Lumos & Hope and Homes for Children Joint Statement on the UN Human Rights Council’s Annual Day on the Rights of the Child

06.03.2026

Reunite and protect: Upholding the Rights of Children Deprived of Family Care in Armed Conflicts

Children deprived of family care face distinct and compounded risks in armed conflict. Entering crises with preexisting protection gaps, they face increased risk of violence, trafficking, exploitation, deprivation of liberty, and prolonged separation from families as supervision, services and oversight systems collapse. Children with disabilities, children from ethnic minority communities, and other populations who are disproportionately placed in institutions in many contexts, face particularly profound risks.

Institutions, already shown to harm children’s development and long-term outcomes, become especially dangerous in conflict. Monitoring breaks down, facilities may be attacked or repurposed, and children can be displaced without proper registration, family tracing, or best-interests determination procedures. Recent ongoing conflicts, including the war in Ukraine, demonstrate how children in institutions can be moved across
borders and incorrectly recorded as lacking family ties, increasing risks of disappearance, re-trafficking and longterm institutionalisation.

These risks extend across the full conflict cycle, from preparedness and emergency response to displacement and recovery. Without resilient child protection systems and sustained child care reform before crises occur, emergency responses will continue to fail the children most at risk.

We therefore urge UN Member States to:

1. Prevent family separation in situations of armed conflict by strengthening family support, social protection
   and child protection systems, including through continued childcare reform.
2. Ensure child institutionalisation is not used as a default emergency response, and prevent the construction,
   expansion or funding of institutions during crises, prioritising safe, appropriate family- and community-based
   care alternatives.
3. Guarantee child-centred responses, based on the best-interest of the child, including timely registration,
   child-level data collection, family tracing and reunification procedures, and robust safeguards in cross-border
   movements, with particular attention to the needs and rights of children with disabilities.
4. Strengthen coordination across humanitarian, development and peacebuilding efforts to ensure continuity
   of care and protection for children separated from or deprived of parental care.
5. Protect access to safe and inclusive education during conflict, displacement and reintegration as a critical
   safeguard against separation and unnecessary child institutionalisation.
6. Improve monitoring and accountability, including through continued analysis within UN reporting
   mechanisms on the impact of armed conflict on children deprived of parental care.
7. Align national and international action with global care reform initiatives, including the Global Charter on
   Children’s Care Reform, to strengthen families and end child institutionalisation.
8. Commit to child care reform and deinstitutionalisation before crises arise, investing in resilient, family- and
   community-based systems that remain operational during emergencies.

Lumos and Hope and Homes for Children stand ready to support Member States in advancing these measures.

Authors

Anouk Moser, Senior Policy and Advocacy Advisor, Lumos: [email protected]

Marie Raverdeau, Advocacy Advisor, Hope and Homes for Children: [email protected]

About Lumos

Lumos works to realise every child’s right to a family by transforming care systems around the world. Our vision is a world in which all children grow up in safe and loving families within supported communities.

Founded in 2005 by author J.K. Rowling, Lumos partners with governments, civil society and young people with lived experience to transform care systems globally and advocate for family-based solutions that help children thrive. We ensure that families receive the support they need to stay together or reunite, and that children grow up in family-based settings such as foster or kinship care, not institutions. Despite clear evidence of the harms of institutionalisation, an estimated 5.4 million children worldwide continue to live in institutions. And a much larger number of children are at risk of institutionalisation – those living in poverty, experiencing domestic violence and abuse, and living in countries affected by conflict.

Media Contacts

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