(d) The right to participation (Article 4(2) of the Charter). Non-discrimination of children 18. Article 3 of the African Children‟s Charter provides that “every child shall be entitled to the enjoyment of the rights and freedoms recognized and guaranteed in this Charter irrespective of the child‟s or his/ her parents‟ or legal guardians‟ race, ethnic group, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national and social origin, fortune, birth or other status.” The principle of non-discrimination is fundamentally rooted in a number of international human rights instruments. It is set out in Articles 2 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) and the International Covenant on Economic Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). Article 2(2) of the CRC obliges States Parties to ensure that no child is discriminated against on the basis of the actions of his or her parents. In this regard, a child „cannot be treated as a mere extension of his or her parents, umbilically destined to sink or swim with them […] the sins and traumas of fathers and mothers should not be visited on their children.‟5 19. Article 3 provides for the equal enjoyment of the rights and freedoms of the African Children‟s Charter to all children within the jurisdiction of States parties. In this context, the concept of discrimination encompasses any distinction, exclusion or preference.6 Children whose parents/ primary caregivers are involved with the criminal justice system have equal rights to all other children and these rights should not be affected because of the status of their parent. 20. In order to prevent discrimination, States Parties should put measures in place to provide children imprisoned with their parents/primary caregivers with the equivalent services that children who are not imprisoned would receive. Therefore, access to services such as education and health care cannot be restricted for children who are imprisoned with their parents/ primary caregivers just because they find themselves incarcerated since this would amount to a form of discrimination against such 5 per Justice Sachs in S v M (CCT 53/06) [2007] ZACC 18 (September 2007) at para 18. th Human Rights Committee, General Comment No. 3, 13 Session, 1981, available at http://www.unhchr.ch/tbs/doc.nsf/0/c95ed|e8ef|14cbec12563ed00467eb5?OpenDocument (accessed 1 October 2013). 6 9