Committee on the Rights of the Child

List of issues in relation to the combined fifth and sixth periodic reports of Kyrgyzstan *

1.The State party is requested to submit in writing additional, updated information (10,700 words maximum), if possible before 2 June 2023. The Committee may take up all aspects of children’s rights set out in the Convention during the dialogue with the State party.

Part I

2.Please provide information on the following:

(a)Plans to implement the Child Code (2021) and the prospects of including child rights-related laws in the legal inventory process;

(b)Measures taken to strengthen the coordination of all policies relating to the implementation of the Convention at the national and local level and across all sectors, in the absence of a government authority with this mandate;

(c)The mandate and resources allocated to the newly established Commissioner for Children’s Rights and the measures taken to ensure the independence of the role;

(d)Plans to digitalize the case management process;

(e)Plans to engage in meaningful consultations with civil society when elaborating draft laws that affect human rights and fundamental freedoms, in particular freedom of association.

3.Please describe the mechanisms in place to promote the meaningful and empowered participation of children in the development of laws and local policies affecting them.

4.Please provide information on measures taken:

(a)To implement the citizenship automated information system;

(b)To ensure access to birth registration for children whose parents do not have regular residence status or have an undetermined nationality;

(c)To identify and protect stateless children, such as through a procedure to determine whether they are stateless.

5.Please provide information on the measures taken to ensure that children are able and encouraged to effectively exercise their rights to freedom of expression, including in school, and to access information without unnecessary restrictions.

6.Please provide information on measures taken:

(a)To eliminate corporal punishment in all settings, and promote positive and non-violent forms of child-rearing and discipline and attitudinal change within the family and in penal institutions and schools, including through awareness-raising campaigns;

(b)To prevent the stigma and secondary victimization of children who are victims of or witnesses to violence, including through child-friendly and multisectoral procedures and remedies;

(c)To prevent “bride-kidnapping”, conduct relevant awareness-raising activities among the judiciary and law enforcement officials, and provide support to victims;

(d)To strengthen programmes for preventing child marriages, including the early marriage prevention plan.

7.Please explain the measures taken:

(a)To address the large number of children in institutional care, such as through the adoption of a deinstitutionalization strategy;

(b)To ensure sufficient family- and community-based care, including foster care, for children who cannot stay with their families;

(c)To provide support for children left behind by migrant parents;

(d)To facilitate the reunification of children with their families when possible;

(e)To put in place a mechanism to ensure the reporting, monitoring and remedying of violence against and abuse of children in alternative care.

8.Please provide information on the measures taken:

(a)To combat the stigmatization of and discrimination against children with disabilities;

(b)To adopt the draft law on the rights of persons with disabilities;

(c)To ensure the right of children with disabilities to grow up in a family environment;

(d)To investigate cases of sexual exploitation and abuse of girls with disabilities.

9.Please explain the measures taken:

(a)To ensure access for asylum-seeking, refugee and stateless children and children with disabilities to affordable health services;

(b)To address the overhospitalization of children;

(c)To address the mental health needs of children and adolescents;

(d)To ensure access for adolescents to sexual and reproductive health information and services, including free contraceptives and safe abortion services;

(e)To reduce air pollution levels, which affect children’s health, and to increase children’s awareness of climate change and natural disasters.

10.Please provide information on policies or measures in place to ensure the right of all children to an adequate standard of living, including through access to the national social protection scheme.

11.Please provide information on the following:

(a)Progress in ensuring access for all children with disabilities to inclusive education in mainstream schools;

(b)Measures taken to provide education in the languages of minority groups;

(c)Whether or not human rights education has been incorporated into mandatory school curricula;

(d)Introduction of the history of religion into school curricula, and the training of teachers in this regard.

12.Please provide information on the following:

(a)Plans to implement the Committee’s previous recommendations to remove the requirement of 10 days’ notification prior to the visit of labour inspectors and to organize regular unannounced inspection of private and State employment sites;

(b)Measures to address the worst forms of child labour, including in uranium mining and domestic work.

13.Please describe the measures taken:

(a)To establish a child justice system in compliance with the Convention;

(b)To adopt a new State programme on justice for children and to make the Interagency Coordination Council for Juvenile Justice operational again;

(c)To avoid and limit the use of pretrial detention, in particular to ensure that detention is used only as a measure of last resort;

(d)To promote mediation and other non-custodial alternatives to detention, including non-judicial measures.

14.With reference to the recommendations contained in the Committee’s previous concluding observations on the combined third and fourth periodic reports of the State party and the Committee’s concluding observations on the report submitted by the State party under the Optional Protocol on the sale of children, child prostitution and child pornography, please explain the measures taken:

(a)To define and criminalize all crimes under the Optional Protocol in accordance with articles 2 and 3 of the Optional Protocol;

(b)To prevent, and ensure the effective investigation of, all forms of the sale of children prohibited under the Optional Protocol;

(c)To establish extraterritorial jurisdiction over all crimes covered by the Optional Protocol.

15.With reference to the recommendations contained in the Committee’s previous concluding observations on the third and fourth periodic reports of the State party and the Committee’s concluding observations on the report submitted by the State party under the Optional Protocol on the involvement of children in armed conflict, please describe the measures taken:

(a)To criminalize the recruitment of children under 18 years of age by non-State armed groups;

(b)To establish a mechanism for the early identification of children who may have been involved in armed conflict abroad upon entering the State party and provide them with all appropriate care and support;

(c)To extend the extraterritorial jurisdiction for crimes concerning the recruitment and involvement of children in hostilities;

(d)To prohibit the export of arms, including small arms, to countries where children are known to be recruited or used in hostilities.

Part II

16.The Committee invites the State party to provide a brief update, of no more than three pages, on the information in its report with regard to the following:

(a)New bills or laws and their respective regulations;

(b)New institutions and their mandates or institutional reforms;

(c)Recently introduced policies, programmes and action plans, their scope and the financing provided for their implementation;

(d)Recent ratifications of human rights instruments.

Part III

Data, statistics and other information

17.Please provide consolidated information for the past three years on the budget lines regarding children and the social sectors, indicating the percentage of each budget line in terms of the total national budget and the gross national product. Please also provide information on the geographical allocation of those resources.

18.Please provide updated statistical data, disaggregated by age, sex, ethnic origin, national origin, geographical location and socioeconomic status, for the past three years, on the following:

(a)The birth registration rate;

(b)Children who have been identified as stateless;

(c)Cases of violence against children, including abuse, neglect and sexual exploitation and abuse, that have been reported to the authorities, investigated and prosecuted, including information on the sanctions imposed on the perpetrators;

(d)Cases of “bride-kidnapping” that have been reported to the authorities, investigated and prosecuted and sanctions imposed on the perpetrators;

(e)Children living in poverty;

(f)Children with disabilities who are attending mainstream school, who are out of school or who have reported having experienced violence;

(g)Children in street situations;

(h)Asylum-seeking, refugee and migrant children entering the State party from areas where children may have been recruited or used in hostilities.

19.Please provide information on how a children’s rights-based approach is integrated into the planning, implementation and monitoring of measures for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals, including with regard to the participation of children and data collection, and on how those measures promote the realization of children’s rights under the Convention and the Optional Protocols thereto.

20.Please provide the Committee with an update of any data in the report that may have been outdated by more recent data collected or other new developments.

21.In addition, the State party may list areas affecting children that it considers to be of priority with regard to the implementation of the Convention.