A/HRC/40/51 IV. Conclusions and recommendations A. Conclusions 120. It is by now widely accepted that sports are not immune to such abhorrent crimes as the sale and sexual exploitation of children. All concerned actors have gradually been developing responses and prevention mechanisms to deal with these human rights violations. Furthermore, the international legal framework sets clear obligations for States and responsibilities for sports organizations. The challenge lays with effective implementation of these obligations and responsibilities. 121. The best interests of the child should serve as a fundamental principle throughout the practice of sports and should guide any sports programme, in particular at the elite level. 122. Firstly, it can be concluded that the wide range of codes of conduct and ethics adopted by sports institutions do not follow identical approaches and, crucially, terminology. This is particularly problematic as it precludes the provision of systematic and comprehensive responses. For example, the IOC code of ethics refers to the need to respect international conventions on protecting human rights and bans all forms of harassment and abuse, including sexual abuse, while several other codes of conduct adopted by sports organizations refer only to sexual harassment. Moreover, some organizations have adopted specific references to the prohibition of sexual conduct with children and adopted additional policies on sexual harassment while most other institutions do not go into such detail. 123. It is thus fundamental to clearly ban both sexual harassment and abuse. In addition, in the case of children, perpetrators will groom rather than harass their victims. The specificity of grooming is consequently an additional type of conduct that should be prohibited in all codes of conducts, in addition to being criminalized in national law. 124. What is more, all internal policy documents and codes of conduct or ethics should explicitly refer to international human rights standards and indicate that it is the responsibility of the organization to abide by them. 125. Secondly, in the particular context of football, the regulations adopted by FIFA provide a clear child protection framework. Nonetheless, the numerous instances of contravention of these regulations by football clubs indicate that oversight and subsequent sanctions may be insufficient to guarantee the rights of the child. Moreover, there are several loopholes in the existing regulations, such as the absence of a need for the approval of the subcommittee of the FIFA Players’ Status Committee for the international transfer of children under 10 and the lack of comprehensive oversight over football academies beyond the requirement to register children. 126. A grave source of concern in the context of football is the risk of dilution of existing child protection standards in view of the very large sums of money involved. Children should never be considered as commodities that can provide a source of profit. Furthermore, any investment in the development of children should be done in a manner consistent with the evolving capacities of the child and conducive to the child’s achieving the fullest potential, and driven by the best interest of the child. 127. Thirdly, both States and sports organizations should have as their first priority the eradication of child labour, and should consequently keep this objective in mind with regard to the practice of sports by children. Any sport, in particular at the elite level, that leads to situations of child labour should be reformed. 128. The right to education for the full and harmonious development of the child is thus extremely important in this context, as it is often violated at the elite level of sport and indicative of child labour. The onus should be on providing balanced tuition that does not sacrifice the learning of other skills beyond proficiency in sports. 17