Parliamentarians promise to uphold child rights
Sri Lankan Parliamentarians, from all political parties, launched the country’s first ever Parliamentary Caucus for Children, a news release from the UNICEF said.
The launch was to mark the 25th anniversary celebrations of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), ratified by Sri Lanka in 1991.
The launch took place at an event in Parliament attended by a wide selection of Parliamentarians, Government officials, civil society members, the media and the diplomatic corps. In his keynote address, Speaker Chamal Rajapaksa said “the Parliamentary Caucus for Children will be the instrument at the highest level, to take the vision of the CRC forward to benefit the future generations of this country.”
Also speaking at the event Child Development and Women’s Affairs Minister Tissa Karaliyadda requested “all Parliamentarians of Sri Lanka, to join hands with me and pledge their commitment to strengthen the implementation of the CRC for our children.” This pledge of commitment, reaffirms that Members of Parliament will be guided by the CRC in the formulation of policies, budgets, laws and programmes of action for children, UNCEF said.
According to Rashitha Delapola, Director Training, National Youth Services Council of Sri Lanka, the MoU facilitates Chinese language teaching for Sri Lankan youth while providing Sinhala and Tamil language learning opportunities for Chinese students in return.
The MoU also promotes a mutually beneficial youth exchange programme whereby young persons from both countries will share their educational, social and cultural experiences, Mr. Delapola further said.
Chinese being an emerging language in the global arena, the National Youth Services Council has created an opportunity for Sri Lankan youth to explore this avenue. We consider it important for Sri Lankan youth who are the future entrepreneurs of the country to have language competency to make use of the opportunities that would be made available by this leading economic giant – China, he said.
The language teaching will be conducted through 48 regional centres of the National Youth Services Council islandwide, including the centres at Kilinochchi and Mullaitivu, making this one year study programme available to all those interested. On successful conclusion of the learning programme, a certificate will be issued to all participants.
Currently, the regional centres offer Japanese and Korean language learning courses with Chinese to be added.
The proposal to establish the MoU was put forth by Youth Affairs and Skills Development Minister Dullas Alahapperuma to the Dean of the Language Faculty of the Beijing Foreign Studies University in China during the Minister’s tour of China last year with a Sri Lankan youth delegation.
As a part of the exchange priogramme, a group of trained teachers from Sri Lanka will be sent to China to teach Sinhala and Tamil language to the Chinese students at the Beijing Foreign Studies University.