The Verkhovna Rada has ratified the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on a communications procedure, while introducing a restriction with regard to the occupied territories.

Therefore, Ukraine doesn't guarantee the fulfillment of its obligations under the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the territories uncontrolled by Kyiv.

Some 244 MPs voted in favor of the No. 0095 relevant bill at Rada's plenary session on Wednesday.

Ukraine signed the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on a communications procedure on November 20, 2014 in New York.

This protocol allows children and their representatives to bring individual complaints directly to the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child. These claims may concern violations of child’s rights foreseen by the corresponding Convention and its optional protocols by the state-signatory of the Protocol.

The following statement was made during the ratification of the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on a communications procedure: "Ukraine declares that for the period of the temporary occupation of Ukraine's territory, namely, the Crimean Autonomous Republic and Sevastopol, as a result of the Russian military aggression, and until the full restoration of the constitutional order and Ukraine's effective control over the occupied territory, including separate areas of Ukraine's Donetsk and Luhansk regions, application and/or fulfillment of Ukraine's obligations under the Optional Protocol to the Convention on the Rights of the Child on a communications procedure, with respect to the mentioned occupied and uncontrolled by Ukrainian authorities territories of Ukraine is limited and is not guaranteed."