On the day of the celebration of the Universal Children’s Day and 25 years after the adoption of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the Network of Organizations for Children of Serbia – MODS reminds that the state has done a lot to create and improve the positive legal framework for better life of children in Serbia, but there are still great problems and challenges.

State has pledged to do everything for children in Serbia to be safe, but with the first cold days the media informed us about accidents in which children were burnt to death in their cardboard houses. Unfortunately, it turned out that neither school yards are safe and that they can be dangerous to the life of children.

Over the past two decades, the number of children in Serbia decreased by 580,000 and now children make 17.6% of the population in Serbia. The percentage of children which on time receive all recommended immunizations is 70.5. Unfortunately, toys and books are not available to all children younger than 5 years of age – almost one third of children grow up without them. It is still a challenge to the state to ensure that children grow up within a family and their natural environment. Roma children are still overrepresented in the system of formal care, while children with disabilities are overrepresented in the institutional care (out of the total number of children in residential accommodation 58.5% are children with disabilities, and out of the total number of children in foster care only 9% are children with disabilities). In addition, discrimination against children is still widespread, especially against Roma children and children with disabilities.

It is encouraging that the number of parents who declare that they use violent methods in upbringing their children has decreased, that more than a half of parents (57%) in Serbia do not apply violent methods to discipline children and that we can expect that corporal punishment of  children will be explicitly prohibited in Serbia.

Network of Organizations for Children in Serbia - MODS calls on the Government of the Republic of Serbia and the National Assembly to pay special attention to solving many problems and obstacles to exercising of the rights of all children – the right to freely develop and grow without discrimination, play and educate, and live dignifiedly, safely, healthy and happily.