Children’s rights should precede politics

Photo: Mait Ots

In his report, published yesterday, Council of Europe human rights commissioner Nils Muižnieks is again pointing to the stateless children in Estonia. In his opinion, Estonia – as the other Baltic States – is, in this issue, overly influenced by history and therefore unable to prioritize the children’s rights and their full participation in society from birth.

You visited Estonia in March and now you have published a report on the country. How, in your view, are things with human rights, in Estonia generally?

Estonia is among the many European countries that have been through austerity policy. We were highly interested in how austerity policy impacted human rights. It was very exciting for me that, during my visit and talking to people, they mentioned the economic crisis as a thing of the past. They said: yes, we had that, but we survived that and it is no longer an issue. That differs greatly from what I have heard in many other European countries.

It was interesting to study the long-term effects of the crisis. These are still evident in areas like children’s poverty, youth unemployment, the differing situations of Estonians and Russians on the labour market – which has always been, but has been magnified by the crisis. It is the same in Latvia.

I had many interesting meetings, but in the picture I found some contradictions.

Such as?

Like your structures of protection of human rights. You have the institution of the Chancellor of Justice, which is very highly esteemed by all. This is very well resourced, with close to 50 people employed, and having wide scale of functions. So you have a highly respected, mighty institution, and you have a gender equality and equal treatment commissioner so underfinanced that it is quite shocking: two people, yearly budget of €60,000. For me, the difference between these two is quite striking.

But I also had numerous discussions about the stateless children. This is a topic that, for years, I have been raising in Latvia. And I will keep raising it until this topic is solved in the Baltic States.

The number of such children is not very large in Estonia – less than 1,200 kids. So it feels like the problem could be solved and then forgotten. Every time I start talking about the stateless children, people start talking about immigration, citizenship, the past, but I say: let us talk about the children! Let us talk about their interests.

Why is the topic of stateless children so important for you? The way I understand it, Estonian politicians are not about to change the related laws.

I know the sensitivity of the issue due to the history of the Baltic States, I have been involved in the debate in Latvia for twenty years. But for me, if we are talking about children, then we are talking about an especially vulnerable segment of society, whose interests we would have to always consider.

But, in Latvia and Estonia, children’s rights are very often forgotten. I think that if we should ask somebody if it were in a child’s interests to have nationality at birth or not, then for me the answer is clear: it is in the child’s interests. Also, for most UN human rights experts, the issue is quite clear – it is in the children’s interests.

Thus: what is it that is hindering people from acting in the children’s interests? It is other reasons, usually political.

Why is that important? For many reasons. What does not having a citizenship mean for a child? It means growing up not being a full member of the society; it means that the child’s family has no access to some socioeconomic and also political rights.

For Latvia, we have study results – I believe they also apply to Estonia – that being stateless has become a part of people’s identity. This is not the positive identity we would like to promote in a modern democratic society.

I think the key issue is what would be in the child’s interests, and we have to go from there. Many people say that this is the parents- decision, but to that I reply that parents should not be allowed to make decisions which are not in the child’s interests. And it is the state’s task to hinder this problem from reproducing itself.

This is not a topic that I have raised only in Estonia and Latvia. I have also done that in the former Yugoslavia, Italy and elsewhere, where there are many stateless Roma people. My vision is that, all right, let us not talk about stateless people generally, but let us talk about the children, because here we have very clear human rights standards, approaching it from the aspect of children’s rights. This, indeed, is difficult to do often – to separate this from the issue of their parents – but let us talk about the children.

During your visit in March, you said you were surprised at the poor quality of statistics on children’s poverty in Estonia.

Surely, the existence of statistical data is absolutely necessary. Here, the European Union has put pressure on member states, and now that you are in OECD then through that much more statistics can be obtained.

But the overall trend is positive, although the absolute rate of children’s poverty, in 2012, still was 14 per cent, which is remarkable for a country with a growing economy and which is a member of the European Union. You are indeed dealing with the problem, but much remains to be done.

Because one thing that has to be kept in mind when it comes to children’s poverty is that when one talks to experts then they admit that we do not know what are the long term effects of children’s poverty. But it is clear, I think, that children’s poverty affects their health; and if their health condition is poor now, then in 20-30 years time this will mean large expenses for society. If, due to poverty, their access to education is limited, this also will affect the entire society.

Even though we do not know what the effects of it will be in five, ten or twenty years, it is clear that it is cheaper to deal with the problems now than later.

Another interesting topic related to children, in the report, was physical punishment. You are advising Estonia to take clear legal measures to prohibit such punishment. What exactly do you mean? Make corporal punishment a criminal offence?

Yes. This means that such punishment must be banned both in families, schools and in other contexts. Violence towards children may never be used as a method of punishment. Such provisions are in place now in many European countries and it has become a standard regarding children’s rights.

There are study results that show that this is a problem in Estonia, both among Estonians and Russians. You need your awareness raised, but you also need amendment of law which would prohibit this and would punish the people who deal with children this way.