BELARUS NEWS AND ANALYSIS
DATE:
05/12/2008
Belarus, UNICEF to continue working on joint projects
Belarus and the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) will continue working on joint projects, Deputy Foreign Minister Viktor Gaisenok said during a session on the mid-term review of the UNICEF Country Programme for Belarus for 2006-2008 and the joint work prospects for 2009-2010, informs BelTA.
According to Viktor Gaisenok, the main goal of the review is to analyze and assess the efficiency of the joint work within the framework of the Country Programme, to adjust the cooperation areas for the next two years. "We hope that in the result of the joint work we will be able to elaborate the recommendations which will help us cooperate more actively with the United Nations Children's Fund, to understand more clearly the tasks and problems we are concerned over," Viktor Gaisenok said.
The Foreign Ministry views the singing of the basic agreement on cooperation between the Republic of Belarus and the UNICEF as the most important moments of cooperation with the UNICEF in 2006-2008. This year the parliament passed the law to ratify the agreement. The UN Secretariat is yet to notify about the entry into force of the agreement. This year, on the initiative of Belarus, the UNICEF took a decision to award a UNICEF Office in Belarus a status of a full-fledged UNICEF Country Office.
Viktor Gaisenok said that over the last two years the cooperation with the UNICEF has considerably stepped up. The UN Children's Fund started to support the national and international human trafficking prevention initiatives of Belarus. "Although human trafficking is not such an urgent issue in Belarus as it is in other CIS member states and the European Union, its scale and global character require taking additional concerted measures on the international level. This is why our country has presented several international initiatives over the recent years," he said.
The preliminary analysis of the implementation of the programme has shown that certain priority issues have not lost their importance and chime in with the national priorities regarding children. The Country Programme for Belarus helped fulfill the international commitments of Belarus, including the ones to protect children's rights. In line with the programme, the legislation to protect children's rights is being improved. It is necessary to point out the fruitful work in such areas as the early development of a child, children's and youth health care, HIV/AIDS prevention, protection of children's rights.
The priority tasks to the UNICEF mission in Belarus are to step up efforts to raise additional donor resources for the Country Programme for Belarus and a more efficient use of funds while developing and implementing new joint projects of the international technical and humanitarian aid. It is necessary to attract the UNICEF expertise and methodical help for national partners, introduce international innovation methods of the work with children and families.
According to the official, when developing the new projects it is necessary to pay attention to improving the state of the most vulnerable categories of children including disabled children, orphans, juvenile delinquents, violence and human trafficking victims. Joint efforts should be stepped up to solve the problems of social orphanage, de-institutionalization of orphans.
One of the main priorities of the Belarusian social policy is to help the Chernoby-affected population. "The issues of the protection of health and rights of the children living in the affected areas should be reflected in the subsequent programme," Viktor Gaisenok highlighted. Enlargement of the projects, brining an increased emphasis on bigger groups of children who are in need of support will increase the efficiency of the projects and produce big results. "I hope the cooperation between the Republic of Belarus and UNICEF will be based, as before, on a constructive and transparent dialogue on all the aspects of the joint activity," Viktor Gaisenok added.
Source:
http://news.trend.az/index.shtml?show=news&newsid=1364118&lang=EN
Archive
Subscribe Daily Newsletter:
Belarus News and Analysis Donate:
