Is there a latin american child migration law? An analysis of the ‘Advisory Opinion n. 21 on the rights of child migrants’ rendered by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights

Abstract

In 2014, in response to the request of the Southern Cone countries, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights issued an Advisory Opinion on the rights of migrant children in an attempt to emphasize the minimum guarantees that the countries of the region should grant to this category of migrant, especially considering their hypervulnerability when compared to adult migrants. Such request, made in the light of the growing migratory flow of unaccompanied minors in the Americas, has led the Court to point to a number of rights that should be particularly guaranteed, such as the right to seek and receive asylum, non-criminalization, non-detention, and non-return of minors, culminating in the design of what can be considered as a Latin-American Child Migration Law, being it why the present research is deemed relevant, as it emphasizes what would be the bases of this Law. For that matter, a descriptive and exploratory research was conducted, parting from an inductive method through a detailed study of the Advisory Opinion no. 21/14, and, thus, primarily using the documental technique, chosen qualitatively.