A/HRC/31/35 have been victims of abuse by State officials or private actors are rarely able to access justice effectively and abusers can operate with impunity. 13 15. Migrants who lack access to financial and material resources or are otherwise at risk of discrimination are more likely to experience dangerous journeys and a lengthier, more precarious time in transit than those who are able to pay for faster and safer transport to their destination.14 The amount that migrants have to pay the smugglers usually varies according to the service offered and is often determined by the migrants’ socioeconomic or social status or diaspora connections. 16. Children can be particularly at risk, whether they are travelling on their own or with their families or caregivers. Migrant children in transit are unlikely to be able to access education and health care, including mental health care and timely vaccinations. The difficulty in overcoming the isolation and invisibility of children in transit means that this is often the stage of migration where conventional child-protection systems are weakest.15 A particular issue of concern for migrant children in transit is that of age assessment, with a “culture of disbelief” pervading official determinations of age, particularly in the case of adolescent migrants. Concerns have also been raised about inappropriate and highly intrusive age assessment techniques being applied to children. 16 The vulnerability of migrant children to physical, psychological and/or sexual abuse and exploitation, including child labour, is exacerbated when immigration enforcement policies are allowed to override child rights. 17. Policy responses to groups perceived as vulnerable, such as migrant children in transit, are often premised on models of “rescue” and “return” and on inaccurate or incomplete assumptions about why and how children move, rather than a participatory and rights-based analysis of the best interests of the child.17 18. The Committee on the Rights of the Child has asserted that, in the case of a displaced child, the best interests principle must be respected during all stages of the displacement cycle. At any of those stages, a best interests determination must be documented in preparation of any decision fundamentally impacting on the unaccompanied or separated child’s life.18 13 14 15 16 17 18 6 For instance, it has been noted that there have been few successful prosecutions of migrant smugglers, including in cases of abuse or exploitation of migrants, and those who have been tried have invariably been lower-level transporters or facilitators. See Tuesday Reitano, “A perilous but profitable crossing: The changing nature of migrant smuggling through sub-Saharan Africa to Europe and EU migration policy (2012-2015)”, The European Review of Organised Crime, vol. 2, No. 1, 2015, p. 13. Migrant women with few resources are often used by smugglers as decoys at border crossings to facilitate the movement of other migrants. See Carla Angulo-Pasel, “Complex migration: A woman’s transit journey through Mexico, Working paper (United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women, February 2015), p. 15. In some sea crossings, richer migrants were able to secure passage on the upper deck of boats, while poorer migrants found accommodation in the more dangerous hull. See “The darker your skin – the further down you go: The hierarchical system aboard Italy’s migrant boats that governs who lives and who dies”, The Independent, 21 April 2015. Daniela Reale, “Protecting and supporting children on the move: Translating principles into practice” in Children on the Move (Geneva, IOM, 2013), p. 67 and 68. See A/69/277, para. 14. Moussa Harouna Sambo and Fabrizio Terenzio, “Children on the move: a different voice”, in Children on the Move (Geneva, IOM, 2013), p. 23. See the Committee’s general comment No. 6 (2006) on the treatment of unaccompanied and separated children outside their country of origin, para. 19.