace Melbade, Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs of Latvia. A girl reaching 10 today in the midst of a war has spent her entire life under an international system that promised to protect her 20 years before she was born. That girl has the right to ask us what purpose our promises have served. Thirty years into this agenda, we must be prepared to answer her. We commend the work of those who have enabled a child to put down a weapon, embrace their family once again, and return to a classroom. You make real the protection that this Council has the responsibility to guarantee. However, the Secretary General's report published this year records 38,558 grave violations against 24,174 children in 2025. The gap between what we have built and what they continue to suffer demands action. Panama reaffirms its determination to advance this agenda wherever its implementation remains insufficient. In this regard, we propose that this anniversary leave us with three clear imperatives. First, preserve our ability to know and prevent. The monitoring and reporting mechanism established by resolution 16/12 requires independence, access, and resources. Reducing specialized staff or withdrawing protection capacities during mission transitions can leave us without warnings precisely when we need them the most. A lack of information must never be mistaken for an absence of violations. Second, ensure effective follow-up on commitments. Action plans must include timelines, verifiable results, and sustained implementation. The conclusions of the working group must translate into concrete engagement with the parties concerned, and accountability must extend to those responsible, regardless of who their allies may be. Resolution 2832 spearheaded by our hosts and adopted on 19 October, introduces an additional urgency, namely preventing digital technologies from facilitating recruitment and other violations. Its implementation must connect child protection with the responsibility of technological actors. Third, support every child after their release. Reintegration requires predictable funding, safe family reunification, education, and psychosocial care, with specific responses for girls who have survived sexual violence. A child who is released only to be recruited again reveals a form of protection that we have failed to sustain. Mr. President, 30 years fit within the history of an institution, but in the life of a child, six months without school, one night of recruitment, or a few minutes under bombardment can change everything. That difference between our timelines and theirs must be the sense of urgency that guides this mandate. May the next anniversary find more children learning, playing, and growing alongside their families. May the lives that we help protect be the clearest answer to what we did with the authority that was entrusted to us. Thank you very much.

I thank the representative of Panama for the statement, and I now give the floor to the representative of France.

Mr. President, at the outset, I'd like to applaud you. Thank you for steering our proceedings, Minister, and for convening this meeting, which attests to Greece's determination to take forward the children in armed conflict mandate throughout its Security Council presidency. On this note, I'd like to congratulate Greece on the adoption of resolution 2832. Unanimously so, and this just a week ago. I also wish to thank SRSG Ms. Vanessa Frazier, the Executive Director of UNICEF, Ms. Catherine Russell, the AU's Special Envoy for Children Affected by Armed Conflict, Ms. Jaynab Deyagune, and the Director of Watchlist on Children in Armed Conflict, Ms. Bethany Ellis. Thank you. for your briefings and your ongoing commitment to the promotion and defence of children's rights. Mr. President, I'd like to make three remarks. First, France reiterates its unswerving political support for the CAC mandate as we commemorate its 30th anniversary. Its operational nature and its effectiveness have been proven, in particular thanks to the monitoring mechanism for the six grave violations established by this Council, something we initiated back in 2005. We will continue to lend all of our support to it, financially through our UNICEF contributions, but equally politically by ensuring that peace operations, wherever they exist, include a robust child protection component, as well as appropriate capacities for gathering information. Furthermore, we support the efforts of the SRSG aimed at agreeing action plans with states or armed groups. This is a tool which lies at the heart of the CAC mandate, one that has proven its worth. It allows us, when it is implemented in good faith, for concrete improvements in the protection of the rights of children. Syria currently serves as a particularly encouraging example of this. Second, France is deeply disquieted by the alarming number of serious violations committed against children. Last year, this number broke a despondent record, a record not broken since the SRSG's mandate was set up in 1997. State actors are for the first time responsible for the majority of violations, including attacks against schools and hospitals, as well as denials of humanitarian access. Faced with this situation, it is absolutely necessary to ensure respect for IHL, to combat impunity, and for the Council to sanction groups and armed forces who commit these violations. It behooves the Security Council to do so. Mr. President, the protection of children in armed conflict is a long-standing priority for France. This is my third and final point. In 2007, together with UNICEF, we launched the Paris Principles and Commitments, which set out benchmarks for preventing the illegal recruitment of children, working towards freeing them, and supporting their reintegration. 115 states have joined this normative and operational framework. We call on those who have not yet done so to do the same. Together with UNICEF, in February of next year, France will be organizing a high-level conference so as to commemorate the 20th anniversary of the Paris Principles and Commitments. We would like for this event to be more than just another commemoration. We would rather have it as a renewed commitment to better protection of children's rights over the next decade. I thank you.

Thanks to the representative of France for the statement, and I now give the floor to the representative of Denmark.

Thank you, Mr. President, and I thank Greece for convening this meeting and our briefers for their important contributions and leadership on this issue. Let me also thank you, Mr. Minister, for your presence and for your country’s steadfast commitment for supporting children caught in situations of armed conflict. Mr. President, 30 years ago, the international community was confronted with a devastating reality: children were being robbed of their childhoods, forced to fight wars, and subjected to unimaginable violence. In her landmark report from 1996, Graça Machel issued a call to action. Her words inspired a collective commitment to protect children from the horrors of war. From this commitment, the Children and Armed Conflict Mandate was established. Today, 30 years later, we face a striking paradox. We've built a sophisticated institutional mechanism, yet grave violations against children have reached unprecedented levels, including in the occupied Palestinian territories, DRC, Nigeria, Myanmar, Somalia, Haiti, Ukraine, and Sudan. This anniversary must therefore be both a celebration of achievements and a reckoning with failures to prevent violations. Mr. President, we should not underestimate what this mandate has achieved. As we’ve heard from the SRSG, More than 220,000 children have been released from armed forces and armed groups. The mandate has reshaped international norms for the protection of children. It has supported action plans which have transformed military practices, strengthened national legislation, and established safeguards to prevent future recruitment. These achievements were made possible by a unique institutional framework backed by strong, united support from this Council. Denmark is proud to have played a part in establishing the Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism and the Security Council Working Group in 2005. Together with the Secretary-General’s listing mechanism and sustained engagement with parties to conflict, these tools have helped turn promises into action and concrete improvements for children. The lesson is clear: credible monitoring, sustained engagement, and political pressure can change the behaviour of armed forces. Looking ahead, Mr. President, allow me to highlight three overall challenges. First, the growing disregard of states for grave violations against children. For the first time in the mandate’s history, government forces have been found to be responsible for the majority of verified violations. In Ukraine, relentless Russian attacks continue to kill and maim civilians, including children, and to destroy civilian infrastructure. We condemn these and all other such attacks and reiterate our call for the return of all unlawfully deported and forcibly transferred Ukrainian children. In Gaza, the suffering of children remains catastrophic. More than 340 children have been killed since the ceasefire took effect. That is almost one child every single day. Israel must comply fully with its obligations under international law, including international humanitarian law. No parties to conflict, whether state or non-state, can be exempt from scrutiny or accountability. Second, the devastating consequences of explosive weapons in populated areas. As we've heard, airstrikes, artillery, and other explosive weapons continue to kill and maim children, destroying schools, hospitals, and essential infrastructure. Denmark calls for full compliance with international humanitarian law. and strengthen implementation of the Political Declaration on Explosive Weapons in Populated Areas and the Safe Schools Declaration. Third, emerging technologies are creating new risks for children. Drones, artificial intelligence, and AI-enabled targeting systems are transforming warfare, increasing risks of harms to civilians. Their development and use must comply fully with international law. control, and human judgment, as well as accountability, must be maintained. We commend Greece for its effort to ensure the Council spoke with one united voice on these issues when we last week adopted resolution 2832 on digital technologies. Mr. President, 30 years of experience have proven that this mandate can make a real difference. The framework is there. The mechanisms are there. But the widening gap between commitments made and commitments met demands greater political will to act on findings, uphold accountability, and act consistently without exception. Denmark reiterates its unwavering support for Special Representative Frazier, her office, and the Monitoring and Reporting Mechanism. We continue to financially support the Office of the SRSG and UNICEF. We encourage others to do the same, to join us, to deliver on the promise of this mandate for every child. Thank you.

I thank the representative of Denmark for the statement, and I now give the floor to the representative of China.

Thank you, President. I welcome Your Excellency, Foreign Minister, as you preside over this meeting in person. I thank Special Representative Frazier, Executive Director Russell, Special Envoy Janni, and Director Ellis for their briefings. 30 years ago, the UN General Assembly adopted the resolution that recommended the appointment by the Secretary-General of a Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict. Over the past 30 years, the content of the mandate on children and armed conflict has continued to be enriched, and the UN’s child protection mechanism has seen constant improvement. Meanwhile, conflict continues to inflict severe harm on children. According to the Secretary-General’s annual report on CAC, The year 2025 saw a record high in the number of violations against children in conflict since the beginning of the mandate. Children are the future and hope of the world, and it is incumbent upon all parties to protect them. I wish to make four points. First, it's important to end hostilities and promote peace to keep children out of harm's way. The most direct and effective way of protecting children is to end conflicts and violence as soon as possible. China urges all parties to conflicts to abide by the purposes and principles of the UN Charter, cease hostilities, strictly honor their obligations under international law and international humanitarian law, and refrain from attacking children, schools, and other civilians and civilian facilities. All parties should follow the vision of common, comprehensive, cooperative, and sustainable security, properly address differences through dialogue and consultation, and promote political settlement of hotspot issues. It's important to step up humanitarian assistance and improve access to conflict-affected areas to ensure that children will get the necessary assistance and psychological support in a timely manner. Second, it's important to improve the mechanisms and ensure greater accountability. Children in the occupied Palestinian territories and Haiti, among others, live on the front line of conflict and violence and have long suffered from grave violations and threats. Generations have been deprived of a happy childhood. China supports the Security Council in resorting to necessary tools to ensure strict accountability for wanton abuses of children. We support Special Representative Frazier in fulfilling her mandate and duties, call for stronger monitoring and reporting by the UN. support the Council's Working Group on Children and Armed Conflict in the timely consideration of relevant country reports, and urge all parties to take effective steps to stop atrocities against children. Third, it's important to empower through development to enhance the well-being of children. Development is the fundamental solution that addresses the root causes of conflict. We need to support the governments of the countries concerned in guaranteeing the basic needs such as food and education, healthcare and employment, and improving the environment for the growth and development of children, and breaking free from the shadow of war and the cycle of violence, we must properly harness the potential of AI and other emerging technologies, stay people-centered, leverage the technologies for the positive and for good. Ensure the right to education for children in armed conflict, strive to bridge the digital divide and ensure that the benefits will reach more countries in the global south. Fourth, it's important to demonstrate solidarity and step up support for Africa. China welcomes that Ambassador Jacky has assumed the role of the first-ever Special Envoy for Children Affected by Armed Conflict of the AU, and supports the UN in working closely with the AU to help countries in conflict strengthen their child protection capacity. In recent years, through the UN Peace and Development Trust Fund, We have supported the Office of the SRSG for CAAC in implementing child protection projects in Africa, with the latest batch focusing on regional cooperation, covering 11 countries in Central Africa and enjoying broad support and recognition. We will continue to provide help to the best of our ability to developing countries, including those in Africa. China stands ready to work jointly with the international community to silence the guns and end violence, and strengthen support and assistance so that children all over the world can grow up healthy and strong in an environment of peace and tranquility, and to create a better future. Thank you, President.

I thank the representative of China for the statement, and I now give the floor to the representative of Colombia.

Thank you, Mr. President. I would like to thank Greece for convening this important meeting to commemorate the 30th anniversary of the Children and Armed Conflict Mandate. I also wish to thank Ms. Vanessa Fraser, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, along with Ms. Catherine Russell from UNICEF and Bethany Ellis from Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict for their valuable briefings. Three years after the establishment of this mandate, the international community, with the help of this Council, of course, has built a strong framework for protecting children in effective armed conflicts, with monitoring mechanism and tools to promote accountability. Yet, the record number is struggling here, is almost 40,000 grave violations. against children, verified just in 2025, affecting more than 24,000 children. Along with the military technology, uh, that is changing actually the way that civilians are exposed to this technology, particularly when it comes to drones and landmines. We know today that recent reports establish an alarming number, an alarming statistic, five children are killed or injured every day on these technologies. For Colombia, naturally, this is a concerning issue because it is part of the reality this government found.

Mr. President, We've only been in power now for about 72 days, and Colombia has discovered a reality on the ground which is of great concern, of course. And this means that the monitoring mechanism of Resolution 1612 is so important, more than ever before, but also the importance of funding it properly throughout the world. The Colombian example is an important one. Of the three paths of recruitment, we have forced migration, armed groups that are benefiting from recruitment to extend their activities, and we have discovered factors that, of course, are key in this process: the conditions of poverty, the lack of inclusion, the lack of access to education. These are key aspects of the issue, and these illegal groups benefit from that situation. The UN reports show that in 2024 alone, there was a recruitment of a child every 20 hours. And of course, these figures are alarming if you compare them with other figures that show an increase of 300% between 2020 and 2024, just in the case of Colombia. Recruitment of these children is done through social networks. TikTok and Facebook are the ones that are used the most, and they're given a romantic idea of what a warrior and a fighter's life will be like. In the face of that reality, the Colombian government has employed a an educational and social strategy. Our country has an institute for family protection to protect children that has a specific constitutional mandate. But, of course, the challenge for Colombia and other countries facing similar realities is enormous. Just last night, the President of the Republic of Colombia, President Esprella, in a partnership with Google, announced 1 million grants for Colombians for online training on.

AI, trying to demonstrate the difference between online threats of.

Recruitment and the opportunities that are available online offered by the government. We're also showing that there are other alternatives as well, where international corporations that have great media access to these populations can also create opportunities for them.

Not just represent a threat for them.

And in that context, I would invite others to set up similar programs. As was explained in the briefing by the Special Representative, Colombia has been particularly successful fighting this phenomenon, but it's a very delicate threat, and our government is working to counter this threat day by day. We've said time and again that without security, there is no peace. Without security, peace is just an idea. We need to establish these peaceful conditions, but our country is also trying to give these people a future and opportunities with all the challenges that that brings with it. President, I conclude by saying that it's easier to protect the future of a child than to repair the past of someone who lost their way. Thank you.

I thank the representative of Colombia for the statement, and I now give the floor to the representative of Bahrain.

Thank you. The Kingdom of Bahrain would like to thank the Hellenic Republic for convening this very important meeting. We applaud your presence, Mr. Minister, to steer this important meeting, and this within the framework of the 30th anniversary of the establishment of the Mandate on Children and Armed Conflict. We also wish to extend the Special Representative of the Secretary General for Children and Armed Conflict, Ms. Vanessa Frazier, as well as the Executive Director of the United Nations Children's Fund, UNICEF, Ms. Catherine Russell. We also wish to thank the African Union Special Envoy for children affected by armed conflict, Ms. Jainaba Yagne, and the civil society representative. Thank you for your valuable briefings as well as your ongoing efforts aimed at strengthening the protection of children affected by armed conflict. This anniversary is an important step, an opportunity to assess the progress we've made over the last three decades. It's also an opportunity to underscore the need to translate international commitments into practical, concrete measures which guarantee the protection of children against grave violations. And this at a time when armed conflicts are ongoing and the challenges which children face increasingly Mr. President, the establishment of the Children and Armed Conflict mandate, as well as the development of monitoring and reporting mechanisms, as well as action plans with parties, two conflicts, all of the above helped to strengthen the international child protection framework. These efforts also helped to release recruited children and to reintegrate them, all the while preventing grave violations against them. The Kingdom of Bahrain would like to underscore the importance of continuing to support the aforementioned tools and to implement relevant Security Council resolutions, working together with the governments and relevant United Nations entities. The Kingdom of Bahrain believes that despite the headway that's been made, grave violations against children in armed conflict are still rising in an alarming fashion, as indicated by the latest Secretary General's annual report. This means we must beef up international efforts so as to guarantee respect for international law, to protect children's rights, and to guarantee they have access to unfettered humanitarian assistance. Against this backdrop, we reaffirm the importance of protecting education as an essential pillar of child protection, of the prevention of their recruitment, helping to maintain schools as safe spaces for learning. Therefore, we wish to underscore the Kingdom's initiative adopted at the 33rd Arab Summit in May of 2024, the objective being to provide educational services to persons affected by conflict in the region, working jointly with the Arab States League, as well as UNESCO. Mr. President, changes to the character of armed conflict, as well as growing recourse to digital technologies, are creating new challenges vis-à-vis child protection. In particular, it throws up risks related to recruitment and exploitation online, in addition to cyber attacks on educational infrastructure. In parallel, the Kingdom of Bahrain would like to highlight the need to harness the benefits offered by technologies so as to promote safe education, as well as to ensure promotion and protection, in particular by reinforcing international cooperation on capacity building and on bridging the digital divide, so as to ensure safe and responsible use of these technologies. Against this backdrop, resolution 2832 adopted by the Security Council last week, a resolution initiated by Greece, of which the Kingdom of Bahrain was a co-sponsor, is a milestone helping us to mount a response to these challenges and to reinforce the protection of children in the digital sphere. Mr. President, going from commitments to impact means we must continue bolstering cooperation between Member States, the United Nations, as well as regional organizations, in addition to lending our support for building the capacity of actors tasked with protecting children, all the while facing resource constraints. We therefore wish to reiterate the importance of the implementation of existing action plans of reinforcing prevention, accountability, and the protection of children affected by conflicts, all the while harnessing lessons learned, the experience accumulated over the last decades. By way of conclusion, Mr. President, we would like to reiterate our unswerving commitment to supporting international efforts aimed at protecting children in armed conflict. We would like to underscore that the success of these efforts will not be measured by the yardstick of commitments we adopt, not solely. It is also measured by concrete results we achieve, guaranteeing children protection, education, and security, all the while upholding their rights and their future. I thank you.

I thank the representative of Bahrain for the statement, and I now give the floor to the representative of the United States.

Thank you, Minister, and good to see you, and welcome, and congratulations on a very strong presidency from you and your team this eventful month. Colleagues, this is a personal, it's tragic to many of us. It's of personal interest to me as well. I've worked closely on this issue on the ground in Africa and Afghanistan. And one story I wanted to share with you about my time in Afghanistan was working with an elder in Eastern Afghanistan who told me and my teams over and over again that he kept talking about his secret weapon to defeat the extremists. And after a number of meetings talking about this secret weapon, I finally said, I need to see this. What is it? We need to have a common understanding here. And of course, I assumed he was talking about some type of special rocket or gun or some type of hidden arsenal. And when he finally agreed to show me his secret weapon, he brought out his daughters. And this was an illiterate elder in a very, very conservative part of the country. I'd never seen a woman uncovered. He brought them out uncovered and proud, these young women he was smuggling to be educated, one as a doctor and one as a lawyer. And he said, this is how we defeat the extremist. This is This proud father told me that these women one day will do more to defeat the extremists, to defeat the Taliban, than 100 tanks or bombers. And he was right. And his secret weapon was that, you know, where girls are educated, where women thrive, you often do not have, most often do not have an extremist problem. And so, colleagues, I saw why the Taliban feared them, why Al Qaeda, ISIS feared them. As Malala Yousafzai said famously, "The thing the extremists fear the most is a girl with a book." Because it undercuts their ideology, it undercuts their ability to recruit, it undercuts the ability to warp so many minds. But sadly, I think we need to also reflect here as a council and as a United Nations. UNICEF reports that two and a half million Afghan girls have been denied secondary education since the Taliban returned to power. A generation of doctors, teachers, and leaders are being lost. And Afghanistan, as we know, is far from alone. In 1999, decades ago, this Council adopted Resolution 1261, and it condemned the targeting and unlawful recruitment of children in war, as well as attacks on schools and hospitals, as we've heard from many of us today. The UN has verified more than 38,000 grave violations against 24,000 children, the highest number of children affected since this council took up the issue three decades ago. And so I think we have a, yes, a responsibility to change this trajectory, but we have a responsibility to reflect on ourselves and to reflect on our organizations. We have a responsibility to ask ourselves, why isn't it working? And we can commend each other for the current structures and special representatives and what have you, but we believe that this requires a renewed focus on results, and the results aren't there. After 30 years, we cannot settle for an approach that measures success by reports produced, the numbers of reports, or the numbers of meetings held. We cannot look at this problem as we do too many problems in our view of throwing more resources, calling for more resources. We would welcome a for member states to volunteer resources, but just calling for more resources and more people at the problem. We need to look at the resources we have and whether they're being used as effectively as they should be. So our view is that our actions must match our words. We certainly share the concern on the gravity of the problem. I think, we think, frankly, there are few people who exemplify the highest level of attention on this issue except for our current First Lady, Melania Trump. Just last month, during the UN General Assembly high-level week, she learned of the desperate plight of dozens and dozens of families, including children, of course, trapped in Oleshky, Ukraine. Without reliable access to food, medicine, or electricity, these people were slowly dying, trapped in a war zone. And rather than calling for action, calling on organizations to pay attention to it, asking for a report on the situation, she got to work. And just last week, just last week, she led and was able to secure an agreement between Russia and Ukraine For a local ceasefire to allow life saving aid into the city and for the civilians to be evacuated safely, of course, now it's about executing on this amazing, incredible agreement. She and and she will continue to put the highest level attention. On saving these children's lives and saving these people's lives with these are the types of actions, colleague, I think we could all. call upon our leadership to execute effectively. The First Lady has also forged a coalition of 60 nations, together with American technology leaders, including Adobe, Amazon, Google, Intel, and others, to expand educational opportunities, to deliver safe digital learning tools, protect children online, where we know that they are so vulnerable. These private sector partners have already announced more than 23 million in commitments towards a mission that the First Lady has called Fostering the Future Together, and we thank the nations represented here who have joined her and joined us in this important work. She believes, we believe, that technology used responsibly can bring education and opportunity to children who would otherwise not have it, but technology obviously also presents new dangers. Terrorists and armed groups exploit digital platforms to recruit and abuse children, and her initiative is working with these same technology providers that so many children access around the world to ensure that they're used safely. So protecting children from those dangers is at the heart of the First Lady's initiative. It's also her life's work. It's also the life's work of one of my dear personal friends, an American football star by the name of Tim Tebow. We just hosted his foundation here at the UN to focus more countries on the fight against online sexual exploitation. And we certainly hope that the data that this foundation has provided to so many, and I thank you again for those who attended that forum, will help collect evidence, will help prosecute, will help protect these children who are being exploited so mercilessly online. It's also why we've supported Greece's resolution, Minister, 2832, adopted unanimously this week, great work by your team, in calling for stronger protections against the same type of digital exploitation. so horrifically affected by conflict. So, colleagues, we have done extraordinary work together. We have extraordinary opportunities. But again, we call on everyone to examine why the trajectory of this situation is so poor, despite decades of attention by this council and these bodies. Back to that Afghan elder and father I started with, he understood something profound. Again, sometimes the greatest investment we can make in lasting peace is a girl or a boy with a book. The world needs more secret weapons like that against those who would do them harm, but we have a responsibility. We owe them to be worthy of their trust in us and to do better to have better results at the end of all of this effort. I thank you. I thank you, Minister.

I thank the representative of the United States for the powerful statement. I now give the floor to the representative of Somalia.

Mr. President, we thank the Greek Presidency for convening this important and timely discussion and welcome the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Greece for presiding over today’s meeting. We also thank the briefers for their valuable insights and commitment to protecting children affected by armed conflict. Mr. President, 30 years ago, the establishment of Children and Armed Conflict mandate affirmed that children suffering in war demand sustained international attention and action. Somalia pays tribute to the child protection personnel, national authorities, humanitarian partners, and communities that have translated this commitment into protection under exceptionally difficult conditions. The mandate has delivered important gains. Children have been released from armed forces and armed groups. Action plans have established commitments to prevent violations, while monitoring and reporting have supported engagement and accountability. Yet grave violations persist. the gap between our commitment and children's daily lives remains worrying. Their protection cannot depend on nationality, geography, or politics. In this context, Somalia emphasizes three priorities. First, implementation and prevention must remain central. Prevention requires confronting the drivers of conflict, including foreign occupation, poverty, and unresolved grievances. We must prevent recruitment, protect schools and hospitals, safeguard humanitarian access, and support recovery. National governments bear primary responsibility, while international cooperation should strengthen national institutions through predictable financing and technical assistance. The appointment of the African Union's first special envoy for children affected by armed conflict, Ms. Jeneba Jang, offers an opportunity to deepen regional leadership and cooperation with the United Nations. Second, accountability and respect for international law must be consistent and free from double standards. The plight of the Palestinian children demand urgent and sustained attention. Children in Gaza and across the occupied Palestinian territory continue to endure killing, maiming, displacement, deprivation, and long-term trauma. Schools have been destroyed or rendered inaccessible, while restrictions on relief have deprived children of food, health care, education, and safety. The longstanding occupation of Palestinian territory must end. The occupying power, Israel, bears a binding legal obligation under international law to provide basic services to the civilian population and must fully comply without exception, excuse, or delay with international humanitarian law and human rights law. Verified violations must lead to credible investigations and, where appropriate, prosecution consistent with due process. Child protection must also be embedded in peace processes, ceasefires, and humanitarian agreements. Third, we must confront emerging threats. Drones, artificial intelligence-assisted targeting, digital surveillance, and social media are creating new risks, including online recruitment and incitement. These technologies must remain under meaningful human control, legal oversight, and international law. To conclude, 30 years of progress must be defended through political will, consistent accountability, and sustained investment. In Africa, we say it takes a village to raise a child. Today, it takes an international community united in purpose to protect one, and we remain committed in that endeavor. I thank you.

I thank the representative of Somalia for the statement, and I now give the floor to the representative of the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Thank you, Mr. President. The Democratic Republic of Congo would like to thank Greece for convening this briefing session on children and armed conflict. My delegation would like to welcome you, Foreign Affairs Minister of Greece, to the meeting, and we'd like to thank Madam Vanessa

Frazier, Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children and Armed Conflict, Ms. Catherine Russell, Executive Director of UNICEF, as well as Ms. Jainaba Janneh, African Union Special Envoy for Children Affected by Armed Conflict, as well as the representative from civil society.

And we would like to express our thanks for your very enlightening briefings this morning.

This meeting is particularly important as we mark the 30th anniversary of the mandate of children and armed conflict, and we see that violations against children continue to worsen. Murders, mutilations, kidnapping, forced recruitment, and attacks against schools compromise their security and their education, as well as their future. The Democratic Republic of the Congo firmly condemns these acts and recalls that schools must be safe spaces in accordance with international humanitarian law. President, since the historic report of Graca Michel in 1996, followed by various resolutions, including 1612, the mandate has essential mechanisms for monitoring and ensuring accountability. These efforts have helped to free more than 200,000 children. These achievements, however, must lead to effective protection on the ground. The DRC welcomes the adoption last week of resolution 2832 on digital issues. The DRC fully suffers from these conflicts and their effect on children. In the eastern part of the country, childhood continues to be broken, forced recruitment, kidnappings, and sexual violence, depriving children of their fundamental right to education. Thanks. Because of this reality, the DRC has strengthened its commitment and our cooperation with the United Nations through joint action plans of 2012 and 2014. Those efforts have contributed to progress, and we saw the withdrawal of armed forces from the DRC of parties that were listed for recruiting or using children in armed conflict. That was major progress in the protection of children. Legislative measures have also strengthened the protection of victims, guaranteeing their right to compensation. Following on from those commitments, the DRC has a national action plan, including four priorities: prevention, protection, combating impunity, and strengthening institutional capacity. Its implementation has made it possible to make significant progress, particularly training more than 5,000 military and security and legal staff, as well as the reintegration of more than 5,000 children associated with armed groups in 2025. That progress was accompanied by the strengthening of the National Council for Children. That's the entity that in charge of implementing government policy in the area of children's rights. This has made it possible to prepare the national child policy and the 2026 to 2030 strategic policy. Institutional cooperation and coordination, and also the creation of a national information system on the protection of children, and the implementation of the National Children's Parliament in 2026 were other achievements. And finally, internationally, the DRC, adhering to the Vancouver Principles, has consolidated its commitment to prevent the recruitment of children, to strengthen the capacity of the security forces, and cooperation with local communities. Mr. President, despite this progress marked by my government, the situation on the ground remains of concern. The Congolese experience confirms that protecting children must be included into ceasefire plans, peace agreements, and transitional justice systems. Freeing children and integrating them in a sustainable way must be absolute goals. We also underscore the importance of strengthening early warning mechanisms and documentation of violations, including using new technologies, whilst at the same time guaranteeing the rights of children. President, the protection of children in armed conflict is a legal obligation, a moral imperative as well, and an essential condition for lasting peace. The DRC reaffirms its support for the UN mandate, and we call for efforts to be redoubled in order to prevent violations, combat impunity, preserve access to education, and strengthen national protection capability. On this 30th anniversary, let's make sure that our collective commitments translate into concrete action for every child affected by conflict, because every child that we can protect today is an extra chance for lasting peace. Thank you.

I thank the representative of the Democratic Republic of the Congo for the statement, and I now give the floor to the representative of the Russian Federation.

Mr. Giorgos Gherpitritis, we’re delighted to see you in the seat of the Security Council President. We'd like to thank Greece for organizing today's brief on this important topic, children and armed conflict. We also welcome the Special Representative of the Secretary General for Children and Armed Conflict, Ms. Vanessa Frazier, as well as UNICEF Executive Director Ms. Catherine Russell and Ms. Jangge. and Ms. Ellis. We are grateful to the briefers for their input into our discussion. The children and armed conflict agenda remains one of the most active thematic areas of the Council's work. Last week, in this very chamber, we adopted the 15th resolution on this issue, and the working group has dozens of agreed conclusions on its books. The 30th anniversary of the Mandate’s establishment is an opportunity to issue an objective assessment of its implementation in full. The statistics in the SG’s annual report remain distressing. The number of child casualties has grown over the last few years, and the main reason for that is the crisis in the Middle East. Yet, the report does not reflect all of the violations, far from it. For instance, it doesn't have information about the crimes being committed by the Ukrainian Armed Forces. Russia is in contact with the Office of the SRSG on Children and Armed Conflict so as to look for ways of resolving this issue. As things stand, as a result of UAF attacks, since 2022, 1,903 children suffered, of which 313 died and 1,590 were injured. Between 2014 and 2021, in the Donbas at the hands of the UAF, 138 children died, 439 were wounded. And yet Ukraine, to this day, has not made it onto the list of countries committing violations against children. We believe this situation must change. Mr. President, the children and armed conflict agenda has for Russia a very practical dimension: the reintegration and the provision of psychosocial support to victims, creating the conditions for distance learning, evacuation drills in children's institutions, which regularly come under attack, raising awareness among minors about the mine threat. All of this is part of our reality, and this not only in regions which are next to the front. One of the serious factors complicating the implementation of the child protection in conflict Security Council agenda are double standards and blatant lies. For instance, the representative of Latvia levelled accusations which cannot be verified. Shamelessly, they are peddling lies about children who were abducted and deported. And the representative of Denmark repeated those accusations, disseminating left, right, and center these lies. This is being done by their colleagues, political liars from the European Union. We know firsthand about threats to children in cyberspace in the context of armed conflict. which is what the resolution adopted at Greece's behest seeks to regulate. Hence, while the international community promotes global initiatives on amplifying children's voices, proclaiming how important it is for the opinion of every child to be heard at the highest possible level, in October 2021, a resident of Luhansk, Ms. Faina Savchenko, who was 12 at the time, was added to the notorious Ukrainian website Mirrotvorts. or peacemaker. This internet portal, which contains a database of people who the resource's creators deem to be enemies of Ukraine, who should be eliminated. The reason Faina's data was posted is that she publicly addressed the Security Council, speaking about the situation of children in the Donbass, and she did this on International Children's Day. In total, as of year-end 2021, the Peacemaker database contained over 300 Russian minors between the ages of two, two, two years old, two to 17 years old. In 2025, over 100 Russian minors were added to the database. Among the children whose information was posted on the portal, there are also nationals of the Republic of Belarus, Ukraine, Azerbaijan, Israel, Uzbekistan, Moldova, the list goes on. In January of this year, the data of 25 children aged between two and three years old was posted on Peacemaker. In May of this year, another seven minors from Russia aged five to 17 were included on Peacemaker. In August of this year, the database listed information about a Russian boy aged 11. Another digital aspect of the Ukrainian crisis relevant to our mandate is the recruitment of Russian minors by Ukrainian secret services via Telegram chatbots, which are popular with young people. Here's one such scheme. Here's how it works. Representatives of the Ukrainian secret services engage with young men posing as young women. They send them phishing links and ask for geotags of residential houses, schools, malls, and other sites. so-called law enforcement officials contact the teenagers and exert pressure on them, forcing them to commit arson and other sabotage. We are counting on the SRSG's office paying undivided attention to what I just mentioned as it discharges its duties. that is, collecting the lessons learned related to risks emanating from the use of digital technologies in child protection. We hope that the UN, and in particular the SRSG, will take exhaustive measures to ensure that Ukraine immediately deletes children's profiles from Peacemaker. Mr. President, Digital technologies play an important role in the protection of children and children’s development in conflict settings, in particular, the deployment of digital platforms for independent learning, the introduction of asynchronous distance learning formats, as well as the establishment in conflict zones of temporary physical hubs with internet access, with generators, which allow children to maintain access to school curricula, as well as get access to psychosocial support. Such measures are particularly critical given the situations surrounding access to education in crisis hotspots, first and foremost in Gaza, which is seeing the humanitarian crisis persist. Since 2023, the Gazan education system has been nigh on destroyed, depriving roughly 700,000 children of school age of the opportunity to get a fully fledged education due to school damage or destruction. In the West Bank, including East Jerusalem, in the 2024-2025 academic year, 2,040 incidents have been reported, incidents linked to the educational sphere. Of them, 1,218 were in 2025 alone. In the first half of this year, we've already registered 224 incidents, of which 232 affected 20,500 pupils. These included restrictions on access, building demolitions, military raids on schools, the use of weapons, and the detention of pupils on their way to school and back. Mr. President, the Russian Federation welcomes the participation of Ms. Janjeh as a briefer in this meeting. We're convinced that the establishment by the AU of a standalone official specialized in how to alleviate the burden borne by children in armed conflict will foster significant progress on this track in the spirit of African solutions for African problems. First, this will allow the resolution of issues linked to the situation of children, seen through the prism of the root causes of conflicts on the African continent. These include poverty, undeveloped economies, infrastructure, inter-ethnic tensions, and the presence of many active terrorist groups. Yet it's also obvious that the roots of crisis situations stretch back far earlier than the 21st century. The majority of conflicts are a legacy of colonialism. Second, Ms. Jenny's activities will provide impetus to the promotion of the idea of national ownership for decisions on how to prevent serious violations against children on the basis of existing flagship regional and national initiatives, for instance, silencing the guns. We underscore just how important it is to strengthen international cooperation so as to implement this initiative. We welcome its extension out to 2030. We're convinced that this initiative will be properly factored in when we take stock of the third Russia-Africa Summit to be held on 29 October in Moscow. At the summit, we will be highlighting the leading role played by Africans themselves in peacekeeping in the region, as well as the African Union’s efforts as the main regional body for the maintenance of peace and security. Third, we expect that the AU joining the Children’s Agenda will also help to bolster the transparency of the work done by UN country teams on monitoring and reporting in states on the African continent. The transparency of methodology applied to data collection lays the basis for governments trusting the UN system. Fourth, we hope that the appointment of a Special Representative of the African Union will help foster a more detailed analysis of how contemporary challenges, including various forms of neo-colonialism, interference in internal affairs, as well as pressure exerted by UCMs, how they complicate the situation of minors in conflict. While we're on the subject, the corrosive impact of sanctions, including unilateral ones, on the situation of minors affected by conflict was one of the topics covered by Graca Machel, the founder of the Children’s Mandate at the Security Council. We believe that as the agenda turns 30 and as we seek ways of developing it further, the Security Council should pay closer attention to this particular issue. I thank you.

I thank the representative of the Russian Federation for the statement, and I now give the floor to the representative of Pakistan.

Mr. President, I thank you for organizing today’s debate. to mark 30 years of the establishment of the mandate of Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children in Armed Conflict. Your presence, Foreign Minister, attests to the importance attached by Greece to this important subject and your country's leadership in successfully championing this cause at the Security Council. I also thank Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Children in Armed Conflict, Vanessa Frazier, UNICEF Executive Director Catherine Russell, African Union Special Envoy Ambassador Jagne, and Director of Watchlist for Children and Armed Conflict Ms. Ellis, for their briefings. President, the 30th anniversary of CAC mandate arrives at a somber occasion when grave violations against children are escalating. The Secretary-General’s latest report on CAC has documented more than 38,000 verified grave violations against children, the highest since the establishment of this mandate. These offences are not happening in a vacuum, but point towards deeper problems: a callous disregard for international humanitarian law; indiscriminate targeting of children, in some cases exacerbated by AI-integrated weapons; expanding vortex of global conflicts; and crisis of confidence in multilateral diplomacy to provide the requisite redressal and protections. The plight of children is even more alarming in the situations of foreign occupation. More than 12,000 verified incidences of grave violations, including killing and maiming, occurred only in one year against children in the occupied Palestinian territories. Countless Palestinian children bear scars of perpetual psychological trauma. Others suffer with amputated limbs and spinal and head injuries. Pakistan is firmly committed to the CAC mandate. We commend the principled leadership and active engagement of Special Representative Frazier with other stakeholders, including Executive Director UNICEF, for the safety and protection of children. As a State Party to the Convention on the Rights of Child and its Optional Protocol on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, Pakistan remains committed to implementing their provisions. We have undertaken extensive measures to protect children, including by establishing a National Commission for Rights of Children, appointing a national focal person, and endorsing the Vancouver Principles, among others. As we reaffirm our resolve today to galvanize CAC mandate for the protection of children, Pakistan would like to make some suggestions. First, Full respect of international humanitarian law and international human rights law by parties to armed conflict. Second, just settlement of situations of armed conflict and foreign occupation in accordance with international law and relevant UN Security Council resolutions. Third, inclusive governance of military-grade AI anchored in the UN framework. Fourth, Robust, transparent, and verified documentation of grave violations by monitoring and reporting mechanisms. Fifth, elimination of the digital divide, including in conflict settings, through resilient infrastructure and affordable connectivity, prioritizing children, especially those with disabilities. Sixth, national ownership and capacity building of child protection initiatives and strategies. And last but not least, fostering a culture of accountability by eliminating impunity. Mr. President, the 30th anniversary of the CAC mandate is a ripe occasion to review the achievements made for child protection in the last three decades, reflect on the lessons learned, and, most significantly, to reaffirm our firm commitment to the protection of children in armed conflict and elsewhere. Let me reiterate Pakistan's firm commitment and constructive engagement with the fellow Council members and the Office of the Special Representative for ensuring that our collective efforts translate into a safe and prosperous future for our children. I thank you very much.

I thank the representative of Pakistan for the statement, and I now give the floor to the representative of Liberia.

Thank you, Your Excellency. Liberia thanks Greece for convening this briefing and welcomes His Excellency, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Greece, Her Excellency, the Vice Minister for Foreign Affairs of Latvia. We are grateful to the SRSG for Children in Armed Conflict, both for her briefing and her service. Similarly, we thank the Executive Director of UNICEF, the African Union Special Envoy for Children Affected by Armed Conflict, and the Director of Watchlist on Children and Armed Conflict for their sobering briefings. Mr. President, 30 years after this mandate began, its achievements are real. So also, as we just heard, is the distance between the protection we promised and the childhoods War continues to destroy. As the SRSG has pointed out, and it bears repeating, including by speakers before me, in 2025, United Nations verification identified more than 24,000 children affected by grave violations. the highest number recorded since the mandate began. This is serious and demands political decisions equal to the scale of the harm. Mr. President, Liberia speaks from experience. We know what happens when children are drawn into war. and how much sustained work it takes to help them reclaim their childhood and rebuild their lives. A child's release from an armed group is only the beginning. Our responsibility continues long after the weapon is surrendered. In that regard, we propose three priorities. First, defend the mandate's credibility and capacity to act. Monitoring must remain impartial, evidence-based, and protected from political pressure. Listing and delisting must follow consistent criteria equally applied to all. Action plans need deadlines, verified results, and sustained follow-up. Engagement must secure compliance, alongside accountability for violations. Humanitarian and monitoring personnel must have safe access. Where access shrinks, lower verified numbers must never be mistaken for greater protection. Second, translate protection into practice as warfare changes. Liberia welcomes and congratulates Greece for Resolution 2832 on digital technologies and continue to commend your leadership in that regard. States, technology companies, and protection partners must address online recruitment while safeguarding children's rights. The same urgency applies to explosive weapons, attacks on schools and hospitals, and denial of humanitarian access. Children's particular vulnerabilities must inform the planning and conduct of military operations. Third, make children's recovery part of the political foundations of peace. Ceasefire and peace negotiations should include concrete commitments on children's release, safe handover, and reintegration. These measures should begin while negotiations continue. Excellencies, Liberia's experience underscores the importance of education, psychosocial care, family reunification, and community acceptance, with support adapted to girls and boys, including survivors of sexual violence. When peace operations draw down, the council should establish who will assume their child protection functions, with what resources, and how gaps will be prevented. Mr. President, a peace agreement must offer children a future that armed groups cannot take away. That requires predictable funding, national leadership, and safe opportunities for affected children to help shape their recovery. To conclude, on this anniversary, let us judge our progress by whether children are safer, whether perpetrators face accountability, and whether children leaving conflict can stay beyond its reach. Each child rescued from the traps of conflict is a future of peace secured, a family made whole, a community uplifted, and a society made better. This is not a duty we can afford to renege upon. And I thank you for your kind attention.

I thank the representative of Liberia for the statement, and I now give the floor to the representative of the United Kingdom.

Thank you, Excellency, Mr. President, and welcome to you and Vice Minister back to this chamber. Thank you, SRSG Fraser, Executive Director Russell, AU Special Envoy Jagneh, and Director Ellis. Thirty years after its adoption, the United Nations Children in Armed Conflict mandate continues to support the protection of children in conflict. As we have heard, there have been welcome results. Over 40 UN action plans have been agreed with parties to conflict to end and prevent grave violations, which have secured the separation of more than 220,000 children from armed forces and armed groups. For these children, this has meant a reduction in their exposure to violence, reunification with families, mental health and psychosocial support, and access to education. But there is far, far more to do. As we have also heard, the situation facing children in conflict remains dire, and grave violations against children remain at record levels. And the threats they face are evolving with new technologies and new methods of warfare. In Sudan, almost 80% of reported child casualties in the first four months of this year were attributed to drone attacks. In Ukraine, Russian missile and drone attacks kill and injure children, and damage the civilian infrastructure they depend on, including schools and hospitals. In Gaza, 700,000 students are deprived of proper education, schools have been damaged or destroyed. It is therefore critical that we continue to monitor and to report on how such evolving threats affect children, to strengthen engagement with parties, and to hold perpetrators to account. We welcome the Council’s adoption last week of resolution 2832, recognising the impact of digital technologies on children in armed conflict. That resolution strengthens our focus on emerging risks, including how digital technologies can be used for the recruitment and use of children in conflict. And we thank Greece for your leadership on this resolution. We call on all parties listed in the Secretary General's annual report to engage constructively with the United Nations to agree and implement action plans to end and prevent grave violations against children. Mr. President, at a time when respect for international law is under strain, we must protect and build on 30 years of work. That means protecting the integrity of the monitoring and reporting mechanism, ensuring that the United Nations has the access and child protection capacity needed to carry out its work, and upholding the consistent and evidence-based application of the Children in Armed Conflict framework. The United Kingdom will continue to be an active supporter of all that work. Thank you.

I wish to thank the representative of the United Kingdom for the statement. There are no more names inscribed on the list of speakers. The meeting is adjourned.