A/HRC/36/51 status as minors, which requires special protection, and as migrants, which exposes them to all kinds of serious breaches of their fundamental rights. 7. According to the Convention on the Rights of the Child, a child means every human being below the age of 18 years unless, under the law applicable to the child, majority is attained earlier. This definition of a child is the same in both regional and national contexts. In Africa, Europe and the inter-American system of human rights, a child is defined as a human being below the age of 18 years. The term “child” is therefore used throughout the present report to cover children and adolescents below that age. Children on the move and other children affected by migration shall be considered children first and foremost, and their best interests shall be the primary consideration in all actions concerning them. 8. According to the Committee on the Rights of the Child and the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, unaccompanied migrant children are children who have been separated from both parents and other relatives and are not being cared for by an adult who, by law or custom, is responsible for doing so. The study covers unaccompanied children who find themselves outside their country of nationality or, if stateless, outside their country of habitual residence. 9. There are various categories of unaccompanied migrant children: (a) Children separated from their family or caregivers during the move; (b) Children who have started their journey as unaccompanied and separated children, but are currently travelling with groups of people; (c) Children who have interrupted their migration journey because of a lack of resources; in the context of the European migrant crisis, children in this group are often found in urban areas of Greece and Italy. 10. There are often important differences in motivation between migrant children who apply for asylum and those who do not. Children who seek asylum often flee their country from fear of persecution or because of generalized violence; fear is widespread and there is a profound sense of insecurity and impunity.4 Children who do not fall within the definition of an asylum seeker are often moved by the desire to find a place where their basic human rights, including special protection, can be met. Asylum seekers are covered by the Convention relating to the Status of Refugees and its Protocol, while migrant children are covered by international human rights law. However, while in transit, on reception and in destination countries, migrant children and child asylum seekers are exposed to the same risks and human rights violations. Migrant and refugee children have the same universal human rights, as stated in the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants. 5 11. Information received from States shows that there are multiple causes for the migration of children, but they all have one factor in common. At the heart of the motivations for migration, there are multiple violations of the human rights of children in their countries of origin: lack of protection from various manifestations of violence, poverty, lack of opportunities, poor access to education and health services, ill-treatment at home and various kinds of threat, intimidation and insecurity. 12. Marginalized children are locked into a vicious cycle of exclusion, stigmatization and violence, since they start to be perceived as perpetrators themselves, feared by members of their communities and at times criminalized by the authorities. 6 In a survey conducted by UNICEF in 2017 about migrant women and children in Libya, three quarters 4 5 6 4 Source: information provided by the Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Violence against Children to the Advisory Committee, 24 February 2017. The Declaration states (A/RES/71/1, para. 6) that, though their treatment is governed by separate legal frameworks, refugees and migrants have the same universal human rights and fundamental freedoms. They also face many common challenges and have similar vulnerabilities, including in the context of large movements. Source: information provided by the Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Violence against Children to the Advisory Committee, 24 February 2017.