Preventing the impact of the devastating earthquakes on children’s family relations, including identity
In the context of the recent earthquakes that affected, in particular, Turkey and Syria, it is worth remembering that, beyond the devastating humanitarian impact that these have had on children and their families, their rights to identity and family relations have also been at risk.
Indeed, there have been early reports of children being cared for in hospitals, whose identity was unknown, due to the fact that they were too young to know their names and whose parents could not be found or had died. Given the homelessness and potential subsequent moves from one health facility to another, tracing relatives has proven complex. Thus, these children remain at risk of having significant gaps in their identity as they recover physically and grow, and of facing considerable obstacles in reintegrating their families – including with extended family members – without knowing their original family relations. In this context, efforts must continue to register all possible and available information about each of these children and to restore their identity and family relations to any extent possible.
Furthermore, in Syria – a country already suffering of years of conflict and a harsh humanitarian situation, the earthquakes affected many children and families having already been previously displaced from their places of origin, including also into Turkey. Many were living in temporary facilities and camps, in dire conditions and with little safeguards for their safety and rights. Thus, the earthquakes have entailed new displacements and homelessness, making it more difficult to ensure the recognition and portability of their identities, with additional risks of family separations of children and families on the move and potential statelessness.
In these situations, it is a key concern that efforts – in addition to ensuring the physical safety and basic needs of all affected – also address the risks of non-registration of births, of not having physical evidence of identity (certificates, IDs, passports) and of restoring missing elements of identity when these were or have become missing due to the earthquakes, including by safeguarding weakened fundamental infrastructure (health sector, civil registration and vital statistics system). Without the latter, children face an increased risk of permanent and unnecessary separation from their parents, being cared for in makeshift care facilities without any safeguards, of potentially becoming victims of trafficking, sale, exploitation and illegal adoptions, among others, and of not being able to access their rights, including to family relations and of benefitting of services in the future.
Child Identity Protection (CHIP) recalls the international safeguards in place to ensure that children can live with their families and benefit from connected identity, in particular Articles 7 and 8 of the Convention on the Rights of the Child, the UN Guidelines for the Alternative Care of Children, the 2022 Human Rights Council Resolution on the rights of the child and family reintegration and Convention No. 34 of the International Commission on Civil Status relating to civil status certificates. These should guide the ongoing work in these emergency situations.
See, e.g.: ‘Turkey earthquake: The children whose names have been erased’. BBC News. 10 February 2023; UNHCR (2023). Türkiye-Syria earthquake; UNICEF (6 February 2023). Thousands of children at risk after devastating earthquakes hit south-east Türkiye and Syria; World Vision (8 February 2023). Turkey-Syria earthquake: Children at risk of abuse as hundreds of thousands stranded; ‘Inside the effort to help hundreds of kids orphaned by earthquakes in Turkey and Syria’. CBC Radio. 23 February 2023.
