A/65/262 2. Twelfth Ibero-American Conference of Ministers and Authorities Responsible for Children 94. The Special Representative participated in the Twelfth Ibero-American Ministerial Meeting, held in June 2010 in Buenos Aires, and devoted to the role of education in the promotion of children’s social inclusion. Her address placed special attention on the impact of school violence on children’s safety and learning achievement, which is often aggravated by surrounding factors, including social unrest, availability of weapons and gang-related criminal activities. 95. Recognizing the importance of violence prevention, she called for steady investment in early childhood education to ensure the development of children’s talents and abilities to their full potential, to break the cycle of poverty and disadvantage for young people and to promote their social inclusion. Young children are indeed at particular risk of violence and they are also less able to resist and seek protection; fear and trauma compromise their development and threaten their sense of security and trust. Conversely, loving, secure and stimulating relationships of young children with their families and caregivers build a foundation for their physical, emotional and intellectual development and enhance their confidence and free agency. 96. Recalling the still frequent perception of violence as a needed form of discipline and the insufficient attention given to this phenomenon by laws, policies and school institutions, she placed a special emphasis on the adoption of legislation to firmly ban all violence in schools; the development of awareness-raising and capacity-building initiatives for professionals; the promotion of mediation and conflict resolution through non-violent means; as well as the promotion of participatory processes with the involvement of all stakeholders, including children themselves. 97. The Buenos Aires Declaration, adopted by the Ministerial Meeting, echoed some of those concerns, having specifically recommended the development of effective laws and policies for the protection of children from violence, in line with the recommendations of the United Nations study. Violence against children was equally identified as a priority concern to be included in the agenda of future ministerial meetings. 3. Regional meeting on the role of parliamentarians in preventing and eliminating violence against children 98. The National Assembly of Costa Rica, supported by the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) and UNICEF, in 2009 convened an important regional meeting on the role of parliamentarians in the prevention and elimination of violence against children. The meeting called upon national parliaments to promote the organization of a national debate to monitor and advance follow-up to the study’s recommendations, the adoption of law reform to explicitly ban all forms of violence against children, and the allocation of adequate resources in support of child-related public policies. 99. These key dimensions constitute a core agenda that the Special Representative is committed to pursuing across regions and in close collaboration with IPU and UNICEF. They provide a sound reference for her official meetings with national parliaments, as was the case in Peru and Turkey; and they informed her address to 10-47898 19