A/HRC/9/3 page 14 46. The Special Representative recommends that the Council ensure that concluding observations and recommendations made by the Committee on the Rights of the Child on reports submitted by States parties under article 8 of the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict form the basis of the universal periodic review, and that the Council act as a complementary follow-up mechanism to assess the implementation of those observations and recommendations, particularly with regard to the parties to conflict listed in the annexes to the annual report of the Secretary-General (S/2007/757). 47. The Special Representative encourages States parties to the Convention on the Rights of the Child to submit reports under the Optional Protocol to the Committee on the Rights of the Child; to take measures to support the recommendations of the Committee; to strengthen national and international measures for the prevention of the recruitment of children into armed forces or groups and their use in hostilities, in particular by signing and ratifying the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict, and by enacting legislation that explicitly prohibits the recruitment of children into armed forces or groups and their use in hostilities; and to exercise extraterritorial jurisdiction to strengthen the international protection of children against recruitment. 48. In the light of the fact that the vast majority of parties to conflict 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 pursuant to Security Council resolutions 1539 (2004) and 1612 (2005). 49. The Special Representative calls on Member States to comply with international norms and standards for the protection of children in armed conflict, and to take all necessary measures, as a matter of priority, to mitigate the impact of conflict on children that inhibits their full and equal enjoyment of all human rights and fundamental freedoms. 50. The Special Representative recommends that national institutions for human rights monitoring be strengthened, and invites the international community to continue to allocate adequate funding to strengthen further national institutional and societal capacities and mechanisms for monitoring, promoting and protecting human rights, including those of children.