Child, Early and Forced Marriage

A/RES/75/167View PDF

Who created this mandate?

A Resolution of the General Assembly, under agenda item 68aPromotion and protection of the rights of children, published in 2020.

What other versions does this mandate have?

7 versions · 2014–2024

This is an older version — the most recent is A/RES/79/158

2024A/RES/79/158Child, early and forced marriageLatestCompare with previous version
2023A/RES/77/202Child, early and forced marriageCompare with previous version
2020A/RES/75/167Child, early and forced marriageCompare with previous version
2019A/RES/73/153Child, early and forced marriageCompare with previous version
2017A/RES/71/175Child, early and forced marriageCompare with previous version

Versions are identified automatically by matching titles within the same organ (~97% accuracy on a manual audit).

What subjects does this mandate have?

7 topics

Child Welfare Covid-19 Early Marriage Forced Marriage Girls Rights of the Child Women

Which reports were submitted under this mandate?

1 report of the Secretary-General submitted under this mandate, 2022.

2022A/77/282Issue of child, early and forced marriage report of the Secretary-General

Identified automatically from the metadata in each report’s UN Digital Library catalogue record.

What does this mandate say?

37 operative paragraphs

Takes note with appreciation of the report of the Secretary-General;

Calls upon States, with the participation of relevant stakeholders, including women and girls, men and boys, parents and other family members, teachers, religious, traditional and community leaders, civil society, organizations led by girls, women’s organizations, youth and human rights groups, the media and the private sector, to develop and implement holistic, comprehensive and coordinated responses and strategies to prevent and eliminate child, early and forced marriage, to support girls and women who are affected or at risk, who have fled such a marriage or whose marriage has dissolved, and widowed girls or women who were married as girls, including through the strengthening of child protection systems, protection mechanisms such as safe shelters, access to justice and the sharing of best practices across borders;

Also calls upon States to develop and implement measures at all levels to end child, early and forced marriage, including national and subnational action plans where appropriate, and to make adequate resources available across relevant sectors, including health, nutrition, protection, governance and education;

Urges States to enact, enforce and uphold laws and policies aimed at preventing and ending child, early and forced marriage, protecting those at risk and addressing the needs of those affected, and work towards the coherence of these laws and policies at the local level, to ensure that marriage is entered into only with the informed, free and full consent of the intending spouses;

Calls upon States to enact, enforce and uphold laws concerning a minimum age of marriage, to monitor their application and to progressively amend laws with lower minimum ages of marriage and/or ages of majority to 18 and engage all relevant authorities to ensure that these laws are well known;

Urges States to repeal or amend laws and remove any provisions that enable perpetrators of rape, sexual abuse or abduction to escape prosecution and punishment by marrying their victims;

Calls upon States to strengthen their efforts to ensure the timely registration of births and marriages, especially for individuals living in rural and remote areas, including by identifying and removing all physical, administrative, procedural and any other barriers that impede access to registration and by providing, where lacking, mechanisms for the registration of customary and religious marriages;

Also calls upon States to promote the meaningful participation of and active consultation with children and adolescents, including already married girls, on all issues affecting them and to raise awareness about their rights, including the negative impact of child, early and forced marriage, through safe spaces, forums and support networks, including in digital spaces, that provide information, life skills and leadership skills training and opportunities, including catch-up and literacy education, and lifelong learning opportunities, remote learning opportunities and childcare, as needed, to be empowered, to express themselves, to participate meaningfully in all decisions that affect them and to become agents of change within their communities;

Further calls upon States to promote awareness-raising about the harmful effects of child, early and forced marriage on the individual and wider society and the benefits of ending this harmful practice, including through open dialogue with all stakeholders, including girls and boys, women and men, religious, traditional and community leaders, parents, legal guardians and other family members, to work with local communities to combat negative social norms and gender stereotypes that condone child, early and forced marriage, to empower parents and communities to abandon the practice and to empower all women and girls to make informed decisions about their lives;

Recognizes that the child, for the full and harmonious development of his or her personality, should grow up in a family environment and in an atmosphere of happiness, love and understanding and that parents or, as the case may be, legal guardians have the primary responsibility for the upbringing and development of the child, acknowledging the need to support their capacity to prevent and eliminate child, early and forced marriage, and reaffirming that the best interests of the child will be their basic concern;

Urges Governments, while addressing child, early and forced marriage, to confront family poverty and social exclusion through investing in family-oriented policies addressing the multidimensional aspects of poverty, focusing on education, health, employment, social security, livelihoods and social cohesion, paying special attention to gender-sensitive social protection measures, child allowances for parents and pension benefits for older persons and protecting, supporting and empowering children, including girls, in child-headed households;

Also urges Governments, with the collaboration of relevant stakeholders, to tackle poverty, lack of economic opportunities for women and girls and other entrenched economic incentives that act as drivers of child, early and forced marriage, including by ensuring the rights of women and girls to inheritance and property, their equal access with men and boys to social protection, childcare services and direct financial services, to encourage girls to continue their education, including through their re-enrolment in school after childbirth, to develop livelihood opportunities through access to technical and vocational education and training and life skills education, including financial literacy, and to promote freedom of movement, women’s equal access to full and productive employment and decent work, as well as equal political participation and rights to inherit, own and control land and productive measures;

Encourages States to promote and protect the human rights of already married girls and women affected by this harmful practice, to promote equality in all aspects of marriage and its dissolution and to address their specific needs, such as through targeted programmes that provide social services to protect them from sexual and gender-based violence, increase their decision-making power, make it easier for them to seek formal employment, increase their economic independence and financial literacy, access education, skills development programmes and lifelong learning opportunities, ensure their equal access to health-care services and information and decrease their social isolation, including by establishing or strengthening childcare services and working with communities to change discriminatory social norms;

Calls upon States to promote and protect the right of women and girls to equal access to education through enhanced emphasis on free and quality primary and secondary education, including catch-up and literacy education for those who have not received formal education, have left school early or were forced to leave school, including because of marriage, pregnancy, childbirth and/or childcare responsibilities, which empowers young women and girls to make informed decisions about their lives, employment, economic opportunities and health, including through scientifically accurate and age-appropriate comprehensive education that is relevant to cultural contexts, that provides adolescent girls and boys and young women and men, in and out of school, consistent with their evolving capacities, and with appropriate direction and guidance from parents and legal guardians, with the best interests of the child as their basic concern, information on sexual and reproductive health and HIV prevention, gender equality and the empowerment of women, human rights, physical, psychological and pubertal development and power in relationships between women and men, to enable them to build self-esteem and foster informed decision-making, communication and risk reduction skills and to develop respectful relationships, in full partnership with young persons, parents, legal guardians, caregivers, educators and health-care providers, in order to contribute to ending child, early and forced marriage;

Recognizes that education is one of the most effective ways to prevent and eliminate child, early and forced marriage and to help married women and girls to make informed decisions about their lives, and urges States to remove barriers to education, including by investing in quality primary and secondary education for every child in a safe environment, through adequate financing, ensuring that married girls and boys, pregnant girls and women and young parents continue to have access to schooling, improving access to quality formal education and skills development, especially for those living in remote or insecure areas, improving the safety of girls at and on the way to and from school, providing safe and adequate sanitation, including for menstrual hygiene management, adopting and implementing laws and policies to prohibit, prevent and address violence and to hold perpetrators accountable, strengthening and intensifying their efforts to implement effective violence prevention and response activities in schools and communities, engaging men and boys, community leaders and parents, educating children from a young age regarding their human rights and the importance of treating all people with dignity and respect and designing educational programmes and teaching materials that support respectful relationships, non-violent behaviours, gender equality and empowerment of women and girls;

Encourages States to adopt, as appropriate, and implement inclusive policies and programmes to promote technical and vocational training and skills development and lifelong learning opportunities, including in science, technology, engineering and mathematics and in information and communications technology, as well as higher educational opportunities for women and girls, including those at risk of or affected by child, early and forced marriage, so as to enable them to gain the knowledge, attitudes and skills that they need to fulfil their full potential;

Urges Governments to promote, respect and protect the right to the enjoyment of the highest attainable standard of physical and mental health through the development and enforcement of policies and legal frameworks and the strengthening of health systems, including health information systems, that make universally accessible and available quality, gender-responsive, adolescent-friendly health services, sexual and reproductive health-care services, information and commodities, HIV and AIDS prevention, testing, treatment and care, mental health services and nutrition interventions and prevention, treatment of and care for obstetric fistula and other obstetric complications by providing the continuum of services, including family planning, prenatal and postnatal care, skilled birth attendance, emergency obstetric care and post-partum care;

Also urges Governments to promote and protect the human rights of all women and girls, including the right of women, and those girls who have been subjected to child, early and forced marriage, to have control over and decide freely and responsibly on matters related to their sexuality, including sexual and reproductive health, free of coercion, discrimination and violence, and to adopt and accelerate the implementation of laws, policies and programmes that protect and enable the enjoyment of all human rights and fundamental freedoms, including reproductive rights, in accordance with the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development, the Beijing Platform for Action and the outcome documents of their review conferences;

Urges States to formulate or review, as needed, appropriate policies, programmes or strategies in order to prevent and eliminate child, early and forced marriage, and address discrimination and violence, including domestic violence, which may occur against women and girls subjected to child, early and forced marriage, as well as strengthen child protection systems and provide targets and timetables for implementation;

Also urges States to ensure access to justice and accountability mechanisms and remedies for the effective implementation and enforcement of laws aimed at preventing and eliminating child, early and forced marriage, including by informing women, girls and boys about their rights under relevant laws, including in marriage and at its dissolution, improving legal infrastructure, removing all barriers to access to legal counselling, assistance and remedies, training law enforcement officers, the judiciary and professionals working with women and children and ensuring oversight of the handling of cases of child, early and forced marriage;

Calls upon States to develop and implement, in consultation with and with the participation of women and, as appropriate, girls, and integrate into humanitarian responses, from the early stages of humanitarian emergencies, measures to address the increased vulnerability of women and girls to child, early and forced marriage, and to protect women and girls from sexual and gender-based violence and exploitation during humanitarian emergencies, situations of forced displacement, armed conflict, natural disasters and public health emergencies, including by ensuring their access to such services as health and education, as well as strengthening follow-up and interventions to prevent and eliminate child, early and forced marriage in humanitarian settings, as well as to address the needs of those affected;

Also calls upon States to take a comprehensive, rights-based, age- and gender-responsive, victim-centred and multisectoral approach that takes into account linkages with other harmful practices in the prevention of and response to child, early and forced marriage in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, and to pay particular attention to the specific needs of all women and girls, in particular those in vulnerable situations and those experiencing various forms of violence, discrimination, stigmatization, exclusion and inequalities, including in humanitarian situations, in terms of, inter alia, access to essential services such as safe spaces, shelters and other social protection services, health-care services, safe and affordable drinking water and adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all, as well as access to education and to timely registration of births and marriages;

Further calls upon States, with the collaboration of relevant stakeholders, to ensure that COVID-19 response measures are transformative, participatory and adequately funded, promote inclusive, gender-equal and sustainable economies and societies, and address inequalities and exclusion and poverty, which are among the root causes of child, early and forced marriage by, inter alia:

Paying particular attention to the specific needs of children, especially adolescent girls, who are more likely to be subjected to child, early and forced marriage, in the response to the COVID-19 pandemic at all levels, and promoting their effective and meaningful participation in decisions that affect them, by prioritizing the provision of child- and adolescent-centred services, with a focus on equitable access, particularly in relation to schooling, nutrition programmes, immunization, maternal and newborn care, and child protection programmes;

Mitigating the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on families and communities by, inter alia, expanding programmes that protect them against economic shocks, including poverty eradication measures, labour policies, public services and gender-responsive social protection programmes;

Mitigating the impact of school closures, particularly for those learners who are among the poorest, most marginalized and vulnerable, especially girls, by facilitating access to and continuity of equitable and inclusive quality education for all, including through distance learning, re-enrolling all previously enrolled children and those who were already out of school, providing community awareness on the importance of girls’ education, and working to ensure that those subjected to child, early and forced marriage, pregnant girls and women, as well as young parents, also continue to have access to schooling on an equal basis with others, including by ensuring access to the Internet and bridging the digital divides, both between and within countries and the gender digital divide;

Adopting measures to recognize, reduce and redistribute women’s and girls’ disproportionate share of unpaid care and domestic work and the feminization of poverty, which is exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, and to address the discrimination and gender inequality, including gender stereotypes and negative social norms, attitudes and behaviours, unequal power relations in which women and girls are viewed as subordinate to men and boys, that are at the root of these imbalances;

Ensuring continuity and further strengthening protection and support services for women and girls who experience violence, including sexual and gender-based violence, including domestic violence, during the COVID-19 pandemic, especially girls at risk of child, early and forced marriage and already married girls and women affected by this harmful practice, and designating protection shelters, hotlines and help desks, health and support services and legal protection and support as essential services available to all women and girls, in addition to establishing safeguarding measures and raising awareness and providing training for police, judiciary, first responders, health workers, and education and child services staff;

Ensuring uninterrupted access to and funding for essential health-care services, including sexual and reproductive health-care services, and to safe and affordable drinking water and adequate and equitable sanitation and hygiene for all, including menstrual hygiene, and including in disadvantaged areas such as rural communities, informal settlements and humanitarian settings;

Mitigating the impact of COVID-19 response measures on the ability of civil society organizations and other relevant stakeholders working at the local and national levels to continue their work with girls, families and local communities to prevent and respond to child, early and forced marriage;

Encourages relevant United Nations entities and agencies, regional and subregional organizations, within their respective mandates, civil society and other relevant actors and human rights mechanisms to continue to collaborate among themselves and with Member States in developing and implementing strategies and policies at the national, regional and international levels to prevent and eliminate child, early and forced marriage, as well as to support those who were married as children;

Encourages relevant United Nations entities and agencies, regional and subregional organizations, the international financial institutions, civil society and other relevant actors and human rights mechanisms to continue to collaborate with Member States and national statistical agencies in order to assist in strengthening and building capacity for data and reporting systems for analysing, monitoring and publicly reporting on progress to end child, early and forced marriage based on evidence;

Affirms the need for States and relevant United Nations entities and agencies to improve the collection and use of quantitative, qualitative and comparable data on violence against women and harmful practices, including in humanitarian settings and in the context of public health emergencies such as COVID-19, disaggregated by sex, age, disability, civil status, race, ethnicity, migratory status, geographical location, socioeconomic status, education level and other key factors, as appropriate, to enhance research and dissemination of evidence-based and good practices relating to the prevention and elimination of child, early and forced marriage and to strengthen monitoring and impact assessment of existing policies and programmes as a means of ensuring their effectiveness and implementation;

Encourages the international community to fulfil its commitment in supporting developing countries, particularly African countries, least developed countries, small island developing States and landlocked developing countries, in strengthening the capacity of national statistical offices and data systems to ensure access to high-quality, timely, reliable and disaggregated data while ensuring national ownership in supporting and tracking progress, including in the context of child, early and forced marriage;

Encourages Governments to include information on progress towards eliminating child, early and forced marriage, including best practices and implementation efforts, in their national reports to relevant international treaty bodies and the universal periodic review and within the national voluntary reviews conducted through the high-level political forum on sustainable development;

Requests the Secretary-General to submit a comprehensive report to the General Assembly, based on evidence, before the end of its seventy-sixth session, on progress towards ending child, early and forced marriage worldwide, including in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, as well as best practices for programmes aimed at ending the practice and supporting already married girls and women affected by this practice, including girls’ and women’s empowerment programmes, gaps in funding, research and data collection, using information provided by Member States, United Nations bodies, agencies, funds and programmes, civil society and other relevant stakeholders;

Decides to consider the issue of child, early and forced marriage at its seventy-seventh session under the item entitled “Promotion and protection of the rights of children”, taking into account the multifaceted and worldwide nature of this issue.

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