10. The Committee encourages the State Party to provide technical and adequate budgetary support for the Human Rights Commission, particularly the Observatory of Children’s Rights in the National Human Rights Commission, and the Parliamentary Human Rights Committee and the Office of the Ombudsman. 11. With regard to availability of statistics and data, the Committee notes that there is no formal national system for the collection of statistics and data about the overall situation of children and realization of their respective rights. Accordingly, the Committee urges the State Party to provide technical and financial support to the MSWGCA to operationalize the Information Management System in order to collect and analyse updated disaggregated statistics on the implementation of rights of children in all sectors. B. Definition of a child 12. The Committee notes with appreciation the incorporation of the definition of the child, as a person below the age of 18, in the Child Rights Act, which is in line with the Charter. The Committee further commends the setting of the minimum ages of criminal responsibility at 14 years, minimum age for recruitment in the military at 18 years, minimum age for employment at 15 years and minimum age for hazardous work at 18 years. However the Committee notes with concern the contradiction between age of consent for marriage in the Child Rights Act and the Registration of Customary Marriages Act. The former puts the age of marriage at 18 years while the latter provides that a child below the age of 18 may lawfully get married on the condition that parental consent is given to this effect. This contradicts the definition of the Child under the Charter, as well as the obligation of Sierra Leone under article 21 of the Charter, which is to specify the minimum age of marriage to be 18 years and make registration of all marriages in an official registry compulsory. While the Committee appreciates the establishment of a committee that is tasked to ensure the harmonization of the definition of the child in all relevant laws, it urges the State Party to expedite the process of harmonization of the definition of the child, and specifically amend the registration of Customary Marriages Act and ensure that the minimum age for marriage is 18 years in all forms of marriage with no exception. C. General principles Non-discrimination 5