A/HRC/9/3 page 12 IV. REMAINING CHALLENGES INVOLVING CHILDREN IN ARMED CONFLICT 36. Despite the important developments mentioned above, many challenges persist that will require concerted action and continued global efforts to protect war-affected children. The Special Representative remains gravely concerned that the six grave violations are still being committed against children by parties to conflict, in blatant violation of international law. The Special Representative would like to bring to the attention of the Human Rights Council the parties who were included on the annexes to the latest report of the Secretary-General on children and armed conflict (S/2007/757) (see annexes I and II). The Special Representative calls on Member States, who bear a central and immediate political, legal and moral responsibility, to not only comply with international norms and standards for the protection of children within their territories, but also to work in cooperation with the international community to ensure children’s demobilization, rehabilitation and reintegration into society. Furthermore, the Special Representative strongly recommends that national justice processes ensure that the special needs and rights of children affected by conflict are considered. 37. The Special Representative also encourages States parties to the Convention on the Rights of the Child to strengthen national and international measures for the prevention of recruitment of children into armed forces or armed groups and their use in hostilities, in particular by signing and ratifying the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict and enacting legislation that explicitly prohibits and criminalizes the recruitment of children into armed forces or groups and their use in hostilities. They should also exercise extraterritorial jurisdiction in order to strengthen the international protection of children against recruitment. 38. In the light of the fact that the vast majority of parties to conflict listed in the annexes to the annual report of the Secretary-General are non-State actors, the Special Representative requests Member States to help facilitate dialogue between the United Nations country task forces on monitoring and reporting and these groups, for the purposes of developing plans of action to halt the recruitment and use of children, and to address all other grave violations committed against children. V. WORKING WITH THE UNITED NATIONS HUMAN RIGHTS SYSTEM 39. Notwithstanding the important strides for the protection of children made since the previous report of the Special Representative, the overall situation of children affected by armed conflict remains grave, as parties continuing to defy even the most basic principles of international humanitarian law. It is therefore important, if not critical, that the United Nations human rights system continue to play a major role and actively uphold the need to protect the rights of conflict-affected children. 40. The Office of the Special Representative is working closely with the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) to raise awareness of the rights of children affected by armed conflict. OHCHR is an active member of the Task Force on Children and Armed Conflict and its steering committee on monitoring and reporting at Headquarters in New York. The strengthening of the human rights monitoring capacity of