|© UNICEF/MLIA2009-00256/Giacomo Pirozzi| |An adolescent boy
behind bars in the detention centre for minors in the town of
Mopti, central Mali. UNICEF support partners to help children in
prison, while advocating that prisons should only be used as a
last resort.| Children encounter the justice system as victims,
witnesses, because they are in conflict with the law or as
parties to a justice process, such as in custody arrangements.
While detention should be used as a last resort and for the
shortest period of time, children suspected or accused of having
committed an offence are often detained. Children are also
detained for various reasons: because they were accompanying a
parent to detention or seeking asylum in another country; for
vagrancy, begging, missing school; for reasons such as after
being removed from an abusive home situation; or for reasons
such as race, religion, nationality, ethnicity or political
views. UNICEF estimates that more than one million children
worldwide are deprived of their libe