Over the past few weeks, two events have underlined the extreme vulnerability of migrant children as well as the noticeable lack of political will by governments to act in their best interests. Statistics earlier this year estimated that migrants under the age of 18 constituted 12% of the global population of people on the move – around 33m or 1.5% of the world’s total number of children. In Africa, children and young adults constitute 16% of all mobile people.

The statistics make the point that children and young adults are particularly at risk in the world of mobile people, for many obvious reasons. It is also increasingly clear that they face obstacles of a political and administrative nature that impede their being absorbed into and protected by family support.

Paper by CPLO