A/HRC/21/31 I. Background 1. In its resolution 7/29 on the rights of the child, the Human Rights Council decided to dedicate, at a minimum, an annual full-day meeting to discuss different specific themes on the rights of the child, including the identification of challenges in the realization of the rights of the child. In its resolution 16/12 on the promotion and protection of the rights of children working and/or living on the street, the Council decided to focus its next annual full-day meeting on children and the administration of justice. 2. The annual full-day meeting on children and the administration of justice took place on 8 March 2012, and was aimed at raising awareness about the situation faced by children in conflict and in contact with the law, reaffirming existing standards and commitments undertaken by States Members of the United Nations, and highlighting good practices and lessons learned from work undertaken by different actors, as well as identifying key challenges and recommending a way forward. The full-day meeting consisted of two panels: the morning panel, which focused on children in the judicial process, worrying trends and good practices, and the afternoon panel, which was devoted to the protection and realization of the rights of children deprived of liberty and children of incarcerated parents. 3. At the full-day meeting, a panellist who had been in conflict with the law as a juvenile shared his views about deprivation of liberty and suggested ways to help youth in conflict with the law. 4. The organization of the meeting was a joint effort by the Permanent Mission of Uruguay in Geneva (on behalf of the Group of Latin American and Caribbean Countries) and the Permanent Mission of Denmark (on behalf of the European Union), with the support of Austria, the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), the Interagency Panel on Juvenile Justice and a number of non-governmental organizations (NGOs), including the NGO Group for the Convention on the Rights of the Child and the Quaker United Nations Office. II. Children in the judicial process: worrying trends and best practices A. Introductory remarks and statements by panellists 5. The morning panel was moderated by the President of the Human Rights Council. The High Commissioner for Human Rights opened the panel, followed by presentations by Antonio Caparros Linares, a panellist who had been in conflict with the law as a juvenile; Susan Bissell, Chief of the Child Protection Section and Associate Director of the Programme Division at UNICEF in New York; Jorge Cardona Llorens, member of the Committee on the Rights of the Child and professor of public international law at the University of Valencia; Julia Sloth-Nielsen, Dean of the Faculty of Law at the University of Western Cape and member of the African Committee of Experts on the Rights and Welfare of the Child; Constance de La Vega, professor and Director of the Frank C. Newman International Human Rights Clinic at the University of San Francisco; and Renate Winter, judge at the Appeals Chamber of the Special Court for Sierra Leone. 6. In her opening statement, the High Commissioner for Human Rights said the theme of children and the administration of justice focused on the harsh reality of millions of children who were in conflict with the law. Their rights were often violated from the first contact they have with the justice system. She referred to articles 37 and 40 of the 3